McMillan Island

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McMillan Island
Native name:
Sqwàlets
Geography
Location Lower Fraser River, Lower Mainland, British Columbia
Coordinates 49°11′N122°34′W / 49.183°N 122.567°W / 49.183; -122.567 [1]
Area1.78 km2 (0.69 sq mi)
Administration
Canada
Province British Columbia
Largest settlementMcMillan Island Indian Reserve No. 6(pop. 63)
Demographics
Population63 (2006)
Pop. density38/km2 (98/sq mi)
Ethnic groups Kwantlen

McMillan Island is an island in the Fraser River, British Columbia, Canada, also known as McMillan Slough.. [2]

Contents

Geography

Overview

McMillan Island is located in the lower Fraser River, north of Fort Langley and south of Maple Ridge, and separated from the former by Bedford Channel. It has a total land area of 1.78 square kilometres. [3]

Geology

It is composed primarily of settled silt and debris from the Fraser River and shaped by the erosive power of the river. Geologically it was (10000 years ago) a peninsula on the shore of what is now Maple Ridge. Erosion wore down the peninsula until it became an island, although one much larger than the current McMillan Island. Once there was a channel worn between this large island and the mainland, the water flow slowed and silt and debris settled on the south side of the island, eventually connecting it to what is now Fort Langley. The water eventually broke a small section of the original island off, resulting in the current McMillan Island. [4]

McMillan Island was, as late as the 1920s, two islands separated by a very narrow channel. The north-western island was called Brae Island, while the south-eastern was McMillan. Following the construction of Jacob Haldi Bridge across the larger Bedford channel, the upstream portion of the narrow separating channel slowly became filled by this sediment, thus combining the two islands. [5]

Human geography

There is a bridge across the Bedford Channel [6] to the island along Glover Road, the main road through both Fort Langley and McMillan Island. There are several docks on the island, including the docks from the former Albion Ferry.

About 68 hectares (170 acres) of McMillan Island that was previously Brae Island was acquired by the Greater Vancouver Regional District in 1995 and much of it was designated Brae Island Regional Park. Some of this land has been leased for the creation a private campground. The remaining 1.5 hectares (3.7 acres) of former Brae Island is owned by the Township of Langley. [7]

The area that was McMillan Island prior to its joining with Brae Island is the reserve land of Kwantlen First Nation. This reserve, "McMillan Island 6", is 191 hectares (470 acres) in size and the largest and most populated of the First Nation's seven reserves. In 2016, the reserve was home to approximately 94 people, and there are 22 private dwellings [8] and the Kwantlen Nation's Band Office. [9]

History

Kwantlen territory

The island is a part of the Kwantlen First Nation's traditional territory. This reserve is the location of their main village which relocated here once Fort Langley was built, partly to dominate trade with the fort and also for protection from attack under the shelter of the fort's guns. Their former main village was at Qayqyat, or Kikait, opposite New Westminster on the Fraser's southeast bank there, at a location also known as Brownsville in today's Bridgeview neighbourhood of the City of Surrey.

Their territory overlaps with that of the Kwikwetlem, Tsawwwasen and Katzie nations, and extends up the Fraser as far as the Stave River; beyond that is the territory of the Matsqui nation. Most of the band's reserves are on the north bank of the Fraser.

The island was named after James McMillan of the HBC who founded Fort Langley. He visited the area in 1824 and again in 1827. [10] :170

Albion Ferry

A dock on the north side of the island was formerly the southern-bank terminus of the Albion Ferry. However, with the opening of the Golden Ears Bridge, ferry service has ceased. [11]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fraser River</span> River in British Columbia, Canada

The Fraser River is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Blackrock Mountain in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for 1,375 kilometres (854 mi), into the Strait of Georgia just south of the City of Vancouver. The river's annual discharge at its mouth is 112 cubic kilometres (27 cu mi) or 3,550 cubic metres per second (125,000 cu ft/s), and it discharges 20 million tons of sediment into the ocean.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Index of British Columbia–related articles</span>

The following is an alphabetical list of articles related to the Canadian province of British Columbia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stó꞉lō</span> First Nations ethnic group of British Columbia, Canada

The Stó꞉lō, alternately written as Sto꞉lo, Stó:lô, or Stó:lõ, 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 and lower Fraser Canyon of British Columbia, Canada, part of the loose grouping of Coast Salish nations. Stó꞉lō is the Halqemeylem word for "river". The Stó꞉lō are the river people. The first documented reference to these people as "the Stó꞉lō" occurs in Catholic Oblate missionary records from the 1880s. Prior to this, references were primarily to individual tribal groups such as Matsqui, Ts’elxweyeqw, or Sumas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albion Ferry</span> Former ferry service in British Columbia, Canada

The Albion Ferry was a passenger and vehicle ferry service that sailed on the Fraser River between Albion and Fort Langley in the Lower Fraser Valley region of British Columbia, Canada from June 2, 1957, until July 31, 2009.

