Presqu’ile, Show Me the Money

For those of you who enjoy camping in Ontario, don’t you just love going into the Provincial Parks with their nicely paved campground roads? OK, maybe you can find that at almost every other park, except Presqu’ile Provincial Park near Brighton, Ontario.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Presqu’ile. In fact, I love it so much I’ve camped or visited there for 40 years and my parents have been going even longer than that. It has changed a lot over that time, some good and some bad, but it’s still like a home away from home. I know several of the staff at the park and they’re all super people but perhaps it’s time to stop worrying about going over budget for a change and get the park back in shape.

Believe it or not, birders, naturalists and tree-huggers aren’t the only people who use the park. While I respect those people and the fun they have, I’d hazard to guess that most of the parks revenue comes from your average campers. These are people who enjoy meeting with other campers, spending time with their families and sitting by campfires under star-filled skies. Sure they might look for the odd bird or plant but most are there to get away from the phone and to enjoy the great outdoors.

I can’t even begin to imagine how much revenue Presqu’ile generates each year. Just for fun, let’s assume the park is full for a weekend and in most cases during the summer it is. An average night of camping is around $35 and with 400 campsites; the revenue generated from only a two night weekend stay is $28-thousand dollars. Multiply that by 12 weekends from June to September and it comes to $336-thousand dollars. That's just the weekends during the peak part of the season and doesn't even count all of the sites that are full from Sunday to Thursday, the early Spring or the Fall camping. The number would grow a lot more if we counted those.

Of course, that’s just the campers and the numbers don't include senior or disability discounts. We haven't even factored in the daily passes purchased by visitors coming in for a picnic, day at the beach or a drive through to see the remaining few deer that weren’t killed during the last few culls. Believe it or not, I’ve actually seen a couple of deer this year but it is a rare sight. A day pass is around $16 per vehicle so there’s a lot more extra revenue that will come in from those.

OK, I think you get the picture, money shouldn’t be an issue. My point is this; why won’t the management of the park or the powers that be spend some of that money to upgrade the steadily deteriorating roads in the campgrounds? I’m starting to think they don’t even read the suggestions left on the backs of the expired permits. Patch jobs just don’t work anymore. Surely there must be some money left after paying the staff and any other bills to lay some asphalt and do the job properly.

Last summer the dust created by the lazy and quick fix effort to improve the camping area roads was unbelievable. It was everywhere including all over the trees and vehicles, not to mention inside the trailers. At times you couldn’t even sit outside and enjoy the day. How did the park respond to this problem? They sent around a small water truck to trickle some H2O on the roads to keep the dust down. Would anyone like to guess how well that solution worked in the 28 plus degree heat we had? The roads were dry and dusty again in a matter of minutes.

Forget the dust, how about the fact that the campers are forced to use the roads when driving and pulling their trailers to their sites. We’re talking about trailers that cost any where from $5-thousand dollars to several hundred-thousand dollars for motor homes and luxury bus models. That’s a lot of money to have bouncing around causing damage to your second home or only home for some campers. I can just imagine how many dishes, TV’s or other items have been broken over the years.

Some might argue that paving the roads might increase the speed of the vehicles in the campground. Trust me when I tell you, there are plenty of people speeding in there already and I am amazed a child hasn’t been killed yet. I don’t know why security is never around to slow people down. After the roads are paved, put in a few speed bumps or speed humps like they have in the U.S. to help with that problem. Four or five speed reducers in each camping area would be a lot better than the potholed roads they have now.

Of course, nothing surprises me anymore. Last year the main road leading into the Park was ripped up to be resurfaced just before the August long weekend. That is easily the busiest weekend of the year and the dust created along that road for the next few weeks was disgusting. The trees were white and anyone riding a bike or walking along the road had to have a shower to clean the filth off them after they finished their outing. Obviously someone who makes more money than me but with fewer brain cells came up with that idea. No doubt they did it because it saved money somehow and that’s all that matters isn’t it? Perhaps this was a screw-up on Brighton’s part since it is a county road but it still reflects poorly on the park and they should have fought it and held off until September when the peak season was over.

Someone needs to step up, open the purse strings a little and finally get the roads paved once the park closes after Thanksgiving this year. It’s time for Presqu’ile Provincial Park to stop shipping their profits to other Parks and keep some of that money for themselves, increase the budget and get the campground roads fixed. If not for the reasons mentioned above, then do it for all of those kids who are trying to rollerblade and keep falling because the roads are a mess.