Mission, British Columbia
Encyclopedia
Mission, the core of which was formerly known as Mission City, is a district municipality
in the province
of British Columbia
, Canada
. It is situated on the north bank of the Fraser River overlooking the City of Abbotsford
and with that city is part of the Central Fraser Valley
. Mission is the 23rd largest municipality in British Columbia, with a population of 34,505 (2006). Mission was incorporated in 1892 and is 225.78 km2 in size. In 1922 the District of Mission was partitioned by the creation of the Village of Mission, which later became the Village of Mission City, then the Town of Mission City, until amalgamated with the District by plebiscite in 1969.
municipalities Mission is mostly forested upland with only small floodplains lining the shore of the Fraser River, with some benches of relatively poor-quality farmland rising in succession northwards above the core developed area of the town. What agricultural land there is in Mission was once the heart of the berry industry in the Fraser Valley, but that industry is now largely centred across the river in the neighbouring city of Abbotsford
.
The more southerly portion of the municipality is bounded on the west by the lower reaches of the Stave River
, which consists mostly of the lakewaters of two hydroelectric reservoirs, Stave Lake
and Hayward Lake
. Although the vast majority of the population of Mission lives well to the east of the Stave, over 50% of the northern land area of the municipality is west and north of that river; its extreme northwest corner is on the far side of upper Alouette Lake
. A small portion of the lower Stave still runs free in its last two miles before its confluence with the Fraser
at Ruskin
; its last three-quarters of a mile forms the border with the larger municipality of Maple Ridge
to the west.
Over 40% of Mission is actually tree farm, making it only one of two communities with municipal tree farm
s. (Revelstoke BC, with a much smaller and newer farm, is the second.) Mission's tree farm celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2008.
The eastern boundary of the municipality roughly coincides with the division between the Mission upland and the alluvial floodplain of Hatzic Prairie, which resembles much of the rest of the Fraser Valley Lowland. The unincorporated communities from Hatzic eastwards through Dewdney
and Nicomen Island
to Deroche
are part of the social and commercial matrix centred on Mission but have never joined the municipality, as is also the case with areas north of Hatzic and Dewdney such as McConnell Creek and Durieu
; the local economy and societies are built on dairy, berry and corn farming as well as a large First Nations
community at Lakalhamen on Nicomen Island
.
on June 19, 1893. It was the first Board of Trade
in B.C." Some of the early houses and commercial buildings were, in fact, specifically designed to be reminiscent of small towns in southern Ontario in order to encourage buyers. Hailed at the time as a new metropolis, the fledgling town's location at the junction of the Canadian Pacific Railway
mainline with a northward extension of the Burlington Northern Railroad
brought name suggestions that included East Vancouver and North Seattle. The name Mission City was chosen due to the site's proximity to the historic St. Mary's Mission of the Oblate
order just east of town, which was founded in 1868 (now the Peckquaylis Indian Reserve).
At the time of founding, the swing-span Mission Railway Bridge
opened in 1891 was the only crossing of the Fraser River in the Fraser Valley below the Alexandra Bridge
, and all rail traffic between Vancouver and the United States was necessarily routed through Mission until the New Westminster Bridge at New Westminster was built in 1904. The rail bridge at Mission doubled duty as a one-way alternating vehicular bridge until 1973, when a long-promised new Mission Bridge
was finally completed. The bridge's location is geographically important at the head of the tidal bore on the Fraser River, and its water level gauge is an important measure of the Fraser's annual and sometimes dangerously large spring freshet.
Mission City's original retail core was in the small area of lowland between the CPR mainline and the river. Following the great flood of 1894 a few years after the town's founding, the core was relocated just north of the rail line at the foot of the hillside rising above the rail junction. This small commercial strip, originally named Washington Avenue, later Main Street and since the 1980s called First Avenue, is only four or five blocks long and was one of the principal commercial centres of the Fraser Valley for many decades and had a lively retail trade and social life. Following the 1894 flood, abandoned buildings and lots in the old downtown were taken over by Chinese merchants and workers, creating a Chinatown which lasted until the 1920s.
The western part of the district, the Stave Valley, is largely rural and forested but its watercourse is home to what was the largest hydroelectric project in British Columbia until the Bridge River Power Project
opened in 1961. It was built by the British Columbia Electric Railway
(BCER) to provide power to the electric street railway and interurban system in Vancouver. The Stave Falls Power Co. operated a light-gauge railway for passenger and freight service up the lower canyon of the river to the dam
at Stave Falls. During the construction of the Ruskin Dam
(completed 1931) the railway was rebuilt at a higher elevation so as to skirt the new Hayward Lake reservoir. The rail line has long been discontinued, but the old grade and its trestles are now part of a recreation trail circling the reservoir.
Flanking the outraces of the powerhouse at Stave Falls there was once a fairly large community (300 houses), which was served by the railway via connections to the CPR
line at Ruskin
, although the (then very rough) Dewdney Trunk Road used the dam to cross the Stave River
. Population in the Stave Falls area is now away from the dams, west along the Dewdney Trunk towards Maple Ridge, in a rural farm-and-wilderness area south of Rolley Lake Provincial Park
.
Up against the Maple Ridge boundary near the waterfront on the west side of the Stave, and halfway between the dam and the mills at Ruskin, was a large drive-in theatre for many years. It is now a large trailer park, and the most populated of Ruskin's neighbourhoods.
The building of the Highway 1 freeway on the south side of the Fraser in the early 1960s brought huge population growth and large shopping malls to formerly rural Abbotsford, Matsqui, Sumas and Langley; as a result Mission lost its "anchor", the main Eaton's department store in the Valley, and the town's Main Street businesses lost much of their business to the new shopping malls a few minutes away across the river. This process was accelerated with the opening of the new bridge in the mid-1970s.
Despite a cohesive business community and new retail malls on the edges of the old core, Mission's retail community has never regained its former prominence in the Fraser Valley
. Burgeoning "exurban
" population growth connected with the rapid growth of the population of the Lower Mainland
and encouraged by a new commuter rail line direct to downtown Vancouver, the West Coast Express
, has reversed this trend.
