NEWS -- The extension of the public health order through the holiday season means some beloved Christmas festivities in Metro Vancouver won’t be able to continue this year. 

One major attraction that benefits a well-known charity is hoping people will still give even though they’ve been cancelled. 

The Stanley Park Christmas train is an annual tradition for many families, and normally sells well over 100,000 tickets each year, according to the Vancouver Park Board’s supervisor of park experiences Joan Probert.

“This year we had already sold 28,000 tickets, and the last two weeks of December were completely sold out,” Probert said, as she referred to the scaled-down Bright Nights train experience that was initially planned during the pandemic.

However, Probert said this year will be the first time the event will be going dark entirely.

“We’ve had the odd windstorm or snowstorm that shut us down for an evening or two, but we have never ever had to cancel the event in its entirety,” Probert said. “We’re certainly disappointed but mostly we’re disappointed for our charity partner, the Burn Fund, because this is their biggest fundraiser of the year.”

The Christmas train typically raises about a half a million dollars for the B.C. Professional Fire Fighters Burn Fund. Fund president Gord Ditchburn told CTV News this year they’re also running a 50/50 draw online, which is still going ahead.

“Everything has come to a grinding halt, so naturally that affects how we raise funds to continue to operate the programs that we do to support our burn survivors,” Ditchburn said. “There’s no way we can put the public at risk, but we make the plea that the public continue to support us.”

 

In North Vancouver, the lights are up at the Capilano Suspension Bridge, but the annual Canyon Lights holiday season event will not be happening.

The park’s communications manager Stacy Chala said the attraction is still open for daytime operations from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., with COVID-19 safety measures in place.  

“At this point, it’s pretty devastating for us,” she said.

Chala said the lights at the park cover 27 acres, and require some specialized skills to put up. 

“We started decorating the park in mid-August,” Chala said. “We really sell lights with heights, and so we have climbers involved, riggers involved, we also have climbers going down into the canyon to illuminate the canyon as well.”

Chala added the attraction is looking at potentially moving the lights event to sometime next year, if possible. 

“It should be a shame to take it all down after all this work has been done. And I think people are still going to be looking for opportunities to get outside and enjoy nature when it’s safe to do so,” she said. “Right now, we have no solid plans, but we’re looking at all of the options.”

 

In Vancouver, the VanDusen Festival of Lights at the Botanical Garden is also cancelled. 

Ema Tanaka with the Garden said they will be taking down their lights.

“It’s a difficult day,” she said. “Our hearts are definitely heavier today.”

While the Christmas train may not be running, those who purchased tickets to this year’s reduced capacity event will have an easy way to give back to the Burn Fund online. 

“When people go in to get refunds for their tickets for the event, they have the option of donating the ticket proceeds to the burn fund’s charity,” Probert said. “That’s a really great opportunity for people to still feel like they’re giving back, because people come to this event and they’re very generous. And so this is just a way for people to continue to do that, and at least something good will be generated from this cancellation.”