In the 1960s and 70s, Brentwood Bay was a small farming community, with lots of agricultural land surrounding the village. On the main street there were two grocery stores, a bank, a post office and a school, as well as some family homes. There were trees lining the side(s) of the main road. There was also a church and a gas station. In the bay itself, there were a few small marinas for fishing boats and there was an electrical plant on the edge of town near one of the marinas. When Rowen lived in Brentwood with her family, there were 2 large lots nearby which had just one house each. There was also a farm with a barn nearby. Before she lived there, Rowen describes how this area used to be an orchard.
Brentwood has grown quite a bit, especially in terms of housing. On the main street, there are much taller buildings with apartments and shops. They removed many trees on the main street in order to widen the road/sidewalks. On the 2 lots near the house where Rowen lived, the original homes were torn down and three homes were built on each lot. Nearby, the farm with a barn was converted to housing. The old electrical plant was also removed and replaced with housing. Rowen notes that because Brentwood densified rather that expanding outwards, more of the surrounding agricultural and park/forest land could be left intact. Additionally, Rowen describes how the marinas in the bay became bigger and there are generally more large boats, as well as live-aboard boats. Finally, Rowen also notes that invasive wall lizards and grey squirrels have taken the space of their native equivalents.
As a child, Rowen and her family came to Brentwood to access the shops, particularly so that her mother could do the grocery shopping. She also recalls visiting the bank and post office with her mother, and remembers going to the fish and chip shop as a special treat. Later on, she lived there with her own family and described continuing to use the shops in Brentwood, while also walking more in the village and in the surrounding parks. Rowen also used to work in Brentwood and described how she could walk to work. Rowen and her family would sail in the bay, especially in the summer time. As Brentwood became busier, Rowen described how she moved away from Brentwood, and although she still uses Brentwood in a similar way, she is there less frequently.
Rowen describes how she thinks Brentwood will continue to grow by becoming denser and busier. As both the interviewer and someone who has lived in Brentwood in the past, I think that the local council should continue to try prevent urban sprawl as much as possible in order to protect the agricultural and natural landscapes in the area. I feel that improving food security on the island is likely a good strategy in the face of the uncertainties associated with climate change, however, farmers may need to adapt to the changing climate, which Rowen describes as already become much drier and warmer. Protecting natural areas within and around Brentwood is also important, both in terms of ecosystems services like carbon sequestration, and for human and animal well-being.
Nina: Hello, my name is Nina Moffat and today I’m talking with my mum Rowan Moffat about Brentwood Bay, which is a village located on the Saanich Peninsula, which is on the southern tip of Vancouver Island in British Columbia Canada. So, Mum, my first question for you, is about what Brentwood Bay used to look like, can you describe what it was like when you were a kid?
Rowen: So, we used to come into Brentwood occasionally for my mum to do her grocery shopping. There was… two grocery stores, a bank, a post office, down the main street of Brentwood. And there were a couple of family homes there. There were trees sort of lining the road. There was the church. But was very small and quiet. There was a gas station, I guess down the end. Yeah, it was very farm… farm… farm-like around it. There was… farm settings all around the perimeter of the village and yeah. That was, that was Brentwood.
Nina: Cool. And yeah, so it sounds like it was quite small.
Rowen: Yes.
Nina: And yeah, more like agricultural community. And so what does it look like now? What would you say has changed?
Rowen: So, it’s, it’s grown quite a bit. There’s still a bank, there’s one grocery store now. There is… the post office moved. There are more taller buildings with apartments in them. More, more stores, more shops. The church is gone. And they took a fair bit of trees out to widen the road and sidewalks. They put a roundabout in. They’re… the old, the original old school is actually on the main street. Which they use… it’s… they don’t use it as a school anymore, it’s for private functions and it does have a nice park… park-like setting around it. It’s just generally a lot busier. There’s more people that live there on the, on the, on the side streets. Yeah. That’s what it… and then when we lived… do you want to hear about when we lived there now?
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: … in Brentwood?
Nina: That sounds good.
Rowen: So we lived in Brentwood itself for… for over 20 years. We lived about a block from the main street. And in… while we were living there, the houses across the street from… across the street and to the sides of us, they both… they had one home on them, and they both had those houses taken down and three more homes were put into that same lot. And, well, that happened all around us.
Nina: Yeah, it really… the land really filled in a lot, they sort of packed more houses into the same space.
Rowen: Yeah in the town… the town centre and town area… densifying the… the area with more homes and not going up into the agricultural land.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: Keep it for farm land. I guess there was a farm down the road from us… sort of not too far from the main part of Brentwood but, that… that did… the barn came down and the houses got…
Nina: Yeah. Yeah, I remember there was a bunch of sort of empty fields just down the road from where we lived, but now it’s… yeah I think full of houses? Yeah?
Rowen: Yeah, it’s all full of houses now. Well, and originally before we were there, that… it was all… farmland. It was apple or… orchards.
Nina: Oh, okay.
Rowen: … on those streets.
Nina: That’s cool. And, we were talking a little bit earlier about the bay itself and how there’s a lot more boats… in the harbour there.
Rowen: Yes there’s a lot of boats now. There are a few small… smaller marinas that have been there for years. They’ve got bigger, cuz there’s bigger boats now. Before it was small fishing boats, now it’s bigger pleasure boats. And the bay itself has a lot of boats anchored in there with people living aboard in their boat, on their boats.
