Residents of Atlin, B.C. are celebrating victory in their efforts to prevent Yukon Energy Corp. from building a submerged weir in the Atlin River.

The community of 400 had been lobbying the B.C. government for the last year to designate the river and Atlin Lake as a protected area under the province's Atlin Taku land-use plan.

Early drafts of the plan, released in November 2010, had marked the area north of Atlin Provincial Park as a resource management zone which would have allowed for hydroelectric development.

After months of public consultation, the final plan was released Tuesday, changing the designation to protected.

Longtime resident Wayne Merry, president of the Protect Atlin Lake Society, has been getting happy e-mails from residents ever since.

"It's as close to a unanimous as any issue we've ever had in the community,” he told the Star this morning. "People are very excited.”

The river flows almost five kilometres from the west side of Atlin Lake into Tagish Lake, then drains northward into the Yukon to Marsh Lake and the Yukon River

Yukon Energy had budgeted $1 million to research the possibility of putting the weir – a small dam – into the river as a way to reduce flows from Atlin Lake in the fall and allow more water to be used in the winter months, when electrical loads are highest.

Residents argued that the project would do too much damage to the area.

Merry said the province's decision to protect the area "has saved the ecology of Atlin Lake and the river, probably saved a great deal of damage to the coast line and damage to Atlin Provincial Park.”

The land-use plan notes that "Atlin River has very high fish values, particularly as a waterway connecting the two large lakes.

"It provides habitat and a movement corridor between Tagish and Atlin Lakes for lake trout, Arctic grayling, two species of whitefish, burbot and other fish species.”

Janet Patterson, the spokesperson for Yukon Energy said this morning the company is reviewing the plan and wouldn't be able to comment until after officials have had a chance to read through it all.

Merry said the proposed weir would have provided only two megawatts of power, not enough to warrant the potential environmental damage.

"It would have provided a very small amount of the power required in the Yukon,” he said.

"At the same time, the Yukon's own background papers showed that there is 10 times more hydro potential within the Yukon.”

Even though they "disagreed fundamentally” about the value of the proposed weir, Merry said the community holds no animosity toward Yukon Energy.

"They were very good about telling us what their plans were; we just disagreed,” he said.

"We didn't want to see this damage to the lake, the river and the park for that little power.

We want to be good neighbours, but that's too big a trade off.”