Popular Pemberton Music Festival cancelled for 2009

The 2009 Pemberton Music Festival has been cancelled, the mayor of Pemberton, B.C., confirmed Thursday.

The fledgling summer event attracted thousands of music fans to the farming village near Mount Currie in 2008 for a weekend of music and camping.

Mayor Jordan Sturdy told CBC News Thursday that this year's festival, slated for July, was cancelled by organizer Live Nation.

There had been an ongoing dispute over the use of prime farmland as the site of the festival since last year's event, which delayed Live Nation getting the approvals required to go ahead with the 2009 festival.

In November, the province's Agricultural Land Commission concluded that the 40,000 people who attended the 2008 festival did not damage the land it was held on, and the organizer was given permission to use the site for another three years.

But Live Nation said the time it took to get the green light from the commission didn't allow time to line up talent and finalize logistical details.

The company said it will focus on planning a 2010 festival.

Last July, more than 120 artists, including Tom Petty, Jay-Z and Coldplay, performed over four days.

The event's success was marred by massive traffic jams on the Sea to Sky Highway. Also, many fans waited for hours or slept in their cars on the tarmac of the local airport that was being used as a parking lot.