Outside of the core "urban" area, most of which had been the Town of Mission City, the former District of Mission was a collection of distinct rural communities, each with their own history and sometimes distinct ethnic flavour. Silverdale, 7 kilometres west of Mission on the east bank of the lower Stave River, was homesteaded in the 1880s by Italian immigrants (including the Gagliardi family); their descendents reside there to this day. Neighbouring Silverhill was founded by a Finnish Utopian sect who were superseded by Scandinavian and German settlers following a forest fire that virtually wiped out the Finns.
Steelhead, in the northern part of the district, was originally a weekend retreat for some of Vancouver's press community. Other localities such as Ferndale, Cedar Valley and Hatzic were farming communities of mixed origin, with Europeans and anglicized French-Canadians alongside the usual British-Scottish Canadian mix typical of much of the Fraser Valley. Throughout the Mission area before World War II
, there was a large Japanese-Canadian population involved in berry farming, logging and milling and in the fishery on the river.
In 1954, Benedictine
monk
s obtained land near Mission, where they set up their Westminster Abbey
and Seminary of Christ the King. They have lived there ever since, running their own farm and teaching high school and college men at the seminary.
The berry industry, formerly the district's largest and most important, formed the heart of the town's annual summer party, the Strawberry Festival. The Strawberry Festival began in 1946, when it was suggested by the Board of Trade. But with the impacts on this industry (relocation
of the Japanese during wartime and the devastating flood of 1948), the strawberry theme was abandoned. The town acquired the rights to the Western Canada championships of the Soap Box Derby
, which were held annually in a specially built facility until 1973; the Derby has been revived in the new millennium.
Mission's other major industry was logging, and the town's several mills were noted for being the world's largest suppliers of red cedar shake
s and shingles. The District of Mission has operated for many years its own tree farm
, covering most of its northern and northwestern mountainous forests. This tree farm served as a model for silvicultural management on a larger scale throughout British Columbia as well as provided a unique income source for the municipality. From 1967 through the 1970s the Soap Box Derby shared Dominion Day
with a large Loggers Sports event, one of the largest in British Columbia and important on the North American Loggers Sports Association circuit.
In the 1960s and 1970s there was a large cluster of productive mills on the waterfront in Mission, for many years world capital of red cedar shake production (the mill at Whonnock outproduced the largest of the Mission mills, but Mission's city of mills was the largest overall producer). Nearby Eddy Match Co., between Mission and Hatzic, was the largest matchstick-making plant in the world until it closed in the 1960s; its only rival was in Hull, Quebec
.
Adjoining it was the Empress Foods Co. cannery, the survivor of the struggles of the berry industry in the Central Fraser Valley, and dating from the days of Mission's supremacy as strawberry capital of the valley before the 1948 Fraser River
flood wiped it out. In more recent times one of these buildings was for a while converted into the province's largest marijuana
grow-op, in a scandal involving one of the town's wealthiest families (who shall remain nameless here) and which at the time was the largest busted grow-op on record.
Mission is noted as the home of a long-established professional dragstrip, Mission Raceway Park
, which was moved in relatively recent times outside the dyking of the lower part of town to reduce noise in residential and commercial areas nearby.
In 1972 a large tract of land in central Mission's Ferndale area, flat upland at the top of the slope above downtown, was acquired by the federal government and developed into two large penal facilities. One is a minimum
security facility, and the other is a medium security
prison. The northern part of the district, and the wilds of the Stave River basin to the north of it, are home to a few wilderness work camps for young offenders and low-risk convicts; these camps have over recent decades participated in the ongoing clearing of vast forests of flooded-out trees from the inundated areas of Stave Lake
, opening the lake to water recreation and public exploration.
, hydroelectricity and agriculture are Mission's chief resource sectors and provide the basis for varied related retail and service activities. Over the past few years, transportation improvements have enabled the manufacturing sector to expand beyond sawmilling and food processing.
Forest and wood related industries dominate the manufacturing sector, with an emphasis on redcedar shake and shingle mills. Mission also holds the only municipal tree farm license in British Columbia.
Agriculture
is mostly restricted to a narrow belt along the Fraser River, and the unincorporated Dewdney-Deroche district east of Mission contains the majority of the farms in the area. There are about 96 commercial and hobby farms in the area. Dairy is the chief agricultural enterprise; other income sources include poultry, hogs, beef and vegetables.
Mission's largest employer is the local school district, School District #75, and its second largest employer is the District (i.e. the municipality) itself.
Tax
Mission is also known to charge one of the highest land tax in all of Canada. This has attributed to a large influx of funds for City officials to squander.
) that connects the District of Mission with the City of Abbotsford
. The Valley Connector bus is operated by BC Transit, the City of Abbotsford and the District of Mission. Transportation infrastructure includes Abbotsford-Mission Highway 11, and the Lougheed Highway 7. Mission is also accessible through commuter rail, the West Coast Express
, which runs five trains a day, five days a week, between Vancouver
and Mission City Station.
Three days per week Via Rail
's The Canadian
provides eastbound flag stop service from Mission Harbour railway station
.
Mission differs from some of the other Fraser Valley Communities because of its access to the Fraser River. The Fraser near Mission is for the most part undeveloped and unspoiled which makes Mission the perfect launch point for the water based activities that happen there year round. Soft adventure jet boat eco tours run from Mission as well as some of the best salmon or sturgeon fishing expeditions in North America. The Mission Waterfront is also at the early stages of development.
. Past Mayor Abe Neufeld has retired from local politics.
Mission's largest religious denomination is Protestant, followed by Catholic
and no-denomination-declared other Christians, totalling 55.1%. The next largest religious group is Sikh
, comprising 5.1% of the population.
