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Reflections on the conversation with Madeline Donald

Ilyas Kanybek

Madeline Donald raised multiple excellent points during her presentation. One of the most interesting ones is that vegetation holds moist and creates natural flood mitigation that no engineering has access to. In my opinion it once again reiterates the fact that there is a necessity to not entirely abandon but shift our direction towards natural solutions, approaches that have been existent for quite long and successful. I think it is particularly relevant to Kelowna and our Brandt's creek project where it would be more than important to base our actions on the traditional indigenous knowledge. In essence it is also more efficient, less risky and more meaningful approach. It is more efficient because it has been based on the many centuries of "try and make it better". It is less risky as we can reflect on the historical application of these actions. Most importantly it is more meaningful because we get to contribute towards the truth and reconciliation.

Just like any other natural habitats creeks needs more room, space for flourishing. it is essential for us to accept and stop spending research funds and energy and time towards unnecessary attempts to somehow make the habitat fit into the human needs. We need on contrary build our World around the natural habitats, natural flows and climatic realities. That must become the centerpiece.

Another aspect of Madeline's presentation was the usage of Rehabilitation instead of restoration. I think it is essentially important as we are not there to build something as engineers but rather to attempt to let the nature take over and do as it needs. there is no engineering tool that can do better than the nature.

Sofia Bahmutsky

I agree with your perspective Ilyas. Especially when you mention that we should consider living and building around natural habitats, water, and climatic realities instead of trying to force the environment to fit human needs. That is something I have thought about for a long time and always seen that nature being the most powerful force than cannot be boxed in forever. Natural disasters are proof of this, how no engineering feat can withstand natural forces forever. Like you say, "there is no engineering tool that can do better than nature", I wholeheartedly agree!

Leandra Vanbaelinghem

It was very interesting to see archived photos of Kelowna and be walked through the landscape development of Kelowna by Madeline Donald. I learned how the landscape of Kelowna used to be filled with marshy and low-line vegetation and that as Kelowna developed and housed people returning from world war 2, the landscape was drained to be able to build permanent structures. It was very surprising to me how different the landscape looks now compared to a hundred years ago. It almost looked like it was from a different biome. It was helpful to see a stream of pictures as well as the video from the guardian to visually see how much humans terraform their environment to fit their needs.

Madeline provided a lot of helpful information for our Brandt's creek class project. I had learned from Annie that a lot of water going into and out of the creek was unaccounted for. So it was great to learn more about it with visual explanations and examples of a low-flowing section of the creek feeding into a fast-flowing area with unknown water inputs. Also, learning about the different plant species along the creek and how the role they play in their ecosystem is very ambiguous was very interesting, especially coming from a biology background. For instance, the idea that some plants are generally accepted as invasive or harmful may not necessarily be the case in the specific context of Brandt's creek. I appreciated learning the phrase "unruly heritage," which I think is a very important concept to keep in mind when exploring sustainability issues to adopt a future/long-term approach. The cement company example from Mr. Ray Lewis' talk portrays this well. Four months before the company had to act on its environmental breach, they sold the company, so it now became someone else's problem, who would have an additional amount of time to work on pollution problems, delaying the required environmental and sustainable steps. Something that challenged my assumption of Brandt's creek was the idea that only "negative" things could be left/found near Brandt's creek, such as needles and other pollutants. Madeline gave the example that some people grow food like zucchinis for others to eat, which really warmed my heart. I wonder if these positive acts are random along Brandt's creek or concentrated in the north-end part of the creek. Brandt's creek report from 1971 was quite shocking to me in terms of the level of professionalism we are expected to see nowadays. It was strange to see a report with such ambiguous wording, poor justification for actions and spelling mistakes. It made me realize why we are in such problematic situations currently and how past actions were not thought through for their potential consequences. However, we now have the tools and skills to do things differently, address sustainability issues holistically through interdisciplinarity and be more consequential focus.

