Canada Escalating Logging and Prescribed Fire to Reduce Wildfire Risk to the Banff Townsite

Parks Canada is ramping up plans for logging and prescribed fire to reduce the risk of a catastrophic wildfire to the Banff townsite following decades of fire suppression in surrounding forests throughout the national park, the St. Albert Gazette reported (2-13-25).

Much of the work is already underway, with more in the coming year or two, which Parks Canada officials say is on top of 7,000 (17,300 acres) hectares of logging, thinning, and prescribed burns already completed over the past 10 years in Banff National Park and almost 15,000 hectares (37,100 acres) over the past 15-year period.

“We have a really busy program here; we are one of the programs that has done the most in the past 10 to 20 years,” said Jane Park, fire and vegetation management specialist for Banff National Park during a recent presentation to Banff town council. “We’re trying to mitigate risk from every angle.”

Recent unprecedented wildfire seasons in Canada, including the devastating wildfire that destroyed one-third of housing in the Jasper townsite last summer, have stoked the fears of residents of Banff, a community surrounded by dense forests.

As the climate changes, fire seasons are predicted to become longer, with wildfires becoming larger and burning more severely, and fire managers in many districts are looking at and reassessing how to best manage the increasing risk.