Efforts underway to capitalize on potential of Port Maitland; County to spend $92,000 on improvements and plan over next four years

Posted By KAREN BEST

Posted 2 years ago

For several millennium, visitors walked the shores of Lake Erie by the mouth of the Grand River. Some made their homes in what is now called Port Maitland.

Today the junction of river and lake continue to draw anglers, boaters, divers, swimmers and tourists. How to cater to visitors and to respect those who live there will be balanced when Haldimand County begins to study in earnest the tourist potential of the small village and port.

"So why not promote the area?" he asks.

His vision is shared. "We see Port Maitland being a critical element of our dream to improve tourism," says Craig Manley, general manager of planning and economic development. "There's all sorts of opportunity and potential."

A former resident and an avid historian, Bill Warnick nurses a strong passion for this place. He wants its history to be more widely known. "Port Maitland has a ton of potential," he says.

Those who are intimately aware of the area's charms call it home. Joe Flatt loves living in Port Maitland where he has had a wonderful view of the river and lake for 50 or 51 years. That's how long he has operated Flatt's Fly, Bait and Tackle on Esplanade Park, the street running parallel to the river and ending where the beach begins.

"The river is what's it all about," he states.

The store opens about mid-April and closes around Oct. 1. "It all depends on the weather, what I have in stock, what mood I'm in," he says. "If the weather's nice, people linger."

When tourism is mentioned, Flatt points out, "There's not a heck of a lot down here. It's a dead end."

But he is just getting warmed up. "I love it, " he admits.

Since the pier was revamped, all kinds of people come down here, says Flatt. "What we need are benches on the pier. I would pay for one myself," he adds.

Then he remembers public washrooms that he is sure tourists will appreciate.

Once spring arrives, men, women and children begin their pilgrimage to the port to fish and launch boats. The place is filled up when bass are running in July and when the pickerel are plentiful.

As far as he is concerned, the beach is disgraceful and needs a good cleaning to clear away debris whipped up during winter storms.

"What we have, and if it was tidied up and a few benches on the pier and if the county fixed up the boat launch, I think that's all we need," says Flatt. "A restaurant would go good."

He is okay with the county's plan to do a tourism study.

This year, Port Maitland surfaced into the Haldimand County 10-year capital budget. Council approved spending $7,000 to pour a new cement pad to repair and maintain the publicly owned boat ramp. As well, $10,000 will be invested in new playground equipment for the park alongside the river. In three years, the capital plan proposes to build a $25,000 pavilion in the park.

Bringing the total four-year investment in Port Maitland to a total of $92,000, $30,000 will be spent next year on the tourism initiative and another $20,000 in 2010.

Both figures are are slotted in at this point, confirms Coun. Don Ricker, who always checks in with Flatt , also known as the mayor of Port Maitland, to run ideas by him or announce his intention to visit his domain.

"Port Maitland is and always will be one of the gems of Haldimand County because of its location and amenities. Haldimand County is not using it to its potential," says Ricker.

For too long, the county has put off looking at leisure services and tourism possibilities in this part of the county, he continues.

While he just like council managers are interested in knowing what can be done to promote tourism in Port Maitland, Ricker also wants to ensure that whatever is done fits with the lives of people who live there.

The first people who enjoyed the mouth of the Grand River were members of several First Nations.

Archaeologists called the first inhabitants Mound Builders but they were extinct before Europeans arrived, according to Grand Heritage, a history book published by the Dunnville District Heritage Association. Other aboriginal people moved in. Known collectively as the Eastern Woodland peoples, they were Petun, Huron and Neutrals.

The latter nation traded with both the Huron and Iroquois, which formed a confederacy of five nations in the late 1500s. Around 1650, the Iroquois wiped out Huron and Neutral villages. For about 100 years, members of the Mississaugas stopped by the port. Around 1720, the Tuscarora were taken into the Confederacy that became known as Six Nations.

Many historians believe Etienne Brule was the first European to pass through Dunnville on the Grand River and on Lake Erie. He was with Samuel de Champlain when Quebec was founded in 1608. Sixty-one years later, French missionaries Francois Dollier de Casson and Rene Brehant De Galinee, who charted the first map of the Grand river, explored it down to the lake.

In 1784, the British government purchased land along the river from the Mississaugas for Six Nations. The confederacy nations lost territory due to their allegiance with Britain in the American War of Independence.