The largest group is Caucasian
, comprising approximately 97.6% of the population, but even within that Mission's ethnic makeup is very complex, with large numbers of Germans and Dutch, but also Finns, Norwegians and other Scandinavians, Italians, Hungarians, Poles, anglicized French-Canadians and others. The largest visible minority group in Mission are South Asians, primarily Indo-Canadians comprising 5.1% of the population. There is a sizeable First Nations component, and at the Peckquaylis Indian Reserve, which is the former St. Mary's Residential School and its grounds, is a centre for services and governments of the Sto:lo
communities in the area to the east.
and Agassiz
-Kent
. These communities include:
District municipality
A district municipality is a designation for a class of municipalities found in several locations, including Canada, Lithuania, and South Africa.-Usage in British Columbia:...
in the province
Provinces and territories of Canada
The provinces and territories of Canada combine to make up the world's second-largest country by area. There are ten provinces and three territories...
of British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. It is situated on the north bank of the Fraser River overlooking the City of Abbotsford
Abbotsford, British Columbia
Abbotsford is a Canadian city located in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, adjacent to Greater Vancouver. It is the fifth largest municipality in British Columbia, home to 123,864 people . Its Census Metropolitan Area, which includes the District of Mission, is the 23rd largest in Canada,...
and with that city is part of the Central Fraser Valley
Fraser Valley
The Fraser Valley is the section of the Fraser River basin in southwestern British Columbia downstream of the Fraser Canyon. The term is sometimes used to refer to the Fraser Canyon and stretches upstream from there, but in general British Columbian usage of the term refers to the stretch of the...
. Mission is the 23rd largest municipality in British Columbia, with a population of 34,505 (2006). Mission was incorporated in 1892 and is 225.78 km2 in size. In 1922 the District of Mission was partitioned by the creation of the Village of Mission, which later became the Village of Mission City, then the Town of Mission City, until amalgamated with the District by plebiscite in 1969.
Geography
Unlike the other Fraser ValleyFraser Valley
The Fraser Valley is the section of the Fraser River basin in southwestern British Columbia downstream of the Fraser Canyon. The term is sometimes used to refer to the Fraser Canyon and stretches upstream from there, but in general British Columbian usage of the term refers to the stretch of the...
municipalities Mission is mostly forested upland with only small floodplains lining the shore of the Fraser River, with some benches of relatively poor-quality farmland rising in succession northwards above the core developed area of the town. What agricultural land there is in Mission was once the heart of the berry industry in the Fraser Valley, but that industry is now largely centred across the river in the neighbouring city of Abbotsford
Abbotsford, British Columbia
Abbotsford is a Canadian city located in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, adjacent to Greater Vancouver. It is the fifth largest municipality in British Columbia, home to 123,864 people . Its Census Metropolitan Area, which includes the District of Mission, is the 23rd largest in Canada,...
.
The more southerly portion of the municipality is bounded on the west by the lower reaches of the Stave River
Stave River
The Stave River is a tributary of the Fraser, joining it at the boundary between the municipalities of Maple Ridge and Mission, about 35 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, in the Central Fraser Valley region....
, which consists mostly of the lakewaters of two hydroelectric reservoirs, Stave Lake
Stave Lake
Stave Lake is a hydroelectric reservoir in the Stave River system, located on the northern edge of the District of Mission, about 65 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia. The main arm of the lake is just over 20 km long, and there is a southwest arm ending at Stave Falls Dam about...
and Hayward Lake
Hayward Lake
Hayward Lake is a lake and reservoir on the Stave River in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada. Located in the District of Mission about 60 km east of Vancouver, Hayward Lake is formed by Ruskin Dam, which lies about 3 km upstream from the Stave River's confluence with the...
. Although the vast majority of the population of Mission lives well to the east of the Stave, over 50% of the northern land area of the municipality is west and north of that river; its extreme northwest corner is on the far side of upper Alouette Lake
Alouette Lake
Alouette Lake, originally Lillooet Lake and not to be confused with the lake of that name farther north, is a lake and reservoir in Maple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada. It is located at the southeast foot of the mountain group known as the Golden Ears and is about 8 km in length on a...
. A small portion of the lower Stave still runs free in its last two miles before its confluence with the Fraser
Fraser River
The Fraser River is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Mount Robson in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the Strait of Georgia at the city of Vancouver. It is the tenth longest river in Canada...
at Ruskin
Ruskin
- Surname :*John Ruskin , an English author, poet and artist, most famous for his work as art critic and social critic, and for his writing on the architecture of Venice....
; its last three-quarters of a mile forms the border with the larger municipality of Maple Ridge
Maple Ridge, British Columbia
Maple Ridge is a District Municipality in British Columbia, located in the northeastern section of Metro Vancouver. Maple Ridge has a population of approximately 68,949.-History:...
to the west.
Over 40% of Mission is actually tree farm, making it only one of two communities with municipal tree farm
Tree farm
A tree farm is a privately owned forest managed for timber production. The term tree farm is also used to refer to plantations and to tree nurseries.-American Tree Farm System:...
s. (Revelstoke BC, with a much smaller and newer farm, is the second.) Mission's tree farm celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2008.
The eastern boundary of the municipality roughly coincides with the division between the Mission upland and the alluvial floodplain of Hatzic Prairie, which resembles much of the rest of the Fraser Valley Lowland. The unincorporated communities from Hatzic eastwards through Dewdney
Dewdney, British Columbia
Dewdney is an unincorporated community in the Central Fraser Valley of British Columbia, Canada, about 15 km east of the town of Mission. It was incorporated as a district municipality in 1893 but has since become unincorporated and is now represented as part of Electoral Area 'G' in the...
and Nicomen Island
Nicomen Island
Nicomen Island is an island in the Fraser River east of Mission and between Deroche and Dewdney . Located on the river's north side, and separated from the foot of the Douglas Ranges by Nicomen Slough, the island is near-totally given over to agriculture and constitutes a rural community in its...
to Deroche
Deroche, British Columbia
Deroche is a farming and railway community on the Canadian Pacific Railway and BC Highway 7 located approximately 110 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Deroche is adjacent to the eastern end of Nicomen Island, from which it is separated by the Nicomen Slough...
are part of the social and commercial matrix centred on Mission but have never joined the municipality, as is also the case with areas north of Hatzic and Dewdney such as McConnell Creek and Durieu
Durieu, British Columbia
Durieu is a farming community, located on Hatzic Prairie northeast of Mission, British Columbia, Canada in the Fraser Valley region of that province's Lower Mainland. Also known locally as Hatzic Prairie, it has few services other than a store, feed co-op, school and community hall.The community...
