Alberta's best-known former coal mining municipality is again flirting with the mining industry, and the hope that it could someday restart coal production around Crowsnest Pass.
Bruce Decoux, mayor of Crowsnest Pass, just east of the B.C. border, is hoping a new coal play can bring hundreds of mining related jobs back to his community, which is still home to miners who earn their living in Elk Valley mines in B.C.
"We are excited that the Crowsnest Pass will soon be home to a highly reputable international coal mining group and that all citizens in our community will reap benefits," Decoux declared in early January.
His comment was part of announcements confirming Australia-based Riversdale Resources Limited is evaluating the potential for an open pit mine in the area that would produce four million tonnes of coal annually. Riversdale acquired the coal properties for a reported $47 million.
The deal includes 35,000 acres of land and the Grassy Mountain Project, north of the Highway 3 municipality in the southwest corner of the province.
According to a Riversdale news release, the portfolio of lands and leases "provides Riversdale an exciting opportunity to look at multiple developments in the region, which has a long history of coal mining."
That history hasn't always been a clean one, and dust from past mining operations made the Crowsnest communities of Coleman, Blairmore, Frank, Bellevue and Hillcrest unappealing years ago. But Decoux and Crowsnest officials now believe a cleaner, more modern industry can be an economic shot in the arm for a municipality that has in more recent years tried to build tourism and encourage vacation property buyers to snap up homes in the area.
