After months of consultation and debate, the Vancouver Park Board has voted to approve a $90-million expansion of the aquarium in Stanley Park.

In 1995, an agreement was put in place to ensure there was a public referendum if the Vancouver Aquarium put forward plans to expand. In addition, last year, a commitment was made to ensure a public referendum in 2008 on the subject of phasing whales and dolphins out of the Aquarium.

However, in May 2006, members of the city's park board voted 4-2 to overturn the policy deferring any expansion by the Vancouver Aquarium until it is approved in a citywide referendum. The park board also scrapped, by the same 4-2 margin, the commitment made last year to submit the emotional issue of keeping whales and dolphins at the aquarium to a separate referendum in 2008.

The area occupied by the aquarium will grow by 50 per cent, requiring the removal of 32 trees. Monday night's vote on the project had been expected to be close, but only one park board commissioner voted against the plan.

Some people spoke out against the project at the public meeting, saying a bigger aquarium means more animals in captivity. This is the view of the Marine Connection.

The park board has imposed some conditions although disappointingly this does not include prohibiting no more dolphins or whales. It has been stated that the aquarium must pay for the maintenance of the new plaza and a new salmon stream. It also has to donate 1,000 aquarium passes each year to community centres.

The Aquarium hopes construction, which is expected to take four years, will begin in Spring 2007.

Source: CBC News