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Matsqui Island

Abbotsford, British ColumbiaIslands of British ColumbiaIslands of the Fraser RiverLandforms of Lower MainlandMission, British Columbia

Matsqui Island is a large island in the Fraser River in the Central Fraser Valley region of British Columbia, Canada. It is located north of the City of Abbotsford and south of the District of Mission and about 1.6 kilometres (1 mi) downstream from the Mission Bridge. Though technically located within the District of Mission, Matsqui Island and adjoining sandbars are part of the Matsqui Indian Reserve and are governed by the Matsqui First Nation.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Matsqui Island (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 49.116666666667 ° E -122.33333333333 °
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Gifford


V4X 2H6 , Gifford
British Columbia, Canada
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apps.gov.bc.ca

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Nearby Places

Clearbrook, Abbotsford

Clearbrook is a neighbourhood of the City of Abbotsford, British Columbia, located in the western portion of the city in the vicinity of Clearbrook Road. The area was originally known as Sandy Flats or West Abbotsford, and was located in the Poplar district of the District of Matsqui. It became known as Clearbrook by the late 1940s, most likely named after Clearbrook Road, a road that originally ran from Old Yale Road south across the Canada-USA border to nearby Clearbrook, Washington. The area was heavily logged in the early 20th century by the Abbotsford Lumber Company and other smaller logging firms which left behind nothing but large stumps and small trees. In 1930 Mennonite immigrants who had migrated to Canada from Russia beginning in the 1870s as well as those who had fled the Soviet Union in the previous decade began settling in the area. After several years spent clearing the land, these early settlers were able to plant strawberries and raspberries before eventually building dairy and poultry farms. After World War II a commercial area began to develop, with the intersection of Clearbrook Road and South Fraser Way serving as the focal point. Mennonites continued to move to the area, increasing the population to around 4,000 by 1967. A secondary school, the Mennonite Educational Institute, and two post-secondary schools -- Bethel Bible Institute and Mennonite Brethren Bible Institute (the two schools later merged to form what is now Columbia Bible College), were established in Clearbrook in the 1940s, as were a number of Mennonite congregations. By the 1980s the population of the area had reached around 20,000, due to a large influx of people from a variety of backgrounds, most notably Sikh and Hindu immigrants from India, mainly from Punjab. The area is now indistinguishable from the rest of what is now Abbotsford, although many Mennonite Brethren and Mennonite Church congregations continue to flourish in the Clearbrook area, along with Gurdwaras (Sikh temples) and a Hindu temple.

District of Matsqui

Matsqui is a former district municipality in British Columbia, Canada. It was incorporated in 1892 and merged with the district municipality of Abbotsford in 1995 to create the new City of Abbotsford. Matsqui used to be the western part of what is now Abbotsford. It had commercial growth in the Clearbrook area which then spilled over to Abbotsford. The name Matsqui can also be used to refer to a small historic village located on Matsqui Prairie, known as Matsqui Village, which was also formerly part of the District Municipality of Matsqui. It can be found to the immediate northwest of the present-day junction of Harris Road and British Columbia Highway 11 (just south of the Fraser River) in what is now the City of Abbotsford. A branch line of the Canadian Pacific Railway also runs from Mission, British Columbia, to the US border through the eastern boundary of the village. The Matsqui station of the Canadian National Railway line is northeast of the village, on the far side of Highway 11.The word Matsqui derives from the local First Nation language Halkomelem and means a "stretch of higher ground". The Matsqui people, who are part of the Stó꞉lō group historically known as the Fraser River Salish, remain resident in the area to the west of Matsqui Village, to the south of Matsqui Island (which is included in their reserve and is one of the larger islands in the lower Fraser River). Their government is the Matsqui First Nation, which is a member band of the Sto:lo Nation, one of two Sto:lo tribal councils. Matsqui Prairie refers to the floodplain surrounding the village, which lies between the bulk of Sumas Mountain to the east, the Mount Lehman–Bradner upland to the west, and the upland containing Clearbrook and downtown Abbotsford to the south. Matsqui Prairie was inundated in both of the great Fraser River Floods of 1894 and 1948, with Matsqui Village and surrounding farms devastated by flooding. A communications station of the Canadian Forces, Canadian Forces Base Esquimalt Detachment Matsqui, is located on the northeastern edge of Matsqui Prairie adjacent to the foot of Sumas Mountain.