1 www.naturistsociety.com www.naturistaction.org www.naturisteducation.org Preserving Wreck Beach Threats on multiple fronts require vigilance ... and endurance VANCOUVER, BC - Activist Judy Williams will tell you that today's threat to Wreck Beach from the shipping of jet fuel through nearby waterways is similar to a challenge she fended off successfully in 1987. At once, you realize the extent of the ongoing challenge to the beach and the personal commitment Williams has made to protect it. Williams heads the Wreck Beach Preservation Society, but she also chairs the Fraser River Coalition, and she’s associated with the Federation of Canadi- an Naturists and a healthy handful of other activ- ist organizations. Of course, Williams is a board member of the Naturist Action Committee. Each position complements the others, but the activist mélange makes for long and eventful days. Those who are familiar with Wreck Beach will recognize some of the threats to the prized but fragile clothing-optional site: • cliff erosion • threats to nearby Booming Ground Creek • jet skis • roads to the beach • UBC and its various intrusive towers • Point Grey Dump • beach development (e.g. washrooms) • cliff instability due to construction, de- watering, traffic vibration Point Grey Dump Fraser River North Arm WRECK BEACH UBC Vancouver Towers South Arm proposed JET-A fuel terminal Delta YVR Richmond existing JET-A fuel terminal CANADA UNITED STATES See Wreck Beach on page 2. Judy Williams.
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Preserving Wreck BeachThreats on multiple fronts require vigilance ... and endurance
VANCOUVER, BC - Activist Judy
Williams will tell you that today's threat
to Wreck Beach from the shipping of jet
fuel through nearby waterways is similar
to a challenge she fended off successfully
in 1987. At once, you realize the extent of
the ongoing challenge to the beach and
the personal commitment Williams has
made to protect it.
Williams heads the Wreck Beach
Preservation Society, but she also chairs
the Fraser River Coalition, and she’s
associated with the Federation of Canadi-
an Naturists and a healthy handful of other activ-
ist organizations. Of course, Williams is a board
member of the Naturist Action Committee. Each
position complements the others, but the activist
mélange makes for long and eventful days.
Those who are familiar with Wreck Beach
will recognize some of the threats to the prized
but fragile clothing-optional site:
• cliff erosion
• threats to nearby Booming Ground Creek
• jet skis
• roads to the beach
• UBC and its various intrusive towers
• Point Grey Dump
• beach development (e.g. washrooms)
• cliff instability due to construction, de-
watering, traffic vibration
Point
Grey
Dump
Fraser River
North Arm
WRECK
BEACHUBC
VancouverTowers
South Arm
proposed JET-A
fuel terminal
Delta
YVRRichmond
existing JET-A
fuel terminal
CANADA
UNITED STATES See Wreck Beach on page 2.
Judy Williams.
2
Wreck Beach continued from page 1
TOWERS
As is the case for most clothing-optional beaches, the
threats to Wreck Beach are not orderly and well behaved.
Instead, they are clustered and overlapped. At the present
time, Judy Williams is dealing with plans by the Univers-
ity of British Columbia to build new towers on UBC
property that overlooks the beach. This has become a
recurring challenge.
The University seeks to build taller high rise structures
that loom above the beach, breaking the visual barrier that
has preserved the unique separateness of Wreck Beach. The
present threat is the Ponderosa Hub, a cluster of four new
towers. As the huge building are concentrated closer to the
edge of the cliff above the beach, the stability of the cliff face
is incrementally compromised, creating the ultimate
possibility of a collapse that would obliterate the beach
altogether.
POINT GREY DUMP SITE
Since 1938, ships have dumped waste material into the
Georgia Strait at a site that became known as the Point Grey
Dump Site. Located near the mouth of Burrard Inlet, just 10
kilometers (6.2 miles) off the coast of the mainland (and
Wreck Beach), the dumped materials are supposed to be
confined to an area of one nautical mile radius centered at
49°15.40´N, 123°21.90´W. However, studies have found
loads of dumped material more than 4 km outside the
defined site and a trail of refuse and a well defined trail of
debris leading to the site from Vancouver Harbour..
