Farnham Glacier Creek Bridge Incident of 2024

October 2024

The Bridge.

For years, Farnham - a place that I've referred to as "The Glacier" - has waited for adventurous explorers at the head of Farnham Creek in the Kootenay Mountains of Eastern British Columbia. Even as it tried to kill us on our second visit, one can surely gather from the two stories I've written after visiting that this truly is a special place.

Stories of Farnham

The road to Farnham is long, but is - for the most part - a typically non-technical forest service road (FSR) - that even a carefully driven stock 2WD truck could handle. The last couple miles get a little steep, and depending on the time of year, a water crossing at the top benefits from the traction of four wheels, but it's the bridge, just before the final climb, that nearly broke social media, and shed light on a conflict that'd been brewing for years.

And that light may result - this is a developing story - in the bridge being removed, making access to Farnham being significantly more difficult.

September 2024 - The Instagram Reel

I have no idea why I was on Instagram a few days after we returned from nearly being blown off the mountain on our second visit to Farnham - perhaps it was for one of my terribly infrequent AdventureTaco photo drops - but for whatever reason, I was, and the algorithm did its job, showing me a reel of the bridge we'd recently visited (note, this reel has since been removed).

The video. Or, someone else's screen recording of it. Original recording on August 9, 2024.

At the time - after having spent quite a bit of time picking what I felt like was the safest line across the bridge - my thoughts were twofold:

LOL, those guys! Must be nice to have humongous tires!

me

WTF are those guys doing, they must know better than that!?

also me

As usual, I chalked it up to social media and didn't give it much more thought. It seemed that no one else did, either. For a while.

October 5, 2024 - The YouTube Video

I never saw it, but apparently, the weekend of October 5-6, a video (now removed) was posted by another participant on YouTube and encompassed the entire trip from the original Instagram reel. In it, Mike, Colin, and Kevin were shown driving over the dilapidated side of the bridge.

Additionally, being a longer-form video, it also contained provocative remarks by some of the participants. While arguably - and by their account later - jokes, these remarks were nonetheless inflammatory. One example was Mike saying something along the lines of, "It's a bridge that should be burned to keep the overlanders out."

Easy to take the wrong way. (source)

This caused an uproar.

Understandably, people who'd never seen the bridge were appalled at the apparent lack of care that the folks driving over the rotten half were showing. Comments condemning their actions fell into several categories, none of them great:

• This is how trails get closed.
• This is not Tread Lightly.
• This is the problem with YouTube and Instagram.
• You guys are a bunch of entitled F#%ks.
• Someone should fix that bridge, rather than destroy it.

There were also a few comments from folks who knew the bridge, and while those comments echoed some of the above, they also took an - interestingly - different tone:

• The sketchiness of that bridge has always looked worse than it was.
• That bridge is in not much worse shape than it was a few years ago.
• It looks dramatic, but they aren't doing any real damage.
• Drawing attention to the video is just going to get the bridge pulled by the Crown (this is what Canadian's call their government, which owns the public land the bridge sits on).

Naturally, the conversation across Social Media - the healthiest part of the internet - devolved into a bunch of yelling. Well, not so much yelling as frantic typing in order to be the loudest - or at least most frequent - bubble in the feed.

October 6, 2024 - The GoFundMe

Everything might have died down, had the video not caught the attention of Jeff ▮▮▮▮▮▮▮▮▮ . Jeff, it turns out, had a bad interaction - a few years earlier - with some of the guys who made the video, as he himself happened to describe, a few weeks earlier:

The story (enlarge) (source).

Still holding a grudge, he saw the YouTube video and Instagram post as an opening. Here, he could rally the (largely uneducated) Social Media masses in his favor. His idea - to call attention to the deteriorating bridge and rally support to fix it - sounded nice on the surface, but to anyone who knows, was a dangerous escalation.

Jeff already had a GoFundMe entitled Farnham Bridge Repair, purportedly to raise funds to repair the bridge. This was the perfect opportunity to push the visibility to a larger audience, which could rally behind the effort and give a reason to reach out to the Crown for support. More than a thousand dollars were donated and the process of reaching out to the Crown to "get permission" for repairs was initiated.