British Columbia K-class ferry

The K-class ferries are a group of similarly designed ferries operated by both BC Ferries and TransLink in British Columbia, Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fort Langley</span> Community in British Columbia, Canada

Fort Langley is a village community in Township of Langley, British Columbia, Canada. It has a population of approximately 3,400 people. It is the home of Fort Langley National Historic Site, a former fur trade post of the Hudson's Bay Company. Lying on the Fraser River, Fort Langley is at the northern edge of the Township of Langley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annacis Island</span>

Annacis Island is a narrow island under the jurisdiction of City of Delta in Lower Mainland, British Columbia, located just downstream of the south arm of the Fraser River bifurcation between Lulu Island to the north and the Delta peninsula to the south. The island is now mostly an industrial zone, and contains one of Metro Vancouver's secondary wastewater treatment plants, the Annacis Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. The island is also home to the British Columbia Institute of Technology's Annacis Island campus.

Barnston Island is an unincorporated island located in the Greater Vancouver metropolitan area of British Columbia, Canada. Most of the island is part of Metro Vancouver Electoral Area A; the remainder is Barnston Island Indian Reserve No. 3, which is outside Electoral Area A limits and is under the governance of the Katzie First Nation, headquartered across the river at their main reserve in Pitt Meadows. Although the island is unincorporated and not officially part of any municipality, mailing addresses on the island use Surrey as the city name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fort Langley National Historic Site</span> Former trading post of the Hudsons Bay Company in British Columbia, Canada

Fort Langley National Historic Site, commonly shortened to Fort Langley, is a former fur trading post of the Hudson's Bay Company in the community of Fort Langley of Langley, British Columbia, Canada. The national historic site sits above the banks of the Bedford Channel across McMillan Island. The national historic site contains a visitor centre and a largely reconstructed trading post that contains ten structures surrounded by wooden palisades.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kwantlen First Nation</span> Indigenous reserve in British Columbia, Canada

Kwantlen First Nation is a First Nations band government in British Columbia, Canada, located primarily on McMillan Island near Fort Langley. The Kwantlen people traditionally speak hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓, the Downriver dialect of Halkomelem, one of the Salishan family of languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nicomekl River</span> River in Canada

The Nicomekl River springs from the ground in Langley, British Columbia and travels west through the city to Surrey's Crescent Beach, where it empties into Mud Bay, the northernmost section of the Boundary Bay of the Strait of Georgia. It has a total length of 34 km, with a drainage area of 149 km2.

James McMillan was a fur trader and explorer for the North West Company and Hudson's Bay Company. He led some of the earliest surveys of the lower Fraser River and founded Fort Langley for the HBC in 1827, and was its first Chief Trader.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tsawwassen First Nation</span> First Nations government in the Greater Vancouver area, Canada

The Tsawwassen First Nation is a First Nations government whose lands are located in the Greater Vancouver area of the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada, close to the South Arm of the Fraser River and just north of the international boundary with the United States at Point Roberts, Washington. Tsawwassen First Nation lists its membership at 491 people, nearly half of whom live on the lands.

Albion, British Columbia is a neighbourhood in Maple Ridge, British Columbia and is one of several small towns incorporated within the municipality at its creation. It is the oldest non-indigenous community of the district's settlements, and is only slightly younger than Fort Langley, adjacent across the Fraser River, and Kanaka Creek, which is just to the west and lies along the creek of the same name. Its official definition is the area bounded by the Fraser River, Kanaka Way, and 240th Street, but in its historic sense it means the community centred on and flanking 240th Street and adjoining areas along the Fraser River waterfront and around the Maple Ridge Fairgrounds, while along Kanaka Way and also on the near bank of Kanaka Creek, the creek, is historically the community of Kanaka Creek. Burgeoning newer home construction east of 240th Street near the Lougheed Highway is also often referred to as part of Albion.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bedford Channel</span>

The Bedford Channel is a small side channel of the Fraser River near the north end of the Township of Langley, on the south side of McMillan Island. The pair of islands—Brae Island and McMillan Island that protect the riverfront of Fort Langley, British Columbia are reached by the bridge that crosses the Bedford Channel on the way to the now-closed Albion Ferry terminal and the main reserve community of the Kwantlen First Nation on McMillan Island. The Bedford name has been used in the name of a new housing development in the town of Fort Langley.