Ilyas Kanybek

I agree with Leandra that this presentation was very relevant to our project in Brandt's creek. It is especially true for the historical comparative studies. We often perceive the world around us as if it has been like that all the time but if you think the landscape is never static and is constantly changing. I think it was very well presented during this presentation by Madeline Donald. I also very much agree with Leandra that in our perception Brandt's creek has been such unwanted place at the margins that people preferred not to think about but if you think it has not always been like that and the place had and still continues to have its own history. Madeline Donald showed us how there is a vegetation and greenery and I think it did impact and a little changed the way we see the creek now.

Thomas Letcher-Nicholls

I found Madeline Donald’s presentation super fascinating; I follow some of her work through her Instagram account (totally worth a follow), and so it was really exciting to hear about the project, methodology and framework behind that!

As Leandra says, I was really grateful for Madeline’s analysis of the sources and photos from the archives that showed how the creek has changed so radically over time. The video from The Guardian was also super interesting; it showed heavily modified waterways from the UK and Netherlands that we often consider really beautiful (Brandt’s Creek has not exactly had the same glow up); and the video showed how these changes are really unsuitable. By trying to control water, we have made flooding worse and made our water bodies much less healthy.

I am still surprised by how little reliable information there is about the creek (it used to be called Brant’s Creek?). Madeline said some of the documents were unidentifiable – and maybe this shows how little true care and attention (excluding control and channelisation) that the creek has received. And I am shocked by how much we have changed the places we live in. To think of Brandt’s Creek as being completely different and much more of a marsh only a hundred years ago is quite dizzying. I think this helps reinforce the idea that places are not at all static, but constantly transforming. I was really inspired by the care that Madeline shows to the creek through close attention and documentation.

I thought about how in settler-colonial nations like Canada and Australia, it is as if the settler-colonial powers are battling the landscape. It is completely the opposite relationship that Indigenous people have with the Land. Indigenous Australian writer Alexis Wright writes that “The building of an Australian nation required myths about resilience … popularised by the idea that this country needed to be ruthlessly conquered, tamed and exploited for its natural resources” (https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/18/a-dream-of-belonging-for-indigenous-australians-the-fabled-outback-is-home). In the case of Brandt’s creek, it feels like the city’s need to channel and control the water has damaged the water way so terribly.

But it was also moving to hear Madeline talk about the river in a way that made it seem so alive. She talked about the creek and the life to be found there persisting despite the limitations placed upon it: trees and shrubs that grew around fences, vegetation that continues to grow, and animals that still make the creek home. She showed that places that might at first glance seem “ugly” to many can still be care for; and I hope our project can do justice to that.

Hoda Pourpirali

Madeline’s presentation was really engaging for me. Significantly the historical pictures of the city from the past until recent years. As an urban planner, this session of her presentation was so interesting. How the city grew and how the landscape of the city changed.

I am really thankful to her because she learned us a lot about the situation of Brandt’s creek. Madeleine's words were hopeful for me, who thought that this creek was going to disappear, and I realized that there are still living creatures living there, and the vegetation is still growing, and some people are taking care of it.

Of course, during my visit there, I saw some deer and ducks, which surprised me. This was my first encounter with a deer in an urban environment and at a very close distance.

In general, each of the lectures and presentations were given in the class will reveal new dimensions of this stream to us and make us more aware of new issues on the subject of sustainability in general, and the stream to Be specific, precise and curious. I eagerly follow her Instagram profile and look forward to every new update from this stream.

Annie Furman

Thanks for this response, Hoda! I very much agree that the historical photos of Kelowna and Brandt’s Creek are quite engaging and informative. I just realized in writing this response that the earliest archive photos significantly predate the earliest/only city writing Madi has uncovered thus far (and by about sixty years!). It’s an odd disconnect, though of course it’s possible there were city documents written about Brandt’s Creek that never made it into the archives for one reason or another. Still, it makes me think about the potential value people place on photographs of the creek vs written elements.

Annie Furman

I am, of course, slightly biased on Madi’s presentation, since I’m working with her on her Riparian Reanimation project for Brandt’s Creek outside of this class. It’s been fascinating to experience how the framing and nuances of Madi’s storytelling about Brandt’s Creek have evolved, even just over the course of the few short months since she first introduced the project to me.