Nina: Yeah. And I think you also mentioned, there’s… sort of on the edge of Brentwood, there’s a big housing estate called Port Royale, but before it used to be something else?
Rowen: It was electrical plant.
Nina: Oh yeah.
Rowen: So, that would have been… that was in the 60s, it was there up until the 70s. I’m not sure when it went in. But yeah, it was an old plant of some sort. So that that got taken down and they put in a big housing development.
Nina: Yeah!
Rowen: That was a big change.
Nina: Yeah, I bet. And it really changes the way the harbour looks, I guess, when you’re… when you’re on the sea.
Rowen: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but it didn’t look very good before anyways, though, with electrical plant there.
Nina: No, but yeah, that’s interesting, that the industry was also replaced by housing. So not just kind of natural landscapes but everything seems to be changing to housing.
Rowen: More people coming everywhere.
Nina: So you told me a bit before about how used to go into Brentwood to do shopping with your mum. Could you tell me a bit more about what you used to do in Brentwood?
Rowen: Yeah. So, we would go in, I don’t remember how often they would go in, but we’d go do the grocery shopping. That’s where my mum got most of her groceries. There was a grocery store and there was also a bakery where we used to get her bread from. And then we would go to the bank. Those are the main places I remember going to when we were kids. Oh and I guess we went to the post office a little bit. And then a little bit later years, we would go to the fish and chip shop to get fish and chips, which was always something to look forward to.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: Yeah. And maybe a little bit of walking around. Yeah, but not so much… around the neighbourhood.
Nina: And then later, when… when we all lived there?
Rowen: Yeah, so more… I did the grocery shopping there. I also worked in Brentwood. So… would walk to work, it was very convenient for that. Then we would hike… hike… go for work more so then because we had a dog there, so we would walk around the village and some of the trails that were close… close by to the village.
Nina: Yeah. I guess…
Rowen: And visit friends and…
Nina: Yeah. I guess we… we also used to go sailing in the bay a bit.
Rowen: Yes. Yep, we had our boat in the marina down in… in the… in the bay and we would sail from there and yeah, lots of nice summer-time activities there.
Nina: And then, I guess the follow-up question is what do you do in Brentwood now that things have changed a bit and now that…
Rowen: Yeah so, still do a bit of shopping there. Maybe not quite as much. We’ll go into… into the… the bigger town of Sidney, more often… for things. But yeah, still go into Brentwood. It’s still… we still have lots of friends that live in Brentwood so we visit them. … And… What else in Brentwood? Yeah, just… I guess a little bit of the same thing but… but less.
Nina: Yeah, you’re just not there all the time and don’t visit quite as much.
Rowen: Yeah.
Nina: Okay. And… in terms of like the plants and the animals, do you think much has changed in… in Brentwood?
Rowen: Not much in the plants, I don’t think. They did take out some of the… the big trees that went down. I think I mentioned that already.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: But they did… they did replace them with the different kind of tree. The animals are pretty much the same except for the… the little wall lizards that run amok in our… they’re all over the Peninsula now. So they have taken over for the original little salamanders that we have… had, the native salamanders. The wall lizards were escapees from a zoo that… that was around in the 50s and 60s. And they closed the zoo down and they just let the… the little lizards go.
Nina: Oh no!
Rowen: And they did quite well. They’re all over the place here. They’re… they’re invasive.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: And then the grey squirrel is sort of invasive as well. The big grey squirrel is taking over from the little red squirrel that is native to our area. Other than that, I think the wildlife is still the same. Cougars and bears… still see sightings of them. But yeah, it’s not often.
Nina: Every once in a while.
Rowen: Yeah.
Nina: And so yeah, how… how do you feel about all the changes that have happened in… in Brentwood?
Rowen: How do I feel about it? Well, we moved out of Brentwood.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: It’s changed a lot. It… of course, everybody reminisces about when… when they were younger and things were quieter and everybody knew everybody… well now it’s not that way anymore. It’s more of a little town. But it’s still a nice Village. And they… the council there, I think have done a fairly good job of just keeping the housing in the main part of the village and not letting it creep out into the agricultural land. And so, you can still… not far away, still see the open fields and… and… and park… park-like settings. And there’s lots of parks that you can hike and walk and the trees and… it’s still pretty. But yeah, it’s lots more people, lots more traffic.
Nina: Yeah.
Rowen: That happens everywhere, so…
Nina: Yeah. And, what do you think might happen in the future? Do you think just sort of more… more of the same probably or…?
Rowen: That’s what it seems like… more of the same. And I hope that they are able to still keep the agricultural land there, being farmland for us in the future. We all… we all need farmland, but it’s a popular area to come in Canada, because it’s warmer than other areas… that’s another thing, I don’t know if you want to know about is it’s definitely warmer now.
Nina: Yeah, so you’re noticing?
Rowen: … or are we going off?
Nina: Oh, it’s okay. I think it’s… that’s interesting as well.
Rowen: Yeah, it’s definitely a lot warmer here than it used to be.
Nina: Yeah, when you were a kid did you get more snow or? In the winter?
Rowen: Sometimes… I don’t know if that much has changed, you get years, sometimes you don’t have any snow and sometimes you get a lot of snow. But it definitely is drier. Drier and warmer over the summer months. Yeah. Yeah. That has changed a lot.
Nina: Yeah. I think… I think, you’ve answered all the questions and… yeah, that was great. Thanks very much.
Rowen: You’re welcome.