For Warnick, Port Maitland's rich history is something he longs to share with visitors.

After the War of 1812, the Britain built a naval depot on the east side of Port Maitland. The compound, with its 18 buildings and wharf, was built just in case the Americans did not keep their war treaty promise to keep warships off the lakes. By 1837, the depot was gone.

Marine history veered toward another course as the port was soon to become a busy shipping lane and tourist destination.

In the 1827, construction began on the Dunnville dam, part of the Welland Canal system. Warnick says natives told officials their land would be flooded but were told that would not happen. It did because the dam raised the river by nine feet (2.7 metres).

In 1843, a feeder canal extension was cut in from the east side of Port Maitland through Stromness and into Dunnville where a lock stood at what is now Food Basics. The canal, which opened up shipping into the upper river, continued on Main Streets and through the present day intersection to the river. The canal is still under the street, says Warnick.

Port Maitland became a popular port of call for tour boats out of Port Stanley, Port Dover, Dunkirk, Buffalo and Cleveland. Some carried up to 400 passengers, notes Warnick. In 1904, the river's bottom was dredged so the tour boats could travel up to Dunnville.

By 1849, the village population was 50 and the commercial district included two stores and two taverns. An Episcopal church and a tailor and blacksmith were also open for business.

In 1916, the Toronto, Hamilton and Buffalo railway finished its terminal and embarked on bulk shipping line to the United States. Located on the east side of Port Maitland, the company owned the former naval depot property but people began camping on it. Eventually wooden platforms were built for tent floors and then walls. Soon cottages were standing. In 1833, the Beckley beach deed was signed.

During the American prohibition on alcohol between 1920 and 1937, falsified papers for liquor destined for Cuba and the West Indies were a red herring to cloak a busy rum running industry. When the train reached Port Maitland, cases were stowed away on tiny boats headed for the American shore, says Warnick.

While fishing was going on for decades in the area, other industries set up shop in the mid 1900s. Gas well drilling also began out in the lake.

All this history makes Port Maitland a fascinating place. Warnick wants to see it showcased in an interpretative centre. His location of choice is an orange fish processing building at the intersection of Port Maitland Road and Esplanade Park. He also believes other fish houses can be converted into novelty stores and an old tug boat dry-docked for tourists to wander through.

His vision also includes a replica naval depot built on the west side of Port Maitland and a passenger ferry carrying tourists over from the east side where a parking lot lease was arranged with Mosaic, the company that owns the former IMC property.

Warnick also wants tourists to walk into Port Maitland. He dreams of a trail meandering from Rock Point Provincial to the refurbished lock and then down Canal Road to Stromness and on to Dunnville.

Trails are also on the minds of county managers. A consultant hired through the provincial Communities in Action program is looking at connecting trails into Port Maitland. Hanly wants to link county trails into the Wainfleet trail and to see a pathway created in the Marshall Woodlot of Inman Road.

Because walking and cycling are spontaneous activities, trails are tourist drawing cards, especially with the county's natural areas, notes Hanly.

"If we can bring people here, it will drive the economy," he points out.

Currently the county is not promoting and benefiting from waterfront tourism according to a tourist destination report filed with council in November. Based on the report, boating slips will be one of the improvements studied by the county in their Port Maitland tourism initiative.

Manley says the county will look at natural features and county owned lands to get a sense of what could be, how that might happen and what kind of infrastructure will be required.

The tourism initiative will create a business or overall plan identifying realistic projects and related costs, he adds. Throughout, community consultation will play a huge role but there will always be competing interests and challenges, points out Manley.

Along with community consultation, the county will work with the Port Maitland Historical Association, says Hanly.

Some history has sunk. A ship scuttled in the river when the naval depot was operating is one of the wrecks lodged on the river bed and the bottom of the lake near Port Maitland. Clarity is reported to be excellent in the winter, says Hanly who thinks scuba diving can become yet another activity worthy of promotion.

Overall, costs related to creating a plan and acting upon it will not be substantial, he continues. All tourism materials will be created by county employees and a university can be contacted to complete landscape and conceptual designs, he says.

While brainstorming with sights set on the stars, the county will look at what makes sense and keep grounded in crafting proposals, Hanly states.

"We don't want to turn it into a Port Dover," he emphasizes.