It’s considered by some to be the jewel in the crown of Langford's beauty spots, but fears are growing for Langford Lake, which locals say has been polluted by waste running into the watercourse from a nearby construction site.
Since October 2023, residents have noticed a pale-yellow sediment accumulating on the lake bed in the bay near Panda Place, which they say is killing aquatic plants and having a knock-on effect for the dependent ecosystem.
“So now it's basically dead, weeds won't even grow through it,” says Clayton Leachman, who has been lobbying the City of Langford to take action. “It’s such a heavy sediment.”
“Twelve months ago the city should have put something in place to stop it from running out into the lake and dropping on to the bottom and killing in essence all of the marine life,” adds a Goldstream Avenue resident who has lived next to the lake for 35 years. “They’ve just dropped the ball big time.”
The strange sediment has been entering the lake via a stream, fed by a culvert located upstream at the end of Wenger Terrace, next to Highway 1. At the culvert the collection of sediment often creates a brown-beige foam, which Leachman describes as a “toxic bubble-bath.”
“If this is how we're treating our ‘jewel’, people need to make a stand,” he says.
While not officially confirmed to be the cause, the residents think it's no coincidence the appearance of the sediment began when work started on a nearby construction site.
“It was running clear before they started,” said one resident of Panda Place.
In response to the concerns, the City of Langford retained the services of Corvidae Environmental Consulting in November 2023 to investigate the sediment. The consultants collected water samples from two culverts and the lake, and also took a sample of the sediment, before reporting their findings to the council in a report, dated June 13.
Information from the report, obtained via a Freedom of Information request made by a resident, notes water samples taken from both culverts show concentrations of cadmium, cobalt, nickel and zinc, which all exceed B.C. Approved Water Quality Guidelines. High levels of calcium and magnesium were also noted.
However, water samples collected at Langford Lake were said to be in compliance with the same guidelines, because of the “dilution effect on the stormwater entering the larger body of water.”
“It is reasonable to state that the input from the watercourse is not having a deleterious effect on Langford Lake’s water quality with respect to human health or aquatic life,” according to the report.
The sample of sediment taken from the culvert at Wegner Terrace was found to be mainly composed of “fine inorganic material with a high calcium content”, characteristic of limestone and sedimentary rocks.
"No efforts to remove accumulated sediment from the watercourse or the lake are required as none of the materials analyzed exceed any standards or guidelines for the parameters sampled,” says the report.
According to the report, the accumulated sediment is a potential by-product of rock and mineral stripping in an upland area under development, which has recently undergone activities involving drilling, blasting, rock crushing and excavating.
While the environmental consultants say no action is required to remove the sediment, their report suggests detention ponds in the nearby development area could be built to "avoid future increases in dissolved metals concentrations in the watercourse."
However, locals have noted one glaring omission from the report – they say it does not consider the layer of sediment which has accumulated in the lake and its impact on the ecosystem.
And they fear the area affected is starting to grow and spread.
"The city should be trying to stop it from getting even worse,” said Leachman. “But nobody seems to be overly concerned, and that's what really pisses me off.”
Additional testing and reporting is still underway, confirmed a spokesperson for the City of Langford in an emailed statement to the Goldstream Gazette.
“The city continues to work with and follow the guidance of the environmental professional [Corvidae Environmental Consulting] in determining the sediment’s source and any appropriate actions to take,” said the spokesperson.
But for Leachman, time is running out, and he wants the city to take action now.
"Somebody has got to be held accountable to the environment," he says. "Whether it be the council, the developer, or both. It shouldn't rely on residents having to kick and scream all the way to council."
"We gotta fix it now, it's the lake, it only has one life."
