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Amazon says a contractor that damaged a nature preserve in Winnipeg was not following proper procedures.
A third-party contractor hired to move a fence at the e-commerce giant’s Regent Avenue delivery station trampled over sections of neighbouring Rotary Prairie Nature Park in August.
Video shows what looks like a loader driving through the preserve’s side of the chain-link fence. Tire tracks cutting through the roughly eight-hectare preserve — a rare example of a wet tall grass prairie ecosystem — were still visible this week.
“They cut large swaths of the tall grass prairie, and then they took and dumped it in various sections of the park,” said Patricia Dutchak, parks committee chair of Transcona’s Rotary Club.
Dutchak said she’s perplexed as to the extent of the damage, which she said continues very far from the area where the fence was moved and from where it’s understandable that some heavy equipment would be used.
“This is one of the last remaining tracks of tall grass prairie” in North America, Dutchak said.
“Most of it has been cultivated or developed on. There’s less than one per cent left.”
WATCH | Amazon says it’s working to address damage to Winnipeg nature preserve:
Amazon working to fix contractor’s damage to Transcona nature park
Amazon says it’s working with the City of Winnipeg to remedy the situation after a contractor working for the company damaged the Rotary Prairie Nature Park, a protected area next to Amazon’s Transcona distribution facility.
The rotary club is steward of the park, which was designated a nature heritage site by the city in 1992.
The City of Winnipeg said it’s investigating the ecological impact and damage to the preserve, and that it’s working with Amazon toward a resolution.
A spokesperson for the U.S. company said in an email Wednesday that the third-party contractor did not follow correct procedures for working next to protected public land.
The spokesperson said the fence relocation was meant to allow for safer snow and ice removal over the winter.
Amazon said it will make a contribution to the park, and that it’s reviewing its oversight of the contractor, their work and whether its internal procedures need to be updated.
Dutchak said she would like to see better protections implemented, as well as more parking spaces and improved accessibility so more people can enjoy the park.
“It reminds us [of] our past. We could imagine. We could look at this and say, ‘Gee, this is what this used to look like centuries ago,'” she said.
“I think there’s something about humanity, that remembering the history and natural spaces like this somehow root us.”