The Municipality of Crowsnest Pass is a specialized municipality located in the Crowsnest Pass of the Rocky Mountains in southwest Alberta, Canada. The municipality formed as a result of the amalgamation of five municipalities on January 1, 1979. Today, Blairmore and Coleman remain the two largest communities while Frank is the smallest. Crowsnest, Passburg, and Sentinel are other former communities within the municipality's boundaries.
History
The municipality owes its existence to coal mining, the area's primary industry since the first mine opened in 1900. Its ethnic and cultural diversity comes from the many European and other immigrants attracted to the area by the mines. Through the years' coal mining suffered from fluctuating coal prices, bitter strikes, and underground accidents, and all the mines on the Alberta side closed throughout the 20th century as cheaper, safer open-pit mines opened on the British Columbia side of the pass. There is an operating coal mine just across the BC border in Sparwood, which continues to provide significant employment for the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass. Crowsnest Pass is known for tragedy. In 1903, the tip of Turtle Mountain broke loose and decimated part of the Village of Frank. In 1914, the Hillcrest mine disaster occurred in the Hillcrest Mine, killing 189 men. Serious spring floods occurred in 1923 and 1942. Periodic forest fires have swept the valley, including one in the summer of 2003 that threatened the entire municipality. The area was a centre for "rum-running" during prohibition, from 1916 to 1923, when liquor was illegally brought across the provincial border from British Columbia. The legacy is celebrated at the restored Alberta Provincial Police Barracks, now an interpretive centre. For more detailed area history, see the entries for Coleman, Blairmore, Frank, Hillcrest and Bellevue.
The following localities are located within the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass: ;Localities
Crowsnest
East Kootenay
Hazell
Hillcrest or Hillcrest Mines
Savanna
Sentinel
Demographics
In the 2016 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass recorded a population of 5,589 living in 2,567 of its 3,225 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2011 population of 5,565. With a land area of, it had a population density of in 2016. In the 2011 Census, the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass had a population of 5,565 living in 2,586 of its 3,234 total dwellings, a change of -3.2% from its 2006 population of 5,749. With a land area of, it had a population density of in 2011.
Attractions
Within the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass, one can find the Frank Slide Interpretive Centre, an interpretive display at Leitch Collieries, underground tours of the Bellevue Mine, interpretive signs at the Hillcrest Cemetery and both the Crowsnest Museum and Alberta Provincial Police Barracks interpretive centre within Coleman National Historic Site. Pamphlets for self-guided historical walking and driving tours are available throughout the municipality. The area offers hiking, fishing and mountain-biking in the summer, and in winter snowmobiling, a downhill ski hill, and a groomed cross-country ski area, and is about from major ski hills at both Fernie Alpine Resort and Castle Mountain Resort.
