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Episode Air Date: April 16th, 2020

Transcript:

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<<Music: April Showers- ProleteR>>

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[00:00:20.400] - DS
Hey, I'm your host, Devon. And welcome to WildWay a podcast for those who are sustainable. Those who want to be and those who love to learn. On today's episode. We all need it.

<<water flushing>>We all use it <<water pouring>> and we all die without it <<water drop>>. I'm talking about water. But what I really want to get into is the management of water and how that can be sustainable.

I want to do something different for this episode. And instead of interviewing someone, we're going to do a case study of the Village of Lions Bay and show how individual actions can make a big difference in sustainable water management. Here in Canada, we're blessed with an abundance of fresh water. A lot of that water, however, is something called fossil water because it's ancient and stored in glaciers, underground aquifers and lakes. This makes it unavailable to 85 percent of Canadians (Climate Change Canada, 2018). What water is available to us, we consume wildly. Canadians are the number two largest consumers of water, the highest consumers. United States, although I should tell you that agriculture accounts for the majority of water consumption. Community water, however, is something that we can affect by making sure that the management of water resources is done sustainably. This management of water is undergoing a major paradigm shift. Recently, the integration of public attitudes, beliefs and collective behaviors is proving to add tremendous value and culture to framing (Pahl-Wostl, et al. 2007).

In a recent study on social learning, when communities increased general awareness of how their resources were being managed, they showed an increased resiliency to change (Pahl-Wostl, et al. 2007). OK, stay with me and let's get into psychology a bit so we understand why culture is a large part of social learning. It ultimately refers to the head of a collective mind and their perceptions, beliefs, norms and values. Really emphasizing the interrelationship between ideas and practices. The concepts and culture theories can be used to assess environmental management and the influence of cultural perspectives.

They also interpret different perspectives in water management. To put it in a nutshell, cultural framework provides meaning to the information and the basis of discourse for collective action (Clayton & Myers, 2017). Basically, the best way for a community to become resilient is to become more informed. One study has found that you can influence participation positively through individualism. This is because individuals have distinct social roles and belong to more than one social and cultural group. As the researcher puts it, the influence of national cultures seems to be stronger than the influence of technology (Clayton & Myers, 2017).

OK, so basically there is this universal need to accept a systematic understanding of environmental problems and changes both in beliefs and behavior systems. The shift in the way that we need to approach water management is the same as the shifts that are required for many other resources. And basically how we humans view them. Advancements in resource management depend on social learning and changing culture, and the transformations of that culture really need to be accompanied by changes in social structure. OK. I know I got a little wordy and I hope you stayed with me, but it's OK if you don't. Basically, it surmises down to change begins at the individual and it gradually filters into the management of our resources. Now, though, we know an integrated water resource management system includes you and me. Let's investigate how we can make our communities more sustainable.

So, I want to take you to a little place called Lions Bay.

<<ocean sounds>>

The village of Lions Bay is located in Howe Sound between Vancouver and Squamish, roughly. It's by the ocean and has mountain terrain. It's unique in Metro Vancouver because it owns and operates its own water supply, treatment and distribution system. The village only draws its water from surface water via Harvey Creek and Magnolia Creek. The town's water sources are affected by landslides, debris, torrent, high precipitation and seasonal water availability. That depends on snowpack because of Lions Bay Municipality owning and operating its own system.

The community is more able to effect and change current management practices. They can do this through awareness campaigns and education. But the flipside is that issues and bad management practices are sometimes able to go under the radar. In the last election, water services were a huge topic. Residents discover that there is an immense history of infrastructure, neglect and leakage as well as availability problems. I found out that the village is slowly working towards upgrading its old infrastructure by adding another storage tank and increasing leak prevention.

But the leak still remain at one hundred and sixty five litres per capita per day. I also found out another alarming fact. Before I share, I just want to remind you, you know, just in case you forgot that per capita per day means per person per day. So Metro Vancouver has an average of about four hundred and forty four litres per capita per day (Metro Vancouver, 2020). Any guesses what Lions Bay uses? It hovers at about a thousand litres per capita per day ( Lions Bay, 2020). And I got that from the village's website. I've been observing the levels everyday while making this episode and you can check it out too. www.lionsbay.ca. So this is crazy. This is basically double what Vancouver is, double. Why are residents using so much water? I mean, I know these big houses here and there's leaks here and there's some multi-generational homes. But seriously, double.

Lions Bay Public Works is really just into pressure management and actively control. They do this through continuous monitoring of pressure, reducing valves and consumption rates. But let's face it, they're not going to be able to solve this problem just by fixing leaks. This is something that's going to come down to the individual. British Columbia is experiencing a pattern of summer drought. In the summer of 2015, both Harvey and Magnolia Creeks had reduced flows and the village literally almost ran out of water.