The escalation. (enlarge | source)

The reason this was a dangerous escalation may not be apparent to those who don't frequent places such as Farnham. To most, the idea of working with the Crown to repair a bridge that is clearly in rough shape seems like the right thing to do. Unfortunately, reality is that places like these are already - by and large - places that the Crown has no desire to maintain. Often times, these FSRs are explicitly deactivated (decommissioned), at which point access ranges from "at your own risk" to "impossible" depending on the methods used to close the road. At the very least, these places become liabilities for the Crown, as our society has become more litigious, suing in situations that are clearly our own fault.

Still, many of these deactivated roads are enjoyed by offroad enthusiasts because - as with Farnham - they lead to spectacular scenery and faraway places that few are able to visit. These folks continue to visit, aware of the risks, and - usually - with the approach that if anything goes wrong, it's on them - not the Crown - to foot the bill.

October 7-10, 2024 - The Yelling Intensifies

If Social Media excels at one thing, it is escalating conflict. Known innocuously as "the algorithm," we all know that the surest way to drive engagement is through anger. It's not those likes - though they are so often requested - that get an influencer the most views and interactions, it's the downvotes and angry reactions that drive the distribution.

And this was certainly an issue that could be yelled about. An issue where it was easy to stoke the flames, and yet seem to be "doing the right thing." Jeff got the ball rolling in several Facebook groups, and stepped back to watch the flames intensify, all while shrugging and stating that he was "just trying to help," with his "best-of-intentions" GoFundMe.

Initially, the folks who'd created the Instagram and YouTube videos continued to be inflammatory in their response, defending their actions and pushing the issue even further. This would escalate to the point where one sponsor of the YouTube creator was compelled to post a statement condemning the action and stating that they would no longer be sponsoring this individual.

Not surprising. (source)

Eventually, these folks would recognize that they were not helping their cause, and they quieted down, ultimately removing the offending Instagram and YouTube content.

Through all this, I was impressed by one voice I didn't expect to be a standout for me. Shaun is a YouTuber, with an eye for the dramatic. He knows - and has explored - with folks both directly involved and generally in the area. And yet, he seemed to have the most level-headed responses of all. Kudos Shaun.

This is the way. (enlarge | source)

October 7-10, 2024 - The Organized Response

For decades, the offroad enthusiasts and the Crown have participated in the delicate dance of the continued use of deactivated roads. The reason for this was simple - many of those employed by the Crown to maintain these places before they are deactivated are, themselves, enthusiasts. Furthermore, with relatively little blowback, there's been no reason to change the status quo.

Social Media is changing all that. Where enthusiasts might previously have visited, taken a few photos, and shared those photos with their friends, the endorphin-inducing algorithms of Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube now push not just enthusiasts, but also content creators to venture out in search of dramatic videos and the corresponding likes. Those dramatic videos are the problem, in two ways:

1. They look bad. While the creator of a video may know that what they are doing is not actually as dramatic as they may make it seem, the perception is that the activity is dramatic. And, for better or worse (usually the latter), when people who look like they know what they are doing do something, it leads others - who may not know what they are doing - to do the same. Or worse.
2. They draw attention - at an unprecedented scale - to that delicate dance between the Crown and enthusiasts. A dance that cannot be acknowledged, if it is to continue.

Much like the Crown, off-road organizations also have an image to uphold. These organizations serve as the public face of off-road enthusiasts, interfacing with both the Crown and general public to sponsor trail cleanups, restore fire lookouts, and raise awareness of the importance of continued access to public trails and lands.

Of them, the 4WD Association of British Columbia (4WDABC) is one of the best. This group has done so much for the off-road community, has amazing connections and interactions with the Crown, and is held in such high regard by both the community and Crown, that it's truly impressive. Put on the spot as the spotlight was shown on the video of off-road enthusiasts behaving rather poorly at the Farnham Bridge, 4WDABC didn't rush out to support one side or the other, but instead spent the better part of several days crafting their message.

