The Yukon Liberal Party doesn't want a road built through the McIntyre Creek area.

Porter Creek South MLA Don Inverarity and Cherish Clarke, the Liberals' Takhini-Kopper King candidate for the coming election, held a press conference this morning to stress the importance of conserving the wildlife corridor.

"There's going to be 8,000 new residents in the Whistle Bend subdivision, and that traffic has to go somewhere,” said Inverarity. "But cutting through this area is going to ruin this as a wildlife corridor. There's no question about it.”

The City of Whitehorse plans to construct a road from Mountainview Drive and the new Whistle Bend subdivision to the Alaska Highway. The city also wants to build a new residential area in land that straddles McIntyre Creek.

Porter Creek D, said Inverarity, will have somewhere in the neighbourhood of 360 lots. He said the Liberal party is not opposed to infill lots.

"But this is not really infill,” he said. "This is a major subdivision.”

Infill, continued Inverarity, is just that: filling in areas where it make sense, and is logical and reasonable.

"We're not opposed to that. But when we're taking about changing people's ways of life, I have a major concern with that.”

In the winter of 2009, the Friends of McIntyre Creek community group asked the Yukon government to turn the area around McIntyre Creek into a territorial park. Inverarity made his case to the legislative assembly that spring, but was turned down by then-Energy, Mines and Resources Minister Brad Cathers and then-Economic Development minister Jim Kenyon.

They said the city needs to take the lead on an area that's within city limits.

"Time and again, I stood in the legislature and urged the Yukon Party to endorse protecting this area, and the answer was always no,” said Inverarity.

"When we tried to debate this issue in the legislature, the government used its majority to actually shut down the debate. They didn't support protecting this area and didn't even want to talk about it when we raised the issue in the legislature.”

The MLA is not closed to the idea of bringing up the concept of a territorial park to the assembly again.

But the two Liberals stressed that their goal now is to engage the public on what's happening in the corridor.

Clarke said she has been knocking on doors in her riding, and heard from many residents that they don't feel they know how or to whom they should voice their concerns.

As for alternate routes for Whistle Bend, Inverarity said that's something else the public needs to start talking about. He thinks it's important city planners look at where Whistle Bend residents will want to go.

"Is it to get to the Alaska Highway, or downtown?” he asked.

Inverarity suggested looking at routing traffic on Wann or Macdonald roads. He thinks Whistle Bend residents could also use Mountainview Drive as their route to downtown.

"Before we go committing ourselves to infill and developing a residential subdivision in this area, we need to remember we are the wilderness city,” said Inverarity.

"Let's see what that really means to the Yukon government and the City of Whitehorse.”