are diamonds this girl's best friend?

on the subject of the economic future of temagami, our options are limited. i do believe that the forestry option is off the table for at least a generation. all of temagami's mills from the 1950's onward have closed, never to reopen, including the temagami forest products birch mill. that mill was a monumental waste of 10 years, where nearly all of the municipal council's economic development efforts went into that. as for tourism, i honestly don't see a major increase in the numbers anytime soon. true, visitor days will continue to increase slowly, with blips from things like flu outbreaks, u.s. government policy or road blockades. i do see hook and bullet tourism decreasing slowly while ecotourism increases slowly to offset those losses. what else is there? cottage and new home development will probably increase in importance to become a medium-size player. government and retail services won't create economic development on their own, they will simply respond to the growth in other areas.

so i see us in a generation of enhanced status quo, with one big wild card.

diamonds.

if any one development has the potential to knock us out of our rut of enhanced status quo, it is diamonds. temagami lies along the same geological formation on which de beers is developing the victor diamond mine west of attawapiskat.

at least two companies, tres-or and temex, are conducting advanced exploration in temagami. tres-or is working two properties, one near bay lake and the other near rib lake, while temex is working near wilson lake.

adroit resources provides a good overview of the diamond potential in temagami here.

would a diamond mine be a good thing for temagami? as an open pit, it would be a blight on the landscape, every bit as bad as the sherman mine. it would increase access pressure for motorized recreation elsewhere in the region. it wouldn't do anything to speed or slow timber extraction. it would raise property values and bring families into the nipissing-temagami-temiskaming shores area. housing development would increase, particularly on the lakes lining highway 11. municipal tax revenues would soar.

for another 25 years, temagami would be a rich little town, until the diamonds have all been dug up. i have no illusions however that the town would be able to use this windfall to secure its long term future.