The dump is made up primarily of navigation channel
dredge spoils and waste from forest industry sites on the
Fraser River. The waste site’s proximity to Wreck Beach
has raised questions of its effect on those who bathe in the
water that laps at Wreck Beach.
Activists, including Williams, contend that the dump
site should have been decommissioned in the 1950’s. Re-
cent kills of millions of cockles and jelly fish off the outer
banks of Wreck Beach may be attributable to illegal dump-
ing at the offshore site.
JET FUEL UP THE FRASER
A consortium of commercial airlines at Vancouver Inter-
national Airport (YVR) have formed a nonprofit corporation,
Vancouver Airport Fuel Facilities Corporation (VAFFC), to
arrange a less expensive source of Jet Fuel-A. Existing
sources include a refinery and offloading dock on the Burrard
Inlet. Those are connected to VYR by a 40 km overland
pipeline. Additional jet fuel is brought in by as many as 35
trucks a day from a refinery in the U.S.
The airlines wish to have the option of buying huge
amounts fuel on the world market and having it shipped by
sea from places like Singapore. Some seagoing oil tankers
used for that purpose are given the designation, “Panamax.”
Those are enormous ships of the very largest size able to fit
through the locks of the Panama Canal. The VAFFC
proposal would have Panamax-class oilers sailing into the
vitally biodiverse Fraser River Estuary that comprises part of
Wreck Beach on the river’s North Arm and part of the Reifel
Wildlife Sanctuary on the South Arm.
The proposed new offloading terminal would be located
on the South Arm of the Fraser and connected to YVR by a
15 km pipeline. An 80,000 liter storage facility would be
constructed at the site on the north bank of the Fraser’s
South Arm. Consisting of “six to eight” 6-storey tanks, the
tank farm would have containment large enough to hold a
spill for just a single tank.
That’s the type of planning that worries Williams. But
if the VAFFC cannot make the barge off-loading facility and
tank farm happen on the South Arm because of the outraged
opposition to it, they will try again for the North Arm
which runs beside Wreck Beach. In 1987, the plan was to
barge a million liters a week past Wreck Beach into sensi-
tive estuarine habitat. Says Williams: “We went Federal
with our opposition and stopped them! We must stop them
again!”
Judy Williams is not alone, of course. Few activists
are. She is a driving force for the causes she holds dear, but
she deflects accolades.
Says Williams: “I have indeed had many helping hands
over the years. My value has been in the multitude of con-
nections I have made with community groups, community
leaders, politicians, academics, bureaucrats and most impor-
tantly of all, those with the thousands of naturist friends who
have been the wind beneath my wings.
“The continuity of being able to remember (living his-
tory book!) what most of these just “wet behind the ears”
bureaucrats have only heard about, allows me to pick up the
phone and be on a first-name basis with whomever might be
able to help us on the opposite end of that phone line! I just
stopped by the Canadian Coast Guard hovercraft base the
other day to chat about their emergency response strategies
in case of jet fuel spills. Normally, one would have to have
an appointment before they would buzz you through those
gates, but I have had a 30-year love affair with the wonderful
commanders and crew of the base, and I was buzzed right in
when I just decided to drop by and quiz them last week. It’s
all about the knee bone being connected to the hip bone and
the hip bone being connected to the back bone. Everything
is connected. The connections one makes in life really can
and do make a difference when one is fighting to save what
one loves...as in my case... Wreck Beach!”
3Please Give to NAC(to the tune of “The Drinking Man’s Diet”) www.youtube.com/allansherman
NAC, NAC, please give to NAC.They keep the laws of this land on track.Their work takes some moneyTo stay in the sunGive to NAC, NAC, NAC.
I like to talk with Bob Morton.He knows how to legislate fun.He’ll use the right forumTo take on SantorumAnd soon, we’ve won!