; the local economy and societies are built on dairy, berry and corn farming as well as a large First Nations
First Nations
First Nations is a term that collectively refers to various Aboriginal peoples in Canada who are neither Inuit nor Métis. There are currently over 630 recognised First Nations governments or bands spread across Canada, roughly half of which are in the provinces of Ontario and British Columbia. The...
community at Lakalhamen on Nicomen Island
Nicomen Island
Nicomen Island is an island in the Fraser River east of Mission and between Deroche and Dewdney . Located on the river's north side, and separated from the foot of the Douglas Ranges by Nicomen Slough, the island is near-totally given over to agriculture and constitutes a rural community in its...
.
History
The Town of Mission City had an interesting beginning as a land promotion. The town's core commercial properties and residential streets were auctioned off at the "Great Land Sale" of 1891, with buyers brought in via the CPR mainline from Vancouver as well as from Eastern Canada. Soon afterwards, Harry Brown French, an American from New York, came to the city and founded the Mission Regional Chamber of CommerceMission Regional Chamber of Commerce
The Mission Regional Chamber of Commerce is a Canadian non-profit organization that acts as an advocate for economic development in the region and promotes area tourism to visitors and locals...
on June 19, 1893. It was the first Board of Trade
Board of Trade
The Board of Trade is a committee of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, originating as a committee of inquiry in the 17th century and evolving gradually into a government department with a diverse range of functions...
in B.C." Some of the early houses and commercial buildings were, in fact, specifically designed to be reminiscent of small towns in southern Ontario in order to encourage buyers. Hailed at the time as a new metropolis, the fledgling town's location at the junction of the Canadian Pacific Railway
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
mainline with a northward extension of the Burlington Northern Railroad
Burlington Northern Railroad
The Burlington Northern Railroad was a United States-based railroad company formed from a merger of four major U.S. railroads. Burlington Northern operated between 1970 and 1996....
brought name suggestions that included East Vancouver and North Seattle. The name Mission City was chosen due to the site's proximity to the historic St. Mary's Mission of the Oblate
Oblate (religion)
An oblate in Christian monasticism is a person who is specifically dedicated to God or to God's service. Currently, oblate has two meanings:...
order just east of town, which was founded in 1868 (now the Peckquaylis Indian Reserve).
At the time of founding, the swing-span Mission Railway Bridge
Mission Railway Bridge
The Mission Railway Bridge is a Canadian railway bridge spanning the Fraser River at Mission, British Columbia.Replacing an earlier bridge built in 1891, which was the first and only bridge crossing of the Fraser below Siska in the Fraser Canyon until the construction of the New Westminster rail...
opened in 1891 was the only crossing of the Fraser River in the Fraser Valley below the Alexandra Bridge
Alexandra Bridge
The Royal Alexandra Interprovincial Bridge is a steel truss cantilever bridge spanning the Ottawa River between Ottawa, Ontario and Gatineau, Quebec. It is known locally as both the "Alexandra Bridge" and the "Interprovincial Bridge".-History:...
, and all rail traffic between Vancouver and the United States was necessarily routed through Mission until the New Westminster Bridge at New Westminster was built in 1904. The rail bridge at Mission doubled duty as a one-way alternating vehicular bridge until 1973, when a long-promised new Mission Bridge
Mission Bridge
The Mission Bridge is a steel girder bridge linking the District Of Mission to the City of Abbotsford, British Columbia. The bridge is measured at long and is the only direct road link between the two.-History:...
was finally completed. The bridge's location is geographically important at the head of the tidal bore on the Fraser River, and its water level gauge is an important measure of the Fraser's annual and sometimes dangerously large spring freshet.
Mission City's original retail core was in the small area of lowland between the CPR mainline and the river. Following the great flood of 1894 a few years after the town's founding, the core was relocated just north of the rail line at the foot of the hillside rising above the rail junction. This small commercial strip, originally named Washington Avenue, later Main Street and since the 1980s called First Avenue, is only four or five blocks long and was one of the principal commercial centres of the Fraser Valley for many decades and had a lively retail trade and social life. Following the 1894 flood, abandoned buildings and lots in the old downtown were taken over by Chinese merchants and workers, creating a Chinatown which lasted until the 1920s.
The western part of the district, the Stave Valley, is largely rural and forested but its watercourse is home to what was the largest hydroelectric project in British Columbia until the Bridge River Power Project
Bridge River Power Project
The Bridge River Power Project is a hydroelectric power development in the Canadian province of British Columbia, located in the Lillooet Country between Whistler and Lillooet...
opened in 1961. It was built by the British Columbia Electric Railway
British Columbia Electric Railway
The British Columbia Electric Railway was a historic Canadian railway which operated in southwestern British Columbia.Originally the parent company, and later a division, of BC Electric, the BCER operated public transportation in southwestern British Columbia from its establishment in the...
(BCER) to provide power to the electric street railway and interurban system in Vancouver. The Stave Falls Power Co. operated a light-gauge railway for passenger and freight service up the lower canyon of the river to the dam
Stave Falls Dam
Stave Falls Dam is a dual-dam power complex on the Stave River in Stave Falls, British Columbia, Canada . The dam was completed in 1912 for the primary purpose of hydroelectric power production. To increase the capacity of Stave Lake, the dam was raised in 1925 and the Blind Slough Dam constructed...
at Stave Falls. During the construction of the Ruskin Dam
Ruskin Dam
Ruskin Dam is a concrete gravity dam on the Stave River in Ruskin, British Columbia, Canada. The dam was completed in 1930 for the primary purpose of hydroelectric power generation...
