There is very little evidence left of a homeless encampment on the east side of Guelph. The campers have dispersed. The word on the street is that at least two have found another outdoor site to spend the winter.
Several people had been camping along the Guelph Radial Line Trail and the Eramosa River, just under a kilometre from Victoria Road.
A few scattered cedar branches are all that remain of what was a fairly elaborate shelter encircled by green — but turning conspicuously brown — branches, with three tents inside.
That was home to Joanna Couture and Rick Pitre before the land’s owner, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs ordered an eviction in late November of last year. An arm of the ministry, the Agricultural Institute of Ontario, along with the University of Guelph, and the Guelph Police were involved in clearing the site out.
Other squatters on the land had pitched tents near the Couture-Pitre shelter, and as many as nine people had been living there for several months before it decamped.
Two large piles of debris remained on the site in days after the squatters left, causing an eyesore and worrying users of the trail. That garbage is now gone, as are most all signs of habitation.
