A Big White Ski Resort official is happy the Coquihalla is getting safety upgrades.
鈥淲e鈥檙e incredibly encouraged. This has needed to be done for a long time,鈥� said Michael Ballingall, senior vice-president of sales and marketing at Big White Ski Resort.
At the beginning of April, the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure announced it would be undertaking several improvements to make highways safer. These measures include stricter vehicle chain up requirements and fines, investing $1.8 million over the next three years for additional weather stations and road condition signs, enhanced road-maintenance contractor monitoring and auditing and extending winter tire and chain regulations on select highways.
Ballingall said regular road closures have affected the resort鈥檚 clientele and he believes enforcing existing laws should go some distance to remedying current issues.
鈥淣ow that we鈥檙e making the 18 -wheelers chain up, we鈥檙e going to make them abide by the law. This will make it a much easier highway to plow, to travel on. The most important thing in our world is to give travellers the confidence that the road is safe, and that鈥檚 the problem we鈥檙e experiencing now.鈥�
鈥淔or us, it鈥檚 been the biggest problem of the year鈥ancouver/the Lower Mainland is our biggest market, and we鈥檝e heard more caution, complaints, uncomfortable potential customers that said they鈥檙e not coming because of the conditions of the road and there鈥檚 been more cancellations this year because (people) couldn鈥檛 get through,鈥� said Ballingall.
According to the ministry, this winter saw 830 centimetres of total snowfall at the Coquihalla summit 鈥� 114 per cent higher than the 10-year average. While the Kootenay Pass had the highest-ever recorded snowfall of 1,012 centimetres from Oct. 1, 2017, to the end of February 2018 鈥� 148 per cent higher than the 10-year average.
It鈥檚 too late in the season to see how the highway changes will affect Big White, but 鈥渨e鈥檒l see what happens next year,鈥� he said.
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