This site was last modified on September 28, 2003 and is now being maintained at eachnewday.com
"Shelter Valley at Night" was excerpted in the following editorial that appeared in the August 27, 2003 edition of "The Independent;" a Brighton, Ontario, independent newspaper. At the time I wrote the poem the development was but a distant fear and I believe that I was trying only to portray the 401 causeway over the valley, and its guardrails, as a protection for the lights to pass safely over the black void of the valley at night. Even so, I don't believe that the the editor has taken my words too far out of context given the current situation to which he is referring. Personally, I was flattered that someone actually wanted to use my work. See what you think.
Feeling Unsheltered in Shelter Valley
A siege mentality may soon pervade the once peaceful Shelter Valley near Grafton.
Three separate projects, different in scope and intention, and in various stages of planning, ruffle the pages of municipal books, and the feathers of many dozens of people nesting in the valley. One is complete, and apparently temporary. Two business proposals are cutting their way through the red tape, possibly on their way to becoming permanent members of this small community.
Trans Canada Pipelines, under instructions from the Ontario government, installed five emergency electricity generators this summer on the company’s valley property. The installation was done quietly and quickly, and was up and running in time to provide power to consumers during the recent massive blackout. Depending on how the province resolves its power difficulties, the generators could be removed as early as December. Nevertheless, one more corner of Shelter Valley has been disturbed.
Two major proposals to extract groundwater and gravel from valley sites for up to 20 years have created a surge of energy among local citizens that rivals the power plant. Two weeks ago, CJC Bottling introduced new designs for its Vernonville project that include construction of a huge industrial facility on rural land. Company planners say that is needed to process more than one million litres of water, each and every day, if CJC receives government approval to proceed. Transports will haul millions of bottles of Shelter Valley water away, adding further disturbance to this pastoral vale.
Further north, Valley Voices decries a plan by Shelter Valley Aggregates to extract up to half-a-million tonnes of gravel annually, hauling it noisily across country now populated by people who cherish quiet rural landscapes. Violence came to the valley recently when opponents of the pit vandalized the property of a senior citizen who had optioned his land to the developers. A pit spokesman said publicly that Valley Voices was not to blame; but the damage itself has brought the valley to new lows.
Can anyone feel sheltered in Shelter Valley now?
Twenty years ago, Ajax poet and pastor Peter Rhebergen wrote about night traffic in the area of Shelter Valley, and the spreading invasion of development. Decades ahead of today’s troubles, the writer wrote prophetically:
“White reflections against a black abyss,
A foreboding mass that defies its name
...
Where once the sun shone bright,
That now resides in dreams.”