A strict conservation effort by the residents prevented the shortage. One thing this shows is that when asked, the community can pull together and constrict their water usage, increase public awareness of excessive water use and expectation guidelines are the ways to assist behavior change. This includes limiting and turning off water when you brush your teeth, shortening shower time, decreasing the amount of water when taking baths, installing low flow showerheads and faucets, developing water recycling for greywater and rainwater, and maintaining supply in lake cisterns and storage tanks.

Sustainable urban drainage that minimizes downstream impacts on river flows is also a community wide effort that can easily be reached. These additions will increase the household resiliency for seasonal variation of water supply and really establish a neighborhood narrative of sustainable action and leadership.

Vancouver is globally recognized as being a sustainable city and Lions Bay has an opportunity to be a leader in rural water management. The actions made by residents here is going to be a large determinant and that's kind of good news because even in your own communities, your actions do have a really big impact. So make sure to do them. This podcast was produced by me, Devon. Consulting and editing by Janet Waters, presented to you by Capilano University. Special thanks to Tom Varga.

You can reach us on Instagram at WildWayPod or WildWaypodcast@gmail.com You can find our show notes on our website and please subscribe to our channel and invite your friends and thats the WildWay.

 

References:

Aderneck, E. (2016). Consideration of the Village of Lions Bay Regional Context Statement. Metro Vancouver. Retrieved from http://www.metrovancouver.org/services/regional-planning/RegionalContextStatements/LionsBayRCSAcceptancebyGVRDBoardApril29_2016-StaffReport.pdf

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British Columbia. (n.d.). iMapBC. Retrieved from https://maps.gov.bc.ca/ess/hm/imap4m/

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Chhetri, B. K., Galanis, E., Sobie, S., Brubacher, J., Balshaw, R., Otterstatter, M., … Takaro, T. K. (2019). Projected local rain events due to climate change and the impacts on waterborne diseases in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Environmental Health: A Global Access Science Source, (1).

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Cordilleran Geoscience. (2018). The Village of Lions Bay, Natural Hazards Development Permit Area Strategy: Costal, Creek and Hillslope Hazards. . Retrieved from https://www.lionsbay.ca/sites/2/files/docs/services/Planning/02_pierre_friele_-_lions_bay_dpa_final_v4maps.pdf

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Clayton & Myers. (2017). Conservation Psychology. 

 

File:GVRD - Lions Bay.svg. (2009). Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GVRD_-_Lions_Bay.svg

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Hawken, P. (2018). Drawdown: the most comprehensive plan ever proposed to roll back global warming. London: Penguin Books.

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Jakob, M. (2012). The fallout frequency: statistical techniques for debris-flow frequency-magnitude analysis. Banff ISL.  11th international symposium on Landslides.

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Metro Vancouver. Average day per capita water use. (2020). Retrieved from http://www.metrovancouver.org/dashboards/services/water/Pages/Average-day-per-capita-water-use.aspx

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Metro Vancouver Regional Development. (2011). Metro Vancouver Regional Growth Strategy Projections Population, Housing and Employment 2006 - 2041. Retrieved from http://www.metrovancouver.org/services/regional-planning/PlanningPublications/20110729RegionalGrowthStrategyProjections20062041_TH.pdf

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ProleteR. (2012). April showers. On Curses From the Past[mp3]. Free Music Archive: Dusted Wax Kingdom. 

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Stanghellini, P. (2010, October). Stakeholder involvement in water management: The role of ... Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/250140390_Stakeholder_involvement_in_water_management_The_role_of_the_stakeholder_analysis_within_participatory_processes

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Total Precipitation - Monthly data for Vancouver. (2020, March 28). Retrieved from https://vancouver.weatherstats.ca/charts/precipitation-monthly.html

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The Village of Lions Bay. (2018). Lions bay 2018 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report. Retrieved from https://www.lionsbay.ca/sites/2/files/docs/government/Reports/ADWQ/dwq_report_2018_rev.pdf

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The Village of Lions Bay. (2020). Retrieved from https://www.lionsbay.ca/services/public-works/water-consumption-graph

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The Village of Lions Bay. (n.d.). The Village of Lions Bay. Retrieved March 27, 2020, from https://www.lionsbay.ca/community/about-lions-bay/history

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UN. (2020). Water. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/water/

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Zipper, S. C., Jaramillo, F., Wang‐Erlandsson, L., Cornell, S. E., Gleeson, T., Porkka, M., … Gordon, L. (2020, February 13). Integrating the Water Planetary Boundary With Water Management From Local to Global Scales. Retrieved from https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019EF001377