(completed 1931) the railway was rebuilt at a higher elevation so as to skirt the new Hayward Lake reservoir. The rail line has long been discontinued, but the old grade and its trestles are now part of a recreation trail circling the reservoir.
Flanking the outraces of the powerhouse at Stave Falls there was once a fairly large community (300 houses), which was served by the railway via connections to the CPR
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
line at Ruskin
Ruskin, British Columbia
Ruskin is a rural and industrial area about 40 kilometres east of Vancouver, British Columbia straddling the border between the suburban municipalities of Maple Ridge and Mission, on the west bank of the lower Stave River.-History:...
, although the (then very rough) Dewdney Trunk Road used the dam to cross the Stave River
Stave River
The Stave River is a tributary of the Fraser, joining it at the boundary between the municipalities of Maple Ridge and Mission, about 35 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, in the Central Fraser Valley region....
. Population in the Stave Falls area is now away from the dams, west along the Dewdney Trunk towards Maple Ridge, in a rural farm-and-wilderness area south of Rolley Lake Provincial Park
Rolley Lake Provincial Park
Rolley Lake Provincial Park is a provincial park in British Columbia, Canada. It is located on Rolley Lake in the Stave Falls area of Mission, British Columbia....
.
Up against the Maple Ridge boundary near the waterfront on the west side of the Stave, and halfway between the dam and the mills at Ruskin, was a large drive-in theatre for many years. It is now a large trailer park, and the most populated of Ruskin's neighbourhoods.
The building of the Highway 1 freeway on the south side of the Fraser in the early 1960s brought huge population growth and large shopping malls to formerly rural Abbotsford, Matsqui, Sumas and Langley; as a result Mission lost its "anchor", the main Eaton's department store in the Valley, and the town's Main Street businesses lost much of their business to the new shopping malls a few minutes away across the river. This process was accelerated with the opening of the new bridge in the mid-1970s.
Despite a cohesive business community and new retail malls on the edges of the old core, Mission's retail community has never regained its former prominence in the Fraser Valley
Fraser Valley
The Fraser Valley is the section of the Fraser River basin in southwestern British Columbia downstream of the Fraser Canyon. The term is sometimes used to refer to the Fraser Canyon and stretches upstream from there, but in general British Columbian usage of the term refers to the stretch of the...
. Burgeoning "exurban
Commuter town
A commuter town is an urban community that is primarily residential, from which most of the workforce commutes out to earn their livelihood. Many commuter towns act as suburbs of a nearby metropolis that workers travel to daily, and many suburbs are commuter towns...
" population growth connected with the rapid growth of the population of the Lower Mainland
Lower Mainland
The Lower Mainland is a name commonly applied to the region surrounding and including Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. As of 2007, 2,524,113 people live in the region; sixteen of the province's thirty most populous municipalities are located there.While the term Lower Mainland has been...
and encouraged by a new commuter rail line direct to downtown Vancouver, the West Coast Express
West Coast Express
West Coast Express is the interregional commuter railway in British Columbia, Canada. Opened in 1995, it links Mission, Maple Ridge, Pitt Meadows, Port Coquitlam, Coquitlam, and Port Moody with Waterfront Station in Downtown Vancouver, where it interchanges with SkyTrain rapid transit, SeaBus and...
, has reversed this trend.
Outside of the core "urban" area, most of which had been the Town of Mission City, the former District of Mission was a collection of distinct rural communities, each with their own history and sometimes distinct ethnic flavour. Silverdale, 7 kilometres west of Mission on the east bank of the lower Stave River, was homesteaded in the 1880s by Italian immigrants (including the Gagliardi family); their descendents reside there to this day. Neighbouring Silverhill was founded by a Finnish Utopian sect who were superseded by Scandinavian and German settlers following a forest fire that virtually wiped out the Finns.
Steelhead, in the northern part of the district, was originally a weekend retreat for some of Vancouver's press community. Other localities such as Ferndale, Cedar Valley and Hatzic were farming communities of mixed origin, with Europeans and anglicized French-Canadians alongside the usual British-Scottish Canadian mix typical of much of the Fraser Valley. Throughout the Mission area before World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, there was a large Japanese-Canadian population involved in berry farming, logging and milling and in the fishery on the river.
In 1954, Benedictine
Benedictine
Benedictine refers to the spirituality and consecrated life in accordance with the Rule of St Benedict, written by Benedict of Nursia in the sixth century for the cenobitic communities he founded in central Italy. The most notable of these is Monte Cassino, the first monastery founded by Benedict...
monk
Monk
A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of monks, while always maintaining some degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose...
s obtained land near Mission, where they set up their Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey (British Columbia)
Westminster Abbey is a community of Benedictine monks in Mission, British Columbia, established in 1939 from the Abbey of Mount Angel, Oregon...
and Seminary of Christ the King. They have lived there ever since, running their own farm and teaching high school and college men at the seminary.
The berry industry, formerly the district's largest and most important, formed the heart of the town's annual summer party, the Strawberry Festival. The Strawberry Festival began in 1946, when it was suggested by the Board of Trade. But with the impacts on this industry (relocation
Japanese Canadian internment
Japanese Canadian internment refers to confinement of Japanese Canadians in British Columbia during World War II. The internment began in December 1941, following the attack by carrier-borne forces of Imperial Japan on American naval and army facilities at Pearl Harbor...
of the Japanese during wartime and the devastating flood of 1948), the strawberry theme was abandoned. The town acquired the rights to the Western Canada championships of the Soap Box Derby
Soap Box Derby
The Soap Box Derby is a youth soapbox car racing program which has been run in the United States since 1934. World Championship finals are held each July at Derby Downs in Akron, Ohio...
, which were held annually in a specially built facility until 1973; the Derby has been revived in the new millennium.
