The president of the Riverdale Community Association says sloughing banks on the Yukon River are a growing safety concern.

Jenny Trapnell said Thursday the association is not only concerned about the safety aspect of the increasing problem, but wants to know who is going to take charge of the situation.

She also believes the city could have been more proactive to research the problem when it became aware of the situation and erected some barricades about a month ago.

In the ensuring weeks, however, the erosion has gotten worse, she pointed out in an interview.

'We have actually lost a trail that was a very popular fishing area, as well as used by the kayakers,' she said.

The particular section of trail Trapnell pointed out runs right along the river's edge. It's popular among those who prefer it to the paved Millennium Trail, which runs parallel to the river but further away from the bank than the old trail.

The growing erosion is also in the vicinity of the area where the Yukon Canoe and Kayak Club did work a few years ago to replace old concrete debris and re-bar with natural rocks.

The club has taken advantage of the currents caused by the debris for years, but sought to replace the concrete and re-bar with natural rocks as a safety measure.

Trapnell said she does not know what caused the increased erosion, but is expecting different agencies to come up with some answers soon.

Water resources inspector Frank Patch of the Department of the Environment said he would be meeting with city officials and representatives from the Canoe and Kayak Club at the site this afternoon.

Patch said there is no reason at this point to believe the work carried out by the club a few years ago had any bearing on the erosion.

On the other hand, had there been no debris in the river no concrete debris that had been sitting there for 50 years and no natural rocks that were put there in place of the concrete it's not likely there would have been a problem, he suggested.

Patch said for weather-related reasons, ice formed this year in a way that it eventually built up around the debris and started holding back the normal flow of water, creating a large back eddy.

'It is a strong back eddy,' he said. 'The water is certainly moving upstream at quite a clip, and it is that action that is kind of causing the water to undercut the bank.'

The water began eroding the unfrozen material below the frozen surface of the riverbank, creating a heavy shelf that has now fallen in because of no subsurface support, he said.

Patch said this afternoon's meeting would explore ways of correcting the problem, or more specifically, removing the ice blockage from around debris.

It's likely it will take a piece of machinery like a backhoe out on the ice to do the work, though safety is a primary issue, he said.

Trapnell said the association is also wondering who is going to be responsible for repairing the damage that was done.

Andrew Hyde, president of the Yukon Canoe and Kayak Club, said this morning the issue of erosion was brought up a couple of weeks ago at a meeting with representatives from the city and Yukon Energy.

The club, he said, did not change the footprint of the debris nor the flow pattern when it replaced the concrete and re-bar with the natural rocks.