Chamber of Commerce weighs in on canal fees

The Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce has registered its opposition to Parks Canada's proposal to charge locking and parking fees at the Sault Ste. Marie Canal National Historic Site.

"The Sault Ste. Marie Canal area is unique to any other canal site in Canada in that it is adjacent to four USA lock systems, which do not charge a lock fee to any vessel no matter how large or small," says Don Mitchell, who took over yesterday as Chamber president from departing Tracey Gard.

"This Chamber has been informed that if our Sault Ste. Marie Canal Site implements a fee for use, that both the Canadian and USA tour boat operators will discontinue use of the Canadian lock and will use the USA locks," Mitchell says in a letter sent today to federal Environment Minister David Anderson.

SooToday.com article from last night

The following is the full text of Mitchell's letter:

**************************** December 19, 2003

The Honourable David Anderson Minister of the Environment Les Terrasses de la Chaudiere 10 Wellington St., 28th Floor Hull, Quebec K1AOH3

Dear Honourable Anderson,

The Sault Ste. Marie Canal National Historic Site owned and operated by Parks Canada is proposing implementation of a sustainable revenue strategy, which will include user fees.

Revenues will be collected from parking fees as well as lockage fees.

The Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce is very aware that from January to September 2003, tourism from USA to Canada has dropped by 14 percent.

With this in mind, this Chamber would very much like to increase tourism in our area and not have anything occur that would decrease it further.

111,500 passengers go through the Canadian canal yearly. 110,000 with tour boats and 1.500 by pleasure craft.

The Sault Ste. Marie Canal area is unique to any other canal site in Canada in that it is adjacent to four USA lock systems, which do not charge a lock fee to any vessel no matter how large or small.

This Chamber has been informed that if our Sault Ste. Marie Canal Site implements a fee for use, that both the Canadian and USA tour boat operators will discontinue use of the Canadian lock and will use the USA locks.

If this occurs two things will happen which will decrease tourism from the USA at this border point.

Firstly:

The 100,000 USA passengers that now experience the Canadian canal will no longer be exposed to Canada and our history and will not be enticed to further their land trip into our "Naturally Gifted City."

Presently the USA tour operators give their passengers going through our canal a history of the area which results in having some of them coming into Canada.

Secondly:

There are currently 220,000 land visitors to the canal site of which the majority want to experience seeing vessels go through the lock area.

Unfortunately, if the tour operators discontinue their frequent usage of the Canadian canal as they said they would and go through the USA canals, there will be no vessels of this size or frequency going through the lock. Then, there is nothing to watch other than the odd small pleasure craft. Tourism will therefore decline for the whole site, primarily because of the introduction of a fee structure to all vessels going through the lock.

Not only will the canal usage drop but also the land usage.

The Chamber feels very strongly that the canal have no lockage fees or land fees for reasons we have mentioned.

Yours truly,

Don Mitchell President Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce

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