Whistler is surrounded by forest and is at risk for wildfires. Wildfire fuel reduction (reducing the amount of highly combustible organic matter such as trees and woody debris) is one component of Whistler’s Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan and includes techniques such as fuel thinning and fire breaks.
Fuel management in Whistler
The Resort Municipality of Whistler has been conducting wildfire vegetation management projects on Crown and municipal lands since 2004 to reduce the risk of wildfire to our community. The primary goal is to reduce forest fuel loads within the wildland-urban interface to reduce the ability of fire to spread from the forest into the community and vice versa, and to make wildfires easier to fight. Fuel thinning will be discontinued when the fire hazard goes to extreme and will resume when the fire hazard is lower.
Sometimes projects need to burn some of the wood debris. We will alert the public through social media. There is no need to report smoke from fuel thinning projects.
Current Projects
- Rainbow neighborhood project (July - October 2022)
- Riverside Cheakamus Crossing project (Spring 2023)
- Kadenwood Gondola (Autumn 2022)