The Village of Harrison Hot Springs is a small community at the southern end of

Harrison Lake Harrison Lake is the largest lake in the southern Coast Mountains of Canada, being about 250 square kilometres (95 mi²) in area. It is about 60 km (37 mi) in length and at its widest almost 9 km (5.6 mi) across. Its so ...

in the

Fraser Valley The Fraser Valley is a geographical region in southwestern British Columbia, Canada and northwestern Washington State. It starts just west of Hope in a narrow valley encompassing the Fraser River and ends at the Pacific Ocean stretching from the ...

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

. It is a member of the

Fraser Valley Regional District The Fraser Valley Regional District (FVRD) is a regional district in British Columbia, Canada. Its headquarters are in the city of Chilliwack. The FVRD covers an area of 13,361.74 km² (5,159 sq mi). It was created in 1995 by ...

; its immediate neighbour is the District of Kent and included in it, the town of Agassiz. It is a resort community known for its hot springs and has a population of just over 1500 people. It is named after Benjamin Harrison, a former deputy governor for the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...

History

The Village of Harrison Hot Springs has been a small resort community since 1886 when the opening of the

Canadian Pacific Railway The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadi ...

brought the lakeside springs within a short carriage ride of the transcontinental mainline. In its first promotion as a resort it was known as St. Alice's Well, although Europeans had discovered it (not new to indigenous communities) decades earlier when a party of goldfield-bound travelers on Harrison Lake capsized into what they thought was their doom, only to discover the lake at that spot was not freezing, but warm. Although the resort flourished in a low-key fashion for years after this discovery was exploited by hoteliers, the Village of Harrison Hot Springs was not incorporated until 1949. Its namesake

hot springs A hot spring, hydrothermal spring, or geothermal spring is a spring produced by the emergence of geothermally heated groundwater onto the surface of the Earth. The groundwater is heated either by shallow bodies of magma (molten rock) or by circ ...

are a major attraction for tourists who come to stay at the village's spa resort. The

themselves were originally used and revered by the

Sts'Ailes The Sts'ailes (also known as Chehalis) are an indigenous people from the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada. Their band government is the Chehalis First Nation, formerly known as the Chehalis Indian Band. The band's name community i ...

(

Chehalis Chehalis may refer to: People * Chehalis people, a Native American people of Washington state **Lower Chehalis language **Upper Chehalis language * Sts'Ailes people (Chehalis people), a First Nation in British Columbia * Chehalis First Nation, Bri ...

) First Nations people who live along the

Harrison River The Harrison River is a short but large tributary of the Fraser River, entering it near the community of Chehalis, British Columbia, Canada. The Harrison drains Harrison Lake and is the ''de facto'' continuation of the Lillooet River, which feeds ...

nearby. There are two hot springs, the "Potash", with a temperature of 40 °C, and the "Sulphur", with a temperature of 65 °C. According to Harrison Hot Springs Resort, the waters average 1300 ppm of dissolved mineral solids, one of the highest concentrations of any mineral spring. This hot spring is one of several lining the valley of the

Lillooet River The Lillooet River is a major river of the southern Coast Mountains of British Columbia. It begins at Silt Lake, on the southern edge of the Lillooet Crown Icecap about 80 kilometres northwest of Pemberton and about 85 kilometres northwest of W ...

and Harrison Lake. The northernmost of the Lillooet River hot springs is at

Meager Creek Meager Creek is a creek in the southern Pacific Ranges of the Coast Mountains in British Columbia, Canada. It flows northeast into the Lillooet River approximately northwest of the village of Pemberton and is adjacent to the Upper Lillooet Pro ...

, north of Whistler, with another well-known one to the east of Whistler at

Skookumchuck Hot Springs :''This page is about natural hot spring near the First Nations community of Skatin 50 kilometres south of Pemberton Pemberton, British Columbia. For the town and associated rapids in the East Kootenay see Skookumchuck, British Columbia; for t ...

, midway between Pemberton and Port Douglas. One feature of this chain of hot springs is that the Harrison Hot Springs vent is the most sulfuric, and there is consistently less sulfur content as one goes northwards, with the springs at Meager Creek having almost no scent at all.

Geography

Megatsunami risk

Some geologists consider that an unstable rock face at

Mount Breakenridge Mount Breakenridge, , is a mountain in the Lillooet Ranges of southwestern British Columbia, Canada, located on the east side of upper Harrison Lake in the angle of mountains formed by that lake and the Big Silver River. Name The name was confe ...

above the north end of the giant fresh-water fjord of Harrison Lake in the Lower Mainland of southwestern

, Canada, could collapse into the lake, generating a large wave that might destroy the town of Harrison Hot Springs (located at its south end).

Demographics

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; french: Statistique Canada), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and cultur ...

, Harrison Hot Springs had a population of 1,905 living in 885 of its 1,045 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 1,468. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. The population of Harrison Hot Springs grew from 1996 to 2006, when the Canadian Census reported 655 people in 1991, 898 in 1996, 1,343 in 2001, and 1,573 in 2006. It has since receded slightly to 1,468 in 2011 and 2016.

Economy

Harrison Hot Springs' major economy is tourism in relation to the hot springs, with over half of employment found in service industries, with much of the rest found split through retail, government, construction and manufacturing are represented, as well as minor activity in other areas.

Attractions

Harrison Hot Springs' greatest attraction is its titular springs, of course, but it also has the Ranger Station Public Art Gallery, a marina with jet boat tours of the lake available, a nine-hole golf course, and is the closest access to

Sasquatch Provincial Park Sasquatch Provincial Park is a provincial park in Kent, British Columbia, Canada. History The park was established 1968, in its present condition. It actually began in 1959 as a 20 hectare inland fjord called Green Point Park, which was expanded ...

. In July, Harrison Hot Springs hosts the Harrison Festival of the Arts, a ten-day celebration of world music and art. The annual Festival features free outdoor beach concerts, ticketed evening performances, a children's day, visual art exhibits, various workshops, and two weekend art markets. The Harrison Festival also presents ten to twelve professional performing arts events between September and May each year.

Government

The Corporation of the Village of Harrison Hot Springs was incorporated as a municipality in 1949 under the initiative of Colonel Andy Naismith (ret). It has a mayor and four councillors. Harrison Hot Springs is part of the

Chilliwack-Hope Chilliwack-Hope was a provincial electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, established by the ''Electoral Districts Act, 2008''. It was first contested in the 2009 British Columbia General Election. The riding was formed from an amalgama ...

provincial electoral district. Federally, Harrison Hot Springs is in the Mission-Matsqui-Fraser Canyon riding, represented in the

House of Commons of Canada The House of Commons of Canada (french: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada. The House of Common ...

Media

References

External links

* * {{coord, 49, 18, 00, N, 121, 46, 55, W, display=title, region:CA_type:city(1600)_source:dewiki Hot springs of British Columbia Populated places in the Fraser Valley Regional District Villages in British Columbia