GEOG 2OC3 Lecture 7: The West
26 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
The West
The parries, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba
• .% of Caadas aea
• 17.7%of Canadas population
• 4.4% OF Caadas GD
Statistics
• Reliant in the primary sector
• Resource extraction is nearly triple that of the rest of Canada
• Athabasca Tar Sands- an economic and environmental issue
Economy
• Primary sector
• The manufacturing and service sectors have been expanding in recent year
• Growth is partially due to its rising economic fortunes associated with the expansion of the
primary sector.
Perceptions of the West
• Flat landscape
• Wheat farming
• The lael parries is misleading, however, as the environmental categorization (a prairie is a dry
grassland ecosystem) is only applicable to the southernmost part of the region
• the et ea out- crops did poorly one year but there are hopes that they will do better
next year
Urbanization
• Calgary/Edmonton corridor in the province of Alberta experienced increased urbanization as
well as economic diversification
• This highly urbanized region can be seen as a smaller scale version of the Windsor- Quebec city
urban axis in the industrial heartland of southern Ontario and southern Quebec
• 2013, Quebec was responsible for roughly 82,000 of new net jobs generated in the Canadian
economy
• Most jobs were in mining, construction, oil/gas exploration
Interior Plains
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• Primarily found in Saskatchewan and Manitoba
• The region is characterized by low relief
• Geologically stable, underlain by million years of sedimentary marine rocks of remnants of
paleoenvironments that held a high level of biotic diversity.
• Striped appearance of the Alberta badlands- reveals the different depositional environments
occurring over hundreds of millions of years
• Mesozoic era- fossils
• Sedimentary rocks are often superb reservoir rocks for fossil fuels, and the interior region of
Canada is therefore of mineral resources.
• Oil, gas, coal, and potash are the four leading mineral resources in the region
Banff
• Alberta Side of the Rocky Mountains- Caadas oldest Natioal pak- 1885
• Canadian cordillera
• Construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway was integral to the development of the Canadian
Pacific Railway- integral to the development of the park bringing tourists from all over Canada
• 4 million tourists/ year
Physical Landscape
• Canadian shield and the Interior plains
• Influence of glaciation (not as prominent as Southern Ontario)
• Not detrimental to settlement as with the case with other regions (Ontario and Quebec)
• Prairie Grassland ecosystem was a deterrent to settlement until the advent of mechanized
agriculture
• This is because the deep intricate root systems of the prairie grasses made it extremely difficult
for farmers to work the land
• Bonanza: first settlers used this area, root systems of the grasses kept the sod solid that settlers
were able to build sod houses- beneficial since prairie land has no wood for building
Fertile Belt
• Region of Western Canada
• Continental climate- not large bodies of water, hot summers and cold winters, low precipitation
• Not favorable for agriculture
Palliser’s Triangle
• Continental climate
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• Sub-regional variations in both temperature and precipitation
• East and west differences
East- conditions in southern Manitoba in the vicinity of Winnipeg, is desied as otietal
iteio
• With somewhat cold winters
• Black soil zone: tall grassland ecosystem where soils feature a high organize content and great
depth
West- Medicine hat Alberta Pallises tiagle is seiaid, ith feuet ate defiiencies
• The vegetation is sparse, mainly prairie grasses
• Soil is brown and shallow, high lime and salt content, and low organic matter making poor for
agriculture
Environmental Challenges
• Release of carbon dioxide and Sulphur dioxide from the Athabasca Tar Sands operations and
radioactive waste from abandoned uranium mines
• The volume of water diverted from the South and North Saskatchewan rivers have become an
issue
o Drought
o pollution
o Water usage
Captain John Pasiller Expedition- 1857
Identified two natural habitation zones:
• Semi-arid short grass zone (not suited for agriculture)
• Sub-humid area of tall grasses (suitable for agriculture)
Prerequisites for settlement at this time were:
1. A land survey
2. Separate lands for Native peoples
3. A rail link between the east and west
Settlement of the West
Influenced by large corporate entities
• Hudson Bay company- control of all lands drained by ricers into the Hudson Bay form 1670-1870
‘upets Lad
• Canadian Pacific Railway- granted title to some 25 million acres of land leading up to the
construction of the transcontinental railroad
Homesteaders
• The region was characterized by largely subsistence agriculture
• Large numbers of settlers were still required in the region in order to prevent norther US
expansion since earlier attempts at colonization were not successful
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