Whonnock is a rural, naturally treed, and hilly community on the north side of the Fraser River in the eastern part of the City of Maple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada. It is approximately 56 kilometres east of Downtown Vancouver on the Lougheed Highway Whonnock shares borders with three other Maple Ridge communities. To the west the borders are 256th Street with Albion and upper Kanaka Creek with Webster's Corners. To the east Whonnock Creek forms the border with Ruskin. To the north is the municipal border and to the south the Fraser River.

Kanaka Creek is an historic rural residential area located within Maple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada, along the banks of the creek of the same name just east of the district's main town and commercial core of Haney. Just east is Albion and immediately across the Fraser River is Derby or "Old Fort Langley", upstream from which and opposite Albion is Fort Langley. Kanaka Creek was settled by Hawaiian natives in the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company, known as Kanakas, often with local indigenous, usually Kwantlen, wives. Once a thriving community linked closely to the affairs of the fort, like the rancherie outside Fort Vancouver, Kanaka Creek dwindled somewhat when the fort was located further upstream, although some of the original families stayed on for decades. The area has long since been subdivided and is a suburban neighbourhood now, with Kanaka Creek Road, along the creek's west bank, the main arterial, which like the creek runs generally northeast, finally becoming 232nd Street to connect to the Dewdney Trunk Road. Upstream, to the northeast, is Kanaka Creek Regional Park and street connections to Webster's Corners and 240th Street. Although mostly suburban the neighbourhood retains a greenbelt quality because of the protection of the creek by its park and as a salmon spawning stream, and there are still farms operating in some parts of the area.

Nicomen Island is an island in the Fraser Valley region of southwestern British Columbia. Nicomen Mountain in the Douglas Ranges lies to the north across Nicomen Slough. Chilliwack Mountain lies to the south across the Fraser River. Adjacent to the northeast is Skumalasph Island. Dewdney, which by road is about 11 kilometres (7 mi) east of Mission, extends onto the northwestern end of the island. Deroche, which by road is about 29 kilometres (18 mi) west of Agassiz extends onto the northeastern end.

Glover Road is a primary road in Langley, British Columbia which runs from southwest to northeast North-South from the Fraser Highway in downtown Langley to the Fraser River in Fort Langley, travelling over British Columbia Highway 1 and through the community of Milner, British Columbia. The road is 11 km (7 mi) in length and mostly two lanes wide with some divided four lane sections. It is notable as the primary road in and to the village of Fort Langley and as being concurrent for some of its length with British Columbia Highway 10. Beyond Fort Langley, it crosses the Jacob Haldi Bridge onto McMillan Island and terminates at the decommissioned Albion Ferry dock within the lands of the Kwantlen First Nation. The Glover Road overpass is a six-span, two-lane structure permitting access across Trans-Canada Highway. The underpass received an overheight-warning system, the second in the province, following damage from three collisions in three years.

The Salmon River is a small river in the Township of Langley in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada, flowing northwest then northeast to enter Bedford Channel, which separates McMillan Island from Fort Langley, which is just southwest.

References

  1. "BC Geographical Naming". Archived from the original on 2011-07-16. Retrieved 2010-12-14.
  2. BC Names/GeoBC entry "McMillan Island"
  3. "McMillan Island 2006 Census Profile" (PDF). BC Stats. Retrieved 2010-01-16.
  4. "Formation of Fraser River Delta". BC School District 36. Retrieved 2010-12-14.
  5. McMillan / Brae : The Evolution of an Island
  6. "Geography - Fort Langley". Tourism BC. Archived from the original on 2011-09-27. Retrieved 2010-12-14.
  7. Brae Island Regional Park Management Plan
  8. "Community Profile". Statistics Canada. Retrieved 2017-09-15.
  9. "Connectivity Profile". Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. Archived from the original on 2011-06-24. Retrieved 2010-12-14.
  10. Akrigg, G.P.V.; Akrigg, Helen B. (1986), British Columbia Place Names (3rd, 1997 ed.), Vancouver: UBC Press, ISBN   0-7748-0636-2
  11. "Albion Ferry to Cease Operation". Translink. Archived from the original on 2009-12-13. Retrieved 2010-01-16.

Coordinates: 49°10′35″N122°34′12″W / 49.17639°N 122.57000°W / 49.17639; -122.57000 (McMillan Island)