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Imagination, resourcefulness key for towns bucking the trend

Small communities finding success in everything from lilacs to Star Trek

Leaders in many troubled small towns and rural areas across Canada's vast landscape are delving deep into their imaginations for solutions to stagnant populations and economic difficulties caused by urbanization. Bill Reimer, a sociologist at Concordia University who once lead the New Rural Economy Project, says they've endured these struggles for decades without much agency to help themselves.

"It would be nice if the people in these communities were in a position to make their own decisions about their desired future. Unfortunately, they are not often consulted or are unable to respond in an effective fashion. The exceptions are therefore remarkable," he said.

Here are some of those exceptions and the stories of how their creative ideas have given residents new hope for the future of the dots on the map they call home.

Flowers for growth

Cap-a-l’Aigle, QC, proudly calls itself the village of lilacs. In 1998, this village within the municipality of La Malbaie began developing a picturesque garden and an annual festival that now attracts up to 7,000 visitors each year, according to Philippe Carrier-Moisan, the coordinator of the non-profit that manages the project. This horticultural heritage began with a journalist, Denis Gauthier, who saw the lilacs on the town’s main street.

"He said ‘It’s incredible what this village has and we have to put it on display,’” Carrier-Moisan said.

Gauthier found support and eventually he met a German lilac producer, Konrad Kircher, who donated 1,000 different types of lilacs to the event, giving Cap-à-l'Aigle the world’s biggest lilac collection once they’ve all been moved. However, Carrier-Moisan says there have been disappointments.

"They hoped for a certain number of visitors,” he said. “Up to 100,000 visitors, which would have been an incredible Godsend for this very beautiful village. But that number didn't arrive.”

Cap-à-l'Aigle also has an aging population and many of its elderly residents are dying off or moving into retirement homes, leaving empty houses and a hole in the town’s economy, he said. But Carrier-Moisan says the lilac village has big plans to keep blooming, because at 16 years running, it’s still “a very young garden.”

Small change buys a lot in Reston

Headlines splashed last year about a town with a crazy idea: Reston, Man., was selling lots for $10. The town of about 550 in the rural municipality of Pipestone has actually sold these lots for six years now, with a $1,000 deposit and a requirement to build within a year.

Economic Development Officer Tanis Chalmers said Reston is trying to cast out an enticing offer to the public, especially oil workers.

“We are competing, I guess you could say, for the same businesses or the same people that may be looking at the other communities surrounding us as a place to live or work, or set up a business,” she said.

The RM of Pipestone has sold most of the lots it offered through the deal, and Chalmers says the municipality will have more available soon.

The hook caught Lisa Gellatly, who moved with her family from Winnipeg to Reston, in part for her husband’s job.

“It was just unbelievable to be able to buy such a large plot of land for so cheap,” she said.

Gellatly said she never imagined leaving the city.

“I joked with people when we were moving out here that I can’t believe I’m doing this, and even my husband is shocked at how much I’m enjoying living out here.”

Hockey saves the school

Warner, Alta., was dying in 2001. The province was threatening to close its high school, and without a school residents knew they would eventually be without a town. But there was an idea: Warner could build a hockey school using its renovated arena. And then another idea: they could make it a school for women.

Today, the Warner Hockey School’s current and former students include two U.S. national champions and a member of the women’s Under-18 Team Canada, Samantha Fieseler. But the school’s principal, Mark Lowe, says he wasn’t always so confident it would succeed — so he bluffed.

Lowe said he would tell people who asked there was an 80 or 90 per cent chance Warner’s hockey school would open.

“In reality, I thought we had about a 20 or a 30 per cent chance of making it go, but we portrayed the positive outlook and we made people believe, and we ended up believing ourselves,” he said.

Local mechanic Derek Baron, who has been heavily involved in the project, said he initially wasn't very confident, either.

“We didn’t know whether we could get the girls, we didn’t know if we could get a coach,” he said.

But they found a coach and the girls came too, which Baron said was a happy surprise.

“I still grin to this day about it.”

Digging deep for new ideas

The boomtown mining days of Springhill, NS, are over, but this community of 3,868 people is trying to siphon a new identity from the depths of its abandoned coal mines. Springhill’s industry dwindled away after the 1958 disaster that killed 75 miners, its mines filling up with water heated by the earth. There is no hippo in this underground bathtub, like the one Springhill native Anne Murray once sang about, but it turns out the water is something even better — a source of geothermal energy.

The geothermal-powered local community centre has saved about $70,000 a year since it opened nearly a decade ago according to Brian Herteis, the director of engineering and public works, and the community is looking at powering new businesses or even homes with clean energy. But Herteis says there hasn’t been much development recently, and past technical issues partly stunted the project’s growth.

“There were a lot of problems with heat exchangers, with metal corroding and mechanical problems. It cast a bit of a shadow on the technology, and a lot of people thought ‘well, it will never work,’” he said.

Better technology has fixed those problems, and this year, the province of Nova Scotia granted Springhill a geothermal lease to develop the resource.

“I think the time is right, and it’s just a matter of focusing that potential and energy (no pun intended, I guess),” Herteis said, laughing.

Live long and prosper, Vulcan

A few decades ago, Vulcan, Alta., had a dwindling population and few economic prospects, says Pat Wisener, the director of the Vulcan Funeral home.

“There were businesses all boarded up on the main street. It was very, very quiet downtown,” Wisener said.

“You could shoot a canon down the street and not hit anybody on any day of the week.”

But Wisener and other locals noticed tourists stopping at Vulcan’s entrance sign and posing, amused at its connection to the immensely popular Star Trek franchise. With that glint of inspiration and provincial funding, Vulcan decided to boldly go with an idea that launched it light years from its agricultural heritage, building an identity on space adventure and a Trek Station tourism centre.

“Today, it doesn’t matter what day of the week, there’s still people on the street,” Wisener said.

“There’s always friends coming to visit, taking pictures, doesn’t matter what weather, doesn’t matter what time of day or night – they just keep coming through.”

Wisener said new businesses have set up in town, closed restaurants have re-opened and a Star Trek museum opened this summer.

“It’s slow, but it’s coming back,” he said.

Vulcan celebrated its centennial this year, but Wisener says its days as a Trekkie town are far from over; this rebooted town has a rebooted Star Trek franchise to fuel its tourism ambitions.