The trail is part of a broader plan to develop an interpretive centre that will highlight the history of Indigenous communities in traditional resource industries.
With a long history as a working harbour, and home to a booming resource industry, the Village of Sayward is positioning itself as a new experiential tourism hub for resource sector and cultural tourism.
The Working Waterfront Destination Gateway Trail connect points-of-interest such as the ‘Boom Ballet’ – an intricate dance of boom boats – and other historical assets along the harbour with wayfinding information and interpretive lookouts. The project allows visitors to experience Sayward in a modern-day context, highlighting the community’s commercial fisheries, forestry and coastal community life along with the rich settlers’ history of fishing and forestry, thousands of years of Indigenous cultural history, fertile ecology and natural environment. The new elements will also connect Sayward’s existing trails and other recreational amenities to the waterfront and to the town.
The trail is the first step toward a new experiential tourism destination drawing visitors into the region. Completed in 2019, the project is anticipated to serve as a catalyst to encourage the growth of existing accommodation, hospitality and retail businesses, as well as attract new business developments in the village adjacent to the trail.
Island Coastal Economic Trust approved funding for this project in 2020 through the Capital and Innovation program.
We work in reciprocal relationships with coastal communities across the ancestral territories of the Kwak̓wala, Nuučaan̓uɫ, Éy7á7juuthem, Ligwilda'xw, Pəntl'áč, She shashishalhem, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, Hul’q’umi’num’, diitiidʔaatx̣, SENĆOŦEN, Lekwungen, and T’Sou-ke speaking peoples.