A thoughtful response. (enlarge | source)

In addition to the response from the 4WDABC, the drama around this bridge - and the GoFundMe escalation - also caught the attention of the Crown. Unable to acknowledge the delicate dance that the Farnham bridge represented, their hand was forced, and a company was contracted to remove the bridge.

Note: as of 2024-10-10 this plan is still hearsay, and no bridge removal has yet taken place. I hope to update this story as it continues to unfold.

Update - 2024-10-14: This plan was executed as suggested. See The Removal, below.

The plan according to Facebook.

original post on the left (enlarge | source). | Comments on the right (enlarge | source).

October 7, 2024 - The Confession

Perhaps the saddest element of this bridge removal post was a single comment in the slew of comments that continued to address the situation. This comment was telling.

Stepping out from behind the curtain of "best intentions."

And so, as it stands as of October 10, the bridge to Farnham Glacier will soon be lost to history. Not because it posed any real threat - it was a falsely dramatic obstacle that was easily navigated - but because of a poor decision to post a dramatic video and grudge between two groups of enthusiasts that was escalated out of spite. A decision and grudge that were amplified by Social Media, to the point that something had to give.

And, as of now, it looks like we all lose.

October 11, 2024 - The Removal

To my knowledge, no one ventured up to watch the removal of the bridge on October 11, but Niel's post that a crew was going to remove the bridge was accurate and the bridge was removed.

October 13, 2024 - The Bridge is Gone; Access is Not

In the first footage I've seen, @geoscoutadventures headed up Farnham Creek to visit the glacier over the weekend of October 12-13 and posted the following story to Instagram. The bridge has been removed, and a very gentle - at least, given current water levels - crossing of the Farnham Creek headwaters has been graded in.

From falsely sketchy to ho-hum. (source)

October 14, 2024 - The End Result

As compared to the rest of this timeline, I suppose this section is more my opinion than a catalog of what happened.

Based on what I've read online, I don't think what transpired over the last couple of months - since that first Instagram Reel - and culminated in an avalanche of action over the last couple of days, was what anyone was hoping for. Here's how I see it for pretty much everyone involved:

• The original drivers over the bridge. It seemed that these guys enjoyed the bridge, if for no other reason than it was a gatekeeper that prevented more traffic from going somewhere that their trucks could get relatively easily. I think they also probably didn't enjoy the spotlight being shown on their behavior, at least insomuch as it was negatively interpreted.
• Jeff. At least from his actions here, his main goal was retribution and to restrict access - for some of the original drivers over the bridge - to the remainder of the road up to The Glacier. At least given the current situation at the creek, exactly the opposite happened, and access is now easier than ever.
• 4WDABC. This entire situation looked bad, no matter which direction/side one found themselves on. I'm sure that 4WDABC already feels tons of pressure to walk the line between stewards of the land and guardians of open access to public spaces. Situations like this make that a harder job for them, and without a doubt, they'd rather avoid this sort of thing entirely.
• The Crown. Arguably, The Crown had been dragging their feet on the bridge removal for years, so perhaps this was a nice forcing function for the removal. But ultimately, I think they would have preferred to continue to ignore that bridge, save the money, and let it decay over time until it became impassable. This - possibly - would have had the additional "benefit" to The Crown of also restricting access to the remainder of the trail, but we'll never know at this point.

And, I suppose there's one more player in all this - social media. They of course were the only winners. For a few days, or even arguably a few weeks, their algorithms were able to capitalize on the chaos.

And so, as of now, it looks like the joke, once again, is on us.

 

Edit History

Date	Update
2024-16	Updated based on some feedback: Added the first names of the individuals involved with the YouTube video, as I've learned them to be Removed some references to the name "Jeff" as it was suggested that there were too many.
2024-14	Added: October 11, 2024 - The Removal October 13, 2024 - The Bridge is Gone Access is Not October 14, 2024 - The End Result Updated October 5, 2024 - The YouTube Video to include a clip of one of the comments from the YouTube video. October 7-10, 2024 - The Yelling Intensifies to include post from AllTerra Tech.
2024-10	original timeline authored