Mission's other major industry was logging, and the town's several mills were noted for being the world's largest suppliers of red cedar shake
Shake (shingle)
A shake is a basic wooden shingle that is made from split logs. Shakes have traditionally been used for roofing and siding applications around the world. Higher grade shakes are typically used for roofing purposes, while the lower grades are used for siding purposes...
s and shingles. The District of Mission has operated for many years its own tree farm
Tree farm
A tree farm is a privately owned forest managed for timber production. The term tree farm is also used to refer to plantations and to tree nurseries.-American Tree Farm System:...
, covering most of its northern and northwestern mountainous forests. This tree farm served as a model for silvicultural management on a larger scale throughout British Columbia as well as provided a unique income source for the municipality. From 1967 through the 1970s the Soap Box Derby shared Dominion Day
Dominion Day
Dominion Day is a commemoration day of the granting of national status in various Commonwealth countries.-Canada:Dominion Day was the name of the holiday commemorating the formation of Canada as a Dominion on 1 July 1867...
with a large Loggers Sports event, one of the largest in British Columbia and important on the North American Loggers Sports Association circuit.
In the 1960s and 1970s there was a large cluster of productive mills on the waterfront in Mission, for many years world capital of red cedar shake production (the mill at Whonnock outproduced the largest of the Mission mills, but Mission's city of mills was the largest overall producer). Nearby Eddy Match Co., between Mission and Hatzic, was the largest matchstick-making plant in the world until it closed in the 1960s; its only rival was in Hull, Quebec
Hull, Quebec
Hull is the central and oldest part of the city of Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. It is located on the west bank of the Gatineau River and the north shore of the Ottawa River, directly opposite Ottawa. As part of the Canadian National Capital Region, it contains offices for twenty thousand...
.
Adjoining it was the Empress Foods Co. cannery, the survivor of the struggles of the berry industry in the Central Fraser Valley, and dating from the days of Mission's supremacy as strawberry capital of the valley before the 1948 Fraser River
Fraser River
The Fraser River is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Mount Robson in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the Strait of Georgia at the city of Vancouver. It is the tenth longest river in Canada...
flood wiped it out. In more recent times one of these buildings was for a while converted into the province's largest marijuana
Cannabis (drug)
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among many other names, refers to any number of preparations of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a psychoactive drug or for medicinal purposes. The English term marijuana comes from the Mexican Spanish word marihuana...
grow-op, in a scandal involving one of the town's wealthiest families (who shall remain nameless here) and which at the time was the largest busted grow-op on record.
Mission is noted as the home of a long-established professional dragstrip, Mission Raceway Park
Mission Raceway Park
Mission Raceway Park, also known as MRP, is an auto racing facility located in Mission, British Columbia, Canada. The facility features a ¼ mile NHRA-sanctioned drag strip, a 9-turn road course, and a motocross track. It is owned and operated by the B.C. Custom Car Association, and the BCCCA...
, which was moved in relatively recent times outside the dyking of the lower part of town to reduce noise in residential and commercial areas nearby.
In 1972 a large tract of land in central Mission's Ferndale area, flat upland at the top of the slope above downtown, was acquired by the federal government and developed into two large penal facilities. One is a minimum
Ferndale Institution
Ferndale Institution is a minimum-security federal correctional facility located in Mission, British Columbia, in the central Fraser Valley, about 80 kilometres east of Vancouver...
security facility, and the other is a medium security
Mission Institution
Mission Institution is a medium security federal institution within the Correctional Service of Canada and is located in Mission, British Columbia. As of March 2007, it currently houses 259 inmates. Mission Institution is broken up into 5 living units, with an additional 10 cell segregation unit...
prison. The northern part of the district, and the wilds of the Stave River basin to the north of it, are home to a few wilderness work camps for young offenders and low-risk convicts; these camps have over recent decades participated in the ongoing clearing of vast forests of flooded-out trees from the inundated areas of Stave Lake
Stave Lake
Stave Lake is a hydroelectric reservoir in the Stave River system, located on the northern edge of the District of Mission, about 65 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia. The main arm of the lake is just over 20 km long, and there is a southwest arm ending at Stave Falls Dam about...
, opening the lake to water recreation and public exploration.
Economy
ForestryForestry
Forestry is the interdisciplinary profession embracing the science, art, and craft of creating, managing, using, and conserving forests and associated resources in a sustainable manner to meet desired goals, needs, and values for human benefit. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands...
, hydroelectricity and agriculture are Mission's chief resource sectors and provide the basis for varied related retail and service activities. Over the past few years, transportation improvements have enabled the manufacturing sector to expand beyond sawmilling and food processing.
Forest and wood related industries dominate the manufacturing sector, with an emphasis on redcedar shake and shingle mills. Mission also holds the only municipal tree farm license in British Columbia.
Agriculture
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...
is mostly restricted to a narrow belt along the Fraser River, and the unincorporated Dewdney-Deroche district east of Mission contains the majority of the farms in the area. There are about 96 commercial and hobby farms in the area. Dairy is the chief agricultural enterprise; other income sources include poultry, hogs, beef and vegetables.
Mission's largest employer is the local school district, School District #75, and its second largest employer is the District (i.e. the municipality) itself.
Tax
Tax
To tax is to impose a financial charge or other levy upon a taxpayer by a state or the functional equivalent of a state such that failure to pay is punishable by law. Taxes are also imposed by many subnational entities...
Mission is also known to charge one of the highest land tax in all of Canada. This has attributed to a large influx of funds for City officials to squander.
Transportation
Mission is served by a regional transit system (ValleyMAXValleyMAX
ValleyMAX is a public transit system which provides bus services in the Central Fraser Valley area of British Columbia, Canada...
) that connects the District of Mission with the City of Abbotsford
Abbotsford, British Columbia
Abbotsford is a Canadian city located in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, adjacent to Greater Vancouver. It is the fifth largest municipality in British Columbia, home to 123,864 people . Its Census Metropolitan Area, which includes the District of Mission, is the 23rd largest in Canada,...
