Alexandra Bridge Provincial Park
Encyclopedia
Provincial park
A provincial park is a park under the management of a provincial or territorial government in Canada.While provincial parks are not the same as national parks, their workings are very similar...
in 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...
, located in the Fraser Canyon
Fraser Canyon
The Fraser Canyon is an 84 km landform of the Fraser River where it descends rapidly through narrow rock gorges in the Coast Mountains en route from the Interior Plateau of British Columbia to the Fraser Valley...
approximately two kilometres (one mile) north of Spuzzum
Spuzzum, British Columbia
Spuzzum is an unincorporated settlement in British Columbia, Canada. Because it is on the Trans-Canada Highway, approximately 50 km north of the community of Hope, it is often referred to as being "beyond Hope"...
and 40 kilometres (25 mi) north of Hope
Hope, British Columbia
Hope is a district municipality located at the confluence of the Fraser and Coquihalla rivers in the province of British Columbia, Canada. Hope is at the eastern end of both the Fraser Valley and the Lower Mainland region, and is at the southern end of the Fraser Canyon...
.
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...
. The park was established in 1984 because of its historical qualifications, it has picnic tables but no camping. Public access is via a trail from a parking lot on the east side of the Fraser, as the old portion of the pre-modernization Cariboo Highway
Old Cariboo Highway
The Old Cariboo Highway is a portion of the historic Cariboo Highway near Prince George, British Columbia. It runs northward from its junction with Highway 97 just south of Prince George, and terminates at the Yellowhead Highway just east of Prince George....
, which used the bridge, is no longer open to the public..
The Nlaka'pamux
Nlaka'pamux
The Nlaka'pamux , commonly called "the Thompson", and also Thompson River Salish, Thompson Salish, Thompson River Indians or Thompson River people) are an indigenous First Nations/Native American people of the Interior Salish language group in southern British Columbia...
and 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...
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...
have inhabited the area for over 9000 years. The first white persons known to have visited the site were Simon Fraser
Simon Fraser (explorer)
Simon Fraser was a fur trader and an explorer who charted much of what is now the Canadian province of British Columbia. Fraser was employed by the Montreal-based North West Company. By 1805, he had been put in charge of all the company's operations west of the Rocky Mountains...
and his crew during their expedition down the Fraser Canyon
Fraser Canyon
The Fraser Canyon is an 84 km landform of the Fraser River where it descends rapidly through narrow rock gorges in the Coast Mountains en route from the Interior Plateau of British Columbia to the Fraser Valley...
in 1808. Situated at a narrows in the canyon, with room for the necessary abutments, the site was an important fishing site for 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...
and Nlaka'pamux
Nlaka'pamux
The Nlaka'pamux , commonly called "the Thompson", and also Thompson River Salish, Thompson Salish, Thompson River Indians or Thompson River people) are an indigenous First Nations/Native American people of the Interior Salish language group in southern British Columbia...
First Nations peoples. Like all such locations in the Fraser Canyon (which are many), there was a large native village on the west bank just downstream from the bridge site in pre-railway times. Fish-drying racks can still be seen at the location today, and were visible in historic photographs from early times.
A difficult and costly trail, intended to link Fort Langley with New Caledonia
New Caledonia (Canada)
New Caledonia was the name given to a district of the Hudson's Bay Company that comprised the territory largely coterminous with the present-day province of British Columbia, Canada. Though not a British colony, New Caledonia was part of the British claim to North America. Its administrative...
because of the loss of the old route in the wake of the Oregon Treaty
Oregon Treaty
The Oregon Treaty is a treaty between the United Kingdom and the United States that was signed on June 15, 1846, in Washington, D.C. The treaty brought an end to the Oregon boundary dispute by settling competing American and British claims to the Oregon Country, which had been jointly occupied by...
of 1846, began on the east bank of the river and switchbacked up the mountainside, with "staircases" made for the mules and other pack animals. Dangerous and beset with difficult snows, the trail was abandoned after only a few uses and superseded by trails connecting inland farther south. There is mention of a native-built pole-bridge at the site, torn down to make way for the "new" one of the 1860s, but a ferry also operated in this area connecting with Kequaloose on the east bank, where the Brigade Trail begins its climb over the Cascade Mountains before descending back to the Fraser via the Anderson River
Anderson River (British Columbia)
The Anderson River is a tributary of the Fraser River in the Canadian province of British Columbia.The river is presumably named after Alexander Caulfield Anderson of the Hudson's Bay Company who traveled through the region in 1847-48.-Course:...
at Boston Bar
Boston Bar, British Columbia
Boston Bar is an unincorporated town in the Fraser Canyon of the Canadian province of British Columbia. It was not named for an organization of Massachusetts lawyers but dates from the time of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush...
. During the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush
Fraser Canyon Gold Rush
The Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, began in 1858 after gold was discovered on the Thompson River in British Columbia at its confluence with the Nicoamen River. This was a few miles upstream from the Thompson's confluence with the Fraser River at present-day Lytton...
in 1858, a ferry service was established here in a monopoly situation, as J.W. Hicks, the magistrate at Yale, had his "fingers in the pie," as with many other businesses under his official purview. (Hicks was fired because of his various indiscretions during the affair known as McGowan's War
McGowan's War
McGowan's War was a bloodless war that took place in Yale, British Columbia in the fall of 1858. The conflict posed a threat to the newly-minted British authority on the British Columbia mainland, which had only just been declared a colony the previous summer, at the onset of the Fraser Canyon Gold...
.)
The original road bridge was constructed in 1861 by Joseph Trutch
Joseph Trutch
Sir Joseph William Trutch, KCMG was an English-born Canadian engineer, surveyor and politician.-Early life and career:...