I’m intrigued by Madi’s contextualization of Brandt’s Creek as part of our “unruly heritage,” especially as a kind of alternative viewpoint to looking at Brandt’s Creek as a “wicked problem.” Wicked problems and unruly heritages are both defined by complex issues that defy simple policy approaches, but the language we use to speak about them is quite different. Even just the distinction of labeling something as a “problem” vs a “heritage” has considerable weight behind it—a problem, no matter how wicked and complex, implies that what we are looking for is a solution, and in solving the problem, we will achieve some sort of end goal. Heritage is ongoing. There can be problems and complications embedded in that heritage (or, “things we’ve inherited we don’t want to deal with,” as Madi put it), but the process is exactly that—a process, not an end goal—and in exploring the persistence of heritage, we can work toward leaving a more ecologically sound heritage for future generations.

It’s fascinating to look at historical archive photos of Brandt’s Creek (and see the 1974 report on it), especially with this idea in mind. The way that municipal officials in Kelowna have previously seen Brandt’s Creek (as a ditch, not a creek, as an entity that “is not very significant”) have helped create and perpetuate the creek’s unruly heritage. But Brandt’s Creek still defies the assumptions that those viewpoints create (i.e., the diversity of plant and animal life it actually supports). It makes me consider again Madi’s question that if Brandt’s Creek can do what it’s doing now despite its challenges, what could it do if given room to roam? And what can be added to the heritage of Brandt’s Creek through the process of working to give it room to roam?

Shaiyan Siddique

Hi Annie, I completely agree with you that referring to the situation of Brandt's creek as inheriting an unruly heritage instead of calling it a wicked problem makes a lot of difference. For Brandt's creek and most other sustainability issues, the solution is indeed an ongoing process rather than a distinct end goal. Your opinion on the perseverance of Brandt's creek despite all the negligence that it faces also resonated with me on a deeper level.

Sofia Bahmutsky

Madeline Donald, a PhD candidate in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program - Sustainability theme gave a wonderful lecture about her research, namely about the research she has done about Brandt’s Creek. Madeline’s expertise in riparian ecology provided a very practical perspective of Brandt’s Creek which I especially appreciated given my background in environmental science and biology. Madeline’s initial opening to her talk was about unruly heritage which I thought was a very good parallel concept to the “wicked problems” which was introduced to us in previous lectures. I really admired Madeline’s flow of presenting, providing us a holistic historical timeline of Brandt’s Creek from the early 1900’s to present day with photos and documentation. It was very nice to see the state of the creek prior to large scale human intervention to the area.

Overall, I liked the description of types of species in the riparian area, not only the beneficial species, but also the invasive species such as knapweed, and the species which were introduced but now playing a pseudo-beneficial role (thistle, Siberian elm, chicory). It made me realize how the introduced species are actually helpful in the case of Brandt’s Creek degraded state, such as the elms which hold up steep slopes that now hold up tracts of residential lands which were built much too close to the creek’s natural trajectory course. The explanation about the tule plant was important to convey the rich connection that the Syilx people have to the land plants. The creek today houses transient people as well, and I thought of how much shelter a proper riparian area could provide to people compared to how the bare cement and industrialized area is not hospitable presently.

One thing that Madeline’s presentation made very clear was that Brandt’s Creek was not thought of as important by any means by settlers of the area during the industrialization period. It was noticeable by how little information she could find, and also because in the 1974 report she did have available there were direct statements like “Brandt’s Creek is not very significant”, grammatical errors, and overall seemed like the report was written in an unprofessional manner. This disregard of the inherent values of Brandt’s Creek has led to the perpetual “backburner” mentality which has caused the state of Brandt’s Creek today. By this I mean that its unruly heritage has been exacerbated over the past decades and will continue to be this way unless proper consideration is given to the creek. In Madeline’s words “the creek just needs more room”, and I agree, returning land back to the creek riparian zone is a step in the right direction for the creek, the species, and in turn for the people.

Hoda Pourpirali

Hi Sophia. It seems that the idea of showing the past pictures of Kelowna and Brandt's creek by Madi has been very interesting and has been in mind. For you, me and other friends in the class. It was interesting to point out this.