. The Valley Connector bus is operated by BC Transit, the City of Abbotsford and the District of Mission. Transportation infrastructure includes Abbotsford-Mission Highway 11, and the Lougheed Highway 7. Mission is also accessible through commuter rail, the West Coast Express
West Coast Express
West Coast Express is the interregional commuter railway in British Columbia, Canada. Opened in 1995, it links Mission, Maple Ridge, Pitt Meadows, Port Coquitlam, Coquitlam, and Port Moody with Waterfront Station in Downtown Vancouver, where it interchanges with SkyTrain rapid transit, SeaBus and...
, which runs five trains a day, five days a week, between Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
and Mission City Station.
Three days per week Via Rail
VIA Rail
Via Rail Canada is an independent crown corporation offering intercity passenger rail services in Canada. It is headquartered near Montreal Central Station at 3 Place Ville-Marie in Montreal, Quebec....
's The Canadian
The Canadian
The Canadian is a Canadian transcontinental passenger train originally operated by the Canadian Pacific Railway between 1955 and 1978. It is currently operated as an Inter-city rail service by Via Rail Canada with service between Union Station in Toronto, Ontario and Pacific Central Station in...
provides eastbound flag stop service from Mission Harbour railway station
Mission Harbour railway station
The Mission Harbour railway station is in Mission, British Columbia, Canada near the harbour area. The station is served by Via Rail's The Canadian three times per week as a flag stop . The station is only served by eastbound trains. Westbound trains call at the Abbotsford railway station.-...
.
Mission differs from some of the other Fraser Valley Communities because of its access to the Fraser River. The Fraser near Mission is for the most part undeveloped and unspoiled which makes Mission the perfect launch point for the water based activities that happen there year round. Soft adventure jet boat eco tours run from Mission as well as some of the best salmon or sturgeon fishing expeditions in North America. The Mission Waterfront is also at the early stages of development.
Government
The District of Mission uses the current Council-Manager system of local government. The present Mayor and Council, was elected on November 19, 2005. The current mayor is James AtebeJames Atebe
James Atebe is mayor of Mission, British Columbia, Canada,, a municipality east of Vancouver in the British Columbia region known as the Fraser Valley. A native of Ekerenyo, a village in the North Mugirango Constituency of Kenya, he was first elected mayor in 2005, after serving as a member of the...
. Past Mayor Abe Neufeld has retired from local politics.
Demographics
Mission has a low volume of new local employment opportunities and a high proportion of residents (more than 6 out of 10) who commute to work in other locales. The community has a young population, with a median age of 36.4, according to the 2001 Canadian census,Mission's largest religious denomination is Protestant, followed by Catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
and no-denomination-declared other Christians, totalling 55.1%. The next largest religious group is Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
, comprising 5.1% of the population.
The largest group is Caucasian
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
, comprising approximately 97.6% of the population, but even within that Mission's ethnic makeup is very complex, with large numbers of Germans and Dutch, but also Finns, Norwegians and other Scandinavians, Italians, Hungarians, Poles, anglicized French-Canadians and others. The largest visible minority group in Mission are South Asians, primarily Indo-Canadians comprising 5.1% of the population. There is a sizeable First Nations component, and at the Peckquaylis Indian Reserve, which is the former St. Mary's Residential School and its grounds, is a centre for services and governments of the Sto:lo
Stó:lo
The Sto:lo , alternately written as Stó:lō, Stó:lô or Stó:lõ and historically as Staulo or Stahlo, and historically known and commonly referred to in ethnographic literature as the Fraser River Indians or Lower Fraser Salish, are a group of First Nations peoples inhabiting the Fraser Valley of...
communities in the area to the east.
Climate
People
Notable former or current residents include:- 1976 Olympic silver medalist swimmer Gary MacDonaldGary MacDonald (swimmer)Gary MacDonald was a freestyle swimmer from Canada, who won the silver medal in the 4×100 m medley relay at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Canada. He did so alongside Graham Smith, Clay Evans, and Stephen Pickell. Gary was the Canadian record holder in the 50m free as well.MacDonald...
- Big bandBig bandA big band is a type of musical ensemble associated with jazz and the Swing Era typically consisting of rhythm, brass, and woodwind instruments totaling approximately twelve to twenty-five musicians...
era musician Mart KenneyMart KenneyHerbert Martin "Mart" Kenney was a Canadian jazz musician and bandleader whose big band Mart Kenney and His Western Gentlemen was Canada's premier dance band during the 1930s and 1940s.-Musical career:...
and his wife, Norma Locke - singer-songwriter and Juno nominee Paul JanzPaul JanzPaul Janz is a Canadian theologian, and formerly a prominent singer-songwriter of pop rock music in the mainstream and contemporary Christian markets...
- 2005 CFOXCFOX-FMCFOX-FM is a Canadian radio station in the Greater Vancouver region of British Columbia. It broadcasts at 99.3 MHz on the FM band with an effective radiated power of 75,000 watts from a transmitter on Mount Seymour in the District of North Vancouver. Studios are located in Downtown Vancouver,...
Seeds winner Dave Faber and Ray "Red" Bull of 604604 Records604 Records is the production company of Nickelback singer Chad Kroeger and attorney Jonathan Simkin, founded in 2002. Their records are distributed in Canada by Universal Music Group....
recording artist Faber DriveFaber DriveFaber Drive is a four-piece, Canadian pop punk band from Mission, British Columbia.-Biography:Discovered by Chad Kroeger of Nickelback, and signed to his 604 Records label after winning Fox Seeds, a local radio challenge, Faber Drive released their debut album, Seven Second Surgery, on May 15, 2007... - 1988 Olympic1988 Winter OlympicsThe 1988 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XV Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event celebrated in and around Calgary, Alberta, Canada from 13 to 28 February 1988. The host was selected in 1981 after having beat Falun, Sweden and Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy...
short-track speedskaterShort track speed skatingShort track speed skating is a form of competitive ice speed skating. In competitions, multiple skaters skate on an oval ice track with a circumference of 111.12 m...
