For some, it’ s a landmark. For others, it’ s an eyesore. For Lac La Biche County councillors, it’ s a topic of discussion. Demolishing Lac La Biche’ s unused water tower is one of the items for consideration in 2015 budget deliberations.
For some, it’ s a landmark. For others, it’ s an eyesore. For Lac La Biche County councillors, it’ s a topic of discussion.
Demolishing Lac La Biche’ s unused water tower is one of the items for consideration in 2015 budget deliberations. The nearly 50-year-old structure was supposed to have been demolished earlier, but a renewed interest in it and a locally driven campaign to keep it on the horizon have delayed its date with the wrecking ball.
The cost of deconstructing the tower, which at one point stored up to 200,000 gallons of municipal water, would be around $390,000.
The Town of Lac La Biche stopped using the tower more than a decade ago because of the high costs of keeping it functional. What to do with it now hasn’ t been decided yet.
Councillor Rick Olson says he’ s in favour of keeping it standing. For him, he says, the aged piece of infrastructure that dominates Lac La Biche’ s skyline has nostalgic appeal.
“It’ s the first thing I ever saw in Lac La Biche,” he said. “I like the tower, myself. It’ s a symbol.”
Today, the tower is located on private property, so an agreement would have to be reached between the County and the landowner before demolition could happen.
The municipality maintains access to the site, which creates a liability issue for the County, says utilities manager Gary Siebold. In the winter and spring, ice has been known to fall from the tower, so the County typically keeps the area cordoned off.
Councillor John Nowak says that because the tower is on someone else’ s property and it’ s out of commission anyway, the County might just have to accept facts and take it down.
Demolishing the tower was proposed for last year’ s municipal budget, but the project was deferred because other investments were more urgent.
This year again, the project isn’ t likely to be very high on anyone’ s list of priorities, Mayor Omer Moghrabi says.
“We’ re not just going to spend money on taking it down when we’ ve got so much else going on,” he said. “I don’ t think that’ s a priority for our County.”
Several commenters on the POST’ s Facebook page agree that the municipality should spend money elsewhere for now. Many say the water tower is the only real landmark left in the hamlet, so it should be preserved and repurposed.
Some are suggesting restoring it and painting it. The highest-rated comment proposed turning it into a lookout tower for scenic views of Lac la Biche Lake.
Giving the tower a new purpose is definitely an option, Moghrabi says, but for now he and the rest of Council are focusing on higher priorities.
“A lot of places have done things with their old water towers,” he said. “We’ ll come back to it when we have a game plan.”
Several years ago, a Lac La Biche POST article for April Fool’ s Day faked a story about the decommissioned tower being used for low-income, high-rise apartments. At the time, POST staffers responded to several calls from residents asking for more details.
Budget deliberations are still ongoing. Councillors have plodded through the list of potential capital projects and officially deferred some, but others need to be revisited before decisions are made.
“We’ re going to go back through it and prioritize,” Moghrabi said.