, Commissioner of Public Works for the Colony of British Columbia
Colony of British Columbia
The Colony of British Columbia was a crown colony in British North America from 1858 until 1866. At its creation, it physically constituted approximately half the present day Canadian province of British Columbia, since it did not include the Colony of Vancouver Island, the vast and still largely...
, as part of the development of the Cariboo Road
Cariboo Road
The Cariboo Road was a project initiated in 1860 by the colonial Governor of British Columbia, James Douglas...
using native and Chinese labour (though a government minister, Trutch contracted the job privately to his own profit and had the toll license at the location as part of his remuneration). He named the bridge after Princess Alexandra of Wales
Alexandra of Denmark
Alexandra of Denmark was the wife of Edward VII of the United Kingdom...
(wife of Victoria
Victoria of the United Kingdom
Victoria was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she used the additional title of Empress of India....
's eldest son, who would become Edward VII). Trutch's bridge was rebuilt by the Royal Engineers as construction of the Cariboo Road progressed, with the newer span opening in 1863
Just above the bridge on the east bank is Alexandra Lodge, one of the more important roadhouses of the many on the Cariboo Road, situated at the base of the arduous climb up the next hill northwards and at the end of the torturous journey connected Yale
Yale, British Columbia
Yale is an unincorporated town in the Canadian province of British Columbia. It was founded in 1848 by the Hudson's Bay Company as Fort Yale by Ovid Allard, the appointed manager of the new post, who named it after his superior, James Murray Yale, then Chief Factor of the Columbia District...
to Spuzzum
Spuzzum, British Columbia
Spuzzum is an unincorporated settlement in British Columbia, Canada. Because it is on the Trans-Canada Highway, approximately 50 km north of the community of Hope, it is often referred to as being "beyond Hope"...
. The Alexandra Lodge is one of the few original roadhouses still standing and, at times, in operation. Also nearby is the Alexandra Tunnel, one of many on the route of the Canadian National Railway
Canadian National Railway
The Canadian National Railway Company is a Canadian Class I railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. CN's slogan is "North America's Railroad"....
through the Fraser Canyon.
The original bridge was destroyed by the rising waters of the Fraser Flood of 1894 and its remains dismantled in 1912 due hazards during railway construction and the long abandonment of the Cariboo Road, itself a casualty of CPR construction in the 1880s. After World War I the dawn of the automotive era saw a reinvestment in roads in the province, including the re-opening of the Fraser Canyon to road traffic in the form of the new Cariboo Highway in the 1920s, and a new suspension bridge was built upon the footings of the original in 1926 (with a deck level ten feet higher than the previous design). This second Alexandra Suspension Bridge still exists today, though it ceased to be used for automobile traffic in 1964. The new Alexandra Bridge, constructed by the B.C. Ministry of Highways in 1960-64, is approximately two kilometres (one mile) downstream and uses a high truss-arch span to cross the canyon.
The site of the bridge, like most similar spots along the Fraser Canyon, is a traditional fishing spot because of the way the river is forced through narrow, steep banks, offering fishermen a chance to reach salmon struggling through the stronger current through the narrowed gorge. Millions of Spring
Chinook salmon
The Chinook salmon, Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, is the largest species in the pacific salmon family. Other commonly used names for the species include King salmon, Quinnat salmon, Spring salmon and Tyee salmon...
, Coho
Coho salmon
The Coho salmon, Oncorhynchus kisutch, is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family. Coho salmon are also known as silver salmon or "silvers". It is the state animal of Chiba, Japan.-Description:...
, Chum
Chum salmon
The chum salmon, Oncorhynchus keta, is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family. It is a Pacific salmon, and may also be known as dog salmon or Keta salmon, and is often marketed under the name Silverbrite salmon...
, Pink
Pink salmon
Pink salmon or humpback salmon, Oncorhynchus gorbuscha, is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family. It is the smallest and most abundant of the Pacific salmon.- Appearance :...
and Sockeye salmon
Sockeye salmon
Sockeye salmon , also called red salmon or blueback salmon in the USA, is an anadromous species of salmon found in the Northern Pacific Ocean and rivers discharging into it...
pass through the park on their way to spawning grounds every year. As well, the park contains many western hemlock
Western Hemlock
Tsuga heterophylla. the Western Hemlock, is a species of hemlock native to the west coast of North America, with its northwestern limit on the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska, and its southeastern limit in northern Sonoma County, California.-Habitat:...
, western redcedar and Douglas-fir
Douglas-fir
Douglas-fir is one of the English common names for evergreen coniferous trees of the genus Pseudotsuga in the family Pinaceae. Other common names include Douglas tree, and Oregon pine. There are five species, two in western North America, one in Mexico, and two in eastern Asia...
.
Terrain
Rising steeply on the east bank of the Fraser River, the site contains two well-defined glacio-fluvial benches.See also
- Hell's Gate
- Siska, British ColumbiaSiska, British ColumbiaSiska, also known historically as Cisco, is a locality in the Fraser Canyon of British Columbia, Canada 9.4 kilometres south of the town of Lytton. It is at Siska that the Canadian Pacific and Canadian National Railways switch from one side of the river to the other, due to the impossibility of...
- Bridge River RapidsBridge River RapidsThe Bridge River Rapids, also known as the Six Mile Rapids, the Lower Fountain, the Bridge River Fishing Grounds, and in the St'at'imcets language as Sat or Setl, is a set of rapids on the Fraser River, located in the central Fraser Canyon at the mouth of the Bridge River six miles north of the...
- List of crossings of the Fraser River