Unorganized West Manitoulin District
Unorganized West Part Manitoulin District is an unorganized area in Manitoulin District in northeastern Ontario, Canada, encompassing the portion of Manitoulin Island which is not part of an incorporated municipality. It comprises the geographic townships of Robinson and Dawson.
Separate local services boards provide services in Robinson and Dawson townships.
Communities
The division includes the communities of Burnt Island, Cook's Dock, Fernlee, Meldrum Bay, and Silver Water.Meldrum Bay
Meldrum Bay is located at the western terminus of Highway 540, west of Gore Bay. Settled in the 1870s by Scottish people from southern Ontario, and named after the namesake bay on which it is located, Meldrum Bay developed as a commercial fishing and lumbering centre. Its first mill opened in 1880. Once the village was home to stores, hotels, blacksmiths, school, and boarding houses, as well as a busy fishing fleet and Great Lakes steamers tied up at the docks.From the 1920s, steamers of the Owen Sound Transportation Company provided weekly ferry service between Meldrum Bay and Thessalon, on its route between Owen Sound and Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. However, the 1962 opening of the Trans-Canada Highway, and other road improvements, made this service unprofitable. Now during the summer, the docks are busy again, lined with pleasure craft from around the Great Lakes. This area holds some of the best chinook salmon fishing in all of Canada.
Many residents of the area are employed by Lafarge, whose quarry west of Meldrum Bay produces dolomite used in concrete, road construction and metallurgical processing. This Lafarge Canada site opened in the 1980s and is the home of the "largest Canadian marine quarry," with loading docks on the Mississagi Strait.