The Kinder Morgan pipeline runs through our neighbourhood. When the pipeline was built 60 years ago, this was not a residential area. The pipeline was already more than 30 years old when the city rezoned this area for housing, collecting development permit fees at the time and residential taxes ever since.
Kinder Morgan checks for leaks with weekly helicopter flights, spot-checks at ground level, keeps the pipeline route well-marked, keeps tree roots away from the pipeline, and provides emergency information to every home in the neighbourhood every few years.
To build houses near the pipeline and then demand that the pipeline be moved away because it’s near the houses seems fundamentally unfair to the pipeline owners.
It reminds me of my relatives who owned a chicken farm. People built homes all around their farm, then forced the farm to close because they didn’t like the smell of chickens.
And there are people who’ve built homes near blueberry farms and are now trying to ban the propane cannons the farmers use to scare birds away from their berries.
If you knew, or ought to have known, what you were getting into when you chose where to live, it’s not someone else’s responsibility to adjust the world to your taste. Those pipelines, chicken farms and propane cannons all contribute to your enjoyment of a fresh-baked blueberry muffin.
Alan T. Chattaway
Surrey