NAC, NAC, please give to NAC.They keep the laws of this land on track.It’s all of our duty.To stay in the nudeGive to NAC, NAC, NAC.
Right-wingers sure make me crazy.They think being naked is bad.They have no ideaWe’re just being freeAnd it makes us glad.NAC, NAC, please give to NAC.
They keep the laws of this land on track.Dig deep in your walletAnd give it your all.Give to NAC, NAC, NAC.
Please Give to NAC!
In the course of any given day, I may receive hundreds of
NAC and NEF-related e-mails. Some are informational, some
are offers of help, and some are pleas for help. Some of my
favorites come from Kath Rooney, who is a benefactor
of NAC and NEF, a former board member and secretary
of both organizations, and a current NAC Area Rep. Al-
though Kath lives in Michigan with her husband, Phil
Curtiss, her e-mails often seem to come from a different
place, both figuratively and literally. In May, she wrote:
Greetings from a plane between Detroit and
LaGuardia. This song is to the Allan Sherman song
"Drinking Man's Diet." He did parodies. Anyway, here
are the lyrics for this incantation.
Kath included the lyrics that appear here, to the
left, and then she continued her e-mail.
In my eternal quest for approval, I hope you like
this, or, at least that this isn't
too awful. I'd hate to lose the
love of this group of addressees!
Gee, maybe I shouldn't send it.
Maybe I should stop listening to
the voices in my head. Just try
it. WILL YOU SHUT UP!
Nyah, nyah, nyah.
Excuse me, I have an alter
ego to toss out the window. See
you all soon.
Love,
Kath
I chuckled and saved the e-
mail on my computer. I knew
that Kath and Phil would be at
the Eastern Naturist Gathering
the following month in Penn-
sylvania. I immediately
responded, writing flippantly,
“That's too funny, Kath! You'll
be at the Gathering to lead the
singing?”
But Kath is not an individual to be taken lightly or
provoked with an idle challenge.
The 2011 Eastern Gathering was one of the most
enjoyable TNS events in which I’ve participated. Even
so, I was unable to escape from the various naturist
crises of the moment. When the time came for the Star
Search talent show, I was still working on an urgent
response to a proposed anti-nudity ordinance in
Madison, Wisconsin.
Kath was at the talent show. She was in the talent
show, leading the singing. I hadn’t known she’d be on
the program. She sang Please Give to NAC - and I
missed it. My penance is to make sure you don’t miss
it.
Kath Rooney
by Bob Morton
Executive Director
Naturist Action Committee
4
Prolific naturist author and editor Mark Storey has compiled an extensive naturist
bibliography, and he has shared it with the public on the Web site of The Naturist
Society, where TNS Webmaster Carmen Hamm has carefully placed it for easy use.
Here is a powerful alternative for any naturist who has ever felt compelled to shrug
helplessly and say, “Well, it’s just my opinion.” The bibliography includes the
opinions of others, as well as carefully researched psychological, sociological,
philosophical and historical data.
In presenting the resource, Storey has not limited the list to naturist-friendly
propaganda, though such volumes are surely included. Also featured in the
bibliography are critically unfavorable publications, the very titles of which may make
a naturist cringe. Those are important, too.
For those who may be daunted by a compilation of hundreds of book titles, Storey
has thoughtfully created his own “Top Ten” list of nonfiction works from “early”
nudism, as well as his “Top Twenty” nonfiction titles from “later” research.
Understanding that few have a comprehensive naturist library at their fingertips, Storey
even suggests affordable sources for some of the more readily available works.
Naturist Education Foundation Executive Director Bob Morton comments: “As
with any bibliography that deals with a dynamic topic, the list is still growing. I
strongly encourage naturists to take advantage of this valuable and impressive resource.
I suspect you’ll feel encouraged that such a bibliography exists, you’ll be delighted
that someone is doing this sort of work on behalf of naturists, and you won’t be
surprised that The Naturist Society is behind it all.”
The Naturist Society
A naturist bibliography
Mark Storey at work in his favorite writing uniform.