Eden DonatelliEden DonatelliEden Donatelli is a Canadian Olympic Medalist in Short-track speed skating.In 1985, Donatelli became the youngest ever athlete to make Canadian Senior National Team status at 15 years of age. She medaled in 10 different World Championships from 1986 to 1992... - Swimmer Brent HaydenBrent HaydenBrent Matthew Hayden is a Canadian swimmer.Hayden was born and raised in Mission, British Columbia and started swimming when he was five. In his youth, he earned a blackbelt in Isshin Ryu karate. He attended the University of British Columbia for one year...
(Canadian 100m freestyle record holder, 2007 100m world freestyle champion, 2004 & 2008 Olympic athlete) - Musician and Motion Picture Stuntman Richard Cummins
- 1996 Governor General's Literary Award Nominee poet Crispin Elsted
- WNBA (Sacramento Monarchs) basketball player Kim SmithKim Smith (basketball)Kim Smith is a Canadian professional women's basketball player, currently with the Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA.-University of Utah:...
- 1996 and 2000 Olympic swimmer Shannon ShakespeareShannon ShakespeareShannon Shakespeare is a former international freestyle swimmer from Canada, who competed for her native country at two consequentive Summer Olympics, starting in 1996 in Atlanta, Georgia. There she finished in 17th position in the 200 m Freestyle...
- Canadian Idol (Season 5) third-place contestant Carly Rae JepsenCarly Rae JepsenCarly Rae Jepsen is a Juno-nominated Canadian singer/songwriter from Mission, B.C..In the summer of 2007 she placed third in the fifth season of Canadian Idol. She was also a part of the Canadian Idol Top 3 concert tour.-Career:...
- Christian Dave HensmanDave HensmanDavid John Hensman is a Canadian Christian singer-songwriter, minister and businessperson from Mission, British Columbia, Canada.-Musical career:...
- Actor/filmmaker/photographer Graham Wardle
- Hockey Player Adam HobsonAdam HobsonAdam Hobson is a Canadian ice hockey player who is currently playing with Rögle BK of the HockeyAllsvenskan in Sweden. He was drafted by the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2005 NHL Entry Draft....
- Hockey Player Brock Cornish
- Hockey Player Jordan Hickmott
Sports
| Club | League | Sport | Venue | Established | Championships |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mission Icebreakers | Pacific International Junior Hockey League The Pacific International Junior Hockey League is a Junior "B" Ice Hockey league in British Columbia, Canada, sanctioned by Hockey Canada. The winner of the PIJHL playoffs competes with the champions of the Kootenay International Junior Hockey League and the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League... |
Ice hockey Ice hockey Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take... |
Mission Leisure Centre | |
|
Neighbourhoods
Mission's neighbourhoods include a number of rural localities which were part of the District Municipality before amalgamation and which still have some strong local identity. The following list is incomplete, due to the emergence of modern-era development neighbourhoods, but covers the historical localities:- SilverdaleSilverdale, British ColumbiaSilverdale is a semi-rural neighbourhood of the District of Mission, British Columbia, Canada c. 40 km east of Vancouver on the west bank of the Stave River at its confluence with the Fraser. Noted for its historic Italian Canadian community, its economy was farming, fishing and logging based...
- SilverhillSilverhill, British ColumbiaSilverhill is a settlement in British Columbia....
- West Heights
- Stave Falls
- Stave Gardens
- SteelheadSteelhead, British ColumbiaSteelhead is a settlement in British Columbia located north of Mission BC and east of Stave Lake....
- Cedar Valley
- Keystone Road
- Clay Road
- Richards Road
- Cade-Barr
- Cherry Hill
- Ferndale
- Hatzic
- Hillside
Non-Mission District neighbourhoods
Unincorporated communities and rural areas to the east of Mission are linked closely to Mission, partly because of School District No. 75 but also because Mission is the dominant service centre for the north side of the Fraser between Maple RidgeMaple Ridge, British Columbia
Maple Ridge is a District Municipality in British Columbia, located in the northeastern section of Metro Vancouver. Maple Ridge has a population of approximately 68,949.-History:...
and Agassiz
Agassiz, British Columbia
Agassiz is a small community located in British Columbia's Fraser Valley. The only town within the jurisdiction of the District Municipality of Kent, it contains the majority of Kent's population.-References:...
-Kent
Kent, British Columbia
The District of Kent is a district municipality located east of Vancouver, British Columbia. Part of the Fraser Valley Regional District, Kent consists of several communities, the largest and most well-known being Agassiz, the only town in the municipality, Harrison Mills, Kilby, Mount Woodside,...
. These communities include:
- DurieuDurieu, British ColumbiaDurieu is a farming community, located on Hatzic Prairie northeast of Mission, British Columbia, Canada in the Fraser Valley region of that province's Lower Mainland. Also known locally as Hatzic Prairie, it has few services other than a store, feed co-op, school and community hall.The community...
- Hatzic Prairie
- Hatzic LakeHatzic LakeHatzic Lake is an oxbow lake adjoining the Fraser River on the east side of Mission, British Columbia, Canada, immediately below that district municipality's neighbourhood of Hatzic, which is on a benchland above and to the west of the lake...
- McConnell Creek
- Miracle Valley
- Sylvester Road
- DewdneyDewdney, British ColumbiaDewdney is an unincorporated community in the Central Fraser Valley of British Columbia, Canada, about 15 km east of the town of Mission. It was incorporated as a district municipality in 1893 but has since become unincorporated and is now represented as part of Electoral Area 'G' in the...
- Nicomen IslandNicomen IslandNicomen Island is an island in the Fraser River east of Mission and between Deroche and Dewdney . Located on the river's north side, and separated from the foot of the Douglas Ranges by Nicomen Slough, the island is near-totally given over to agriculture and constitutes a rural community in its...
- DerocheDeroche, British ColumbiaDeroche is a farming and railway community on the Canadian Pacific Railway and BC Highway 7 located approximately 110 km east of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Deroche is adjacent to the eastern end of Nicomen Island, from which it is separated by the Nicomen Slough...
- Lake Errock