Madi's presentation contained many dimensions of Kelowna and Brendt's Creek. As it was very interesting to you from the environmental aspects and for me in the urban planning aspect. I completely agree with you that the report previously made for this area is not very rich and maybe it could be better. Overall, our information about Brent creek is very low unfortunately.

Shaiyan Siddique

Madeline Donald is a PhD candidate at UBC Okanagan under the supervision of professor Greg Garrard. Madeline’s presentation gave us some much needed insight about how the situation surrounding Brandt’s creek developed over the better part of the last century. Prior to Madeline’s presentation, I was under the impression that in the past, Brandt’s creek was considered to be of equal or near equal importance to Mill creek or Mission creek. I was under the impression that its relegation in significance was only a recent phenomenon, being dwarfed by the rapid sprawling city surrounding it. However, the gallery of old pictures and their background as discussed in Madeline’s presentation proved otherwise. I was also particularly surprised to see a document from the early 1970s that Madeline presented, of unknown source, describing the creek as insignificant and its then state with rather unkind and unprofessional wording.

Coming from a riverine country such as Bangladesh, I am fully aware of the importance of riparian protecting zones and ecosystems. As highlighted in Madeline’s presentation, this is doubly true for a dry area such as the Okanagan with more than 80% of the biodiversity occurring in in the riparian areas. While listening to this, it reminded me of how I was amazed to look at the Google Earth satellite image of Egypt for the first time back in my childhood. The entire land area of the country consists of yellow sand, being cut through a single line of greenery tracing the river Nile. On the topic of biodiversity, Madeline’s analogy that the riparian zones of Brandt’s creek offer shelter to the homeless just as it does to the biodiversity really moved me and helped me look at the issue from a different light, as I had previously wondered why the homeless choose to be there. I understand that life can be unfair and unpredictable, anything can happen to anyone at anytime and people can sometimes end up in difficult situations due to no fault of their own. Madeline’s referral of these people as experiencing transience and the picture of an open book lying beside Brandt’s creek really touched me and conveyed the sliver of hope that these people hold on to.

I really enjoyed taking this historical tour of the area with Madeline. I also feel that the specific suggestions given by Madeline in the presentation, such as following the example of riparian buffer restoration in the Netherlands and creating a sustainability art project based on the creek will be very useful for the projects of both the groups.

Daisy Pullman

I work with Madeline Donald on the Kelownafornia project so I am already somewhat familiar with her research on Brandt’s Creek and proposed restoration (and puppet show!). Nonetheless, it was great to hear her presentation and I learnt a lot. The 1974 report referenced was an interesting resource for understanding the historical ecology of the creek and will be helpful for our projects as it helps contextualise the creek’s evolution over the decades.

I found the historical photos Madeline Donald used to be a great illustration of just how dramatically the landscape of downtown Kelowna has changed over the decades. From a marshy, wetland ecosystem to an urban, concrete-covered neighbourhood. We can see just how artificial the landscape is, and how intensely channelised Brandt's Creek is now compared to its 'natural' meandering state.

The examples Madeline Donald gave of successfully 'unimproved' waterways in the UK and the Netherlands were intriguing. I really like the concept of 'unimprovement' as I think it challenges the idea of human supremacy over nature and Western ideas of linear progress and the unimpeachability of scientific knowledge.

Anjali Desai

It was interesting to hear from Mandeline Donald, a current PhD student at UBCO, about her research interests and the involvement of fellow classmates in associated projects. I was fascinated by the historical archival images of the development of Kelowna over the years and rapid industrialization gradually taking over the land once covered by natural flora and fauna. This takes my mind to back home, Mumbai, a case study which I also bring in our group project. Rapid industrialization, encroachment and channelization of the river banks led to one of the worst floods in the Mithi river back in 2006. Learning from such scalable case studies, the city must focus on reviving the creek to be prepared of any future natural calamities. Located in the Okanagan valley, Kelowna is a rapidly developing city, which has experienced its share of calamities driven by climate change, e.g., the wildfires and drought in 2017 and 2018 due to the record high precipitation followed extreme heat (City of Kelowna, 2020). The Climate Projections for the Okanagan region 2020 report by the City of Kelowna calls for leaders across the local community to work together and adapt to the changes in the local climate to build a more resilient community