Local conservation areas officially opened on Wednesday, but one of them opened with a catch.
Shade’s Mills Conservation Area was one of 11 GRCA parks that are now open.
Because of a January jet fuel spill on a nearby stretch of Highway 401, though, Shade’s Mills is advising against water play.
“That’s really out of an abundance of caution,” explains Cam Linwood with the GRCA. “We want to get all our reports from the Ministry of Environment before we make a full assessment and a full statement on the reservoir.”
The conservation area is still being assessed by the MOE. Its reservoir is fed by Mill Creek, which had 50,000 litres of jet fuel spill into it in January.
Cleanup efforts ran for months, with environmental assessors still determining whether it’s clean or not.
For that reason, the GRCA is advising against swimming, boating and fishing at Shade’s Mills, even though there appears to be no significant impact upstream or downstream.
Across the other 10 conservation areas, it’s business as usual.
