Decision to reactivate Vancouver fountains that use drinking water questioned amid B.C. drought concerns

The recent decision to reactivate several Vancouver-owned fountains that use millions of litres of drinking water annually is being scrutinized as B.C. officials sound the alarm about worsening drought conditions across the province.

The five fountains are not capable of recirculating water, meaning that water is pumped in, used once and flushed into the sewer – something Park Board Commissioner Tom Digby considers wasteful.

"Each one of these fountains, which were all built in the 1960s and 1970s, wastes approximately one million litres a year of water," Digby said Friday.

"At this time in history, here in Vancouver, it's just not acceptable."

The fountains – located at Barclay Heritage Square, Helmcken Park, the Laurel Street Land Bridge, Haro and Bute Plaza, and Sunset Beach – were turned off years ago to conserve water, with the intention that they would be reactivated once the city was able to retrofit them with recirculating water systems.

But this spring, city council and the park board, both of which are controlled by the A Better City party, decided the fountains should be reactivated regardless, arguing they offer a meaningful mental health benefit to Vancouver residents, some of whom had complained about missing the aesthetic water fixtures.

The water used by the fountains is also a drop in the bucket of the region's water use. Metro Vancouver, with its population of approximately 2.5 million people, goes through upwards of a billion litres of water daily.

COUNCILLOR DEFENDS FOUNTAINS

Coun. Peter Meiszner first introduced the motion pushing for the return of the fountains in March, and shared an image on Twitter last week celebrating the resumed flow of water at Haro and Bute.

"Proud to work with the community to get this water feature back up and running after years of neglect. We all deserve some joy in our city," he wrote.

Meiszner defended the decision to reactivate the fountains on Friday, even while he acknowledged officials knew a drought was likely. He noted there are plans in place to temporarily shut the fixtures off again should drought conditions worsen. 

"We did anticipate that there would likely be a drought this summer, and knew we would have to turn them off, but we wanted to give people a little bit of that joy, at least for a month or two, from seeing them on," he said. 

The councillor also noted the fixtures are using less water than they once did. According to city staff, the five fountains previously used a combined 11.8 million litres of water annually.  

"We've also taken steps to install timers on them so they're not running 24 hours a day. The waterflow is actually substantially reduced from what it was before," Meiszner said. 

Reactivating the fountains was ultimately up to the Vancouver Park Board, which manages water fixtures in the city. Digby was the only commissioner who voted against Meiszner's proposal when it came before the board, arguing that waste is waste – particularly as climate change poses increasing threats of drought, and as growing populations put more pressure on the region's water supply.

"A large group of people sort of still imagine that this was the '60s and '70s, when they grew up, and there seemed to be water everywhere and unlimited resources," he said. "We have to see the city with new eyes."

The commissioner said he would gladly support reactivating the fountains once retrofitted, but noted there is currently no budget for doing so. Each fountain would cost between $75,000 and $150,000 to install a new pumping system, Digby said. 

'EVERY DROP COUNTS'

Some social media users have also questioned the optics of using the fountains, particularly after B.C. Emergency Management Minister Bowinnn Ma urged the public to consider taking shorter showers and finding other ways to reduce water consumption.

At a news conference this week, Ma cautioned that water basins across much of the province – including the Lower Mainland – are experiencing drought conditions earlier in the year than usual.

"I'm calling on everyone, including businesses, to follow the water restrictions set by First Nations or local authorities and to take action to conserve water even above and beyond those restrictions," she said. "Every drop counts."

Basins are different from reservoirs, where drinking water comes from, but the two are connected, Ma noted.

The City of Vancouver has implemented a number of other measures to protect the region's drinking water supply, including annual watering restrictions, which came into effect on May 1.

Officials said bylaw officers have since issued 287 tickets for $250 each, totalling $71,750, to residents who have violated watering rules. 

With files from CTV News Vancouver's Abigail Turner