CN (Canadian National) has already announced that due to the failure to approve the Keystone pipeline, they will be handling substantially increasing volumes of crude oil, likely in unit trains, between the sand-oil fields in northeastern Alberta and refineries in the USA's Gulf Coast region via a routing that is entirely CN (it passes though my home metro area as well as suburban Chicagoland), so it might not be far-fetched to see someone building such a railroad into Alaska. CN is also investing about USA$35M of their own money to rebuild and restore their dormant ex SOO line between Ladysmith, WI and the Rice Lake, WI area to serve several 'frac' sand mines and processing plants in the Rice Lake area, as well as several million dollars more to replace their 113 year old ex-CNW mainline swing bridge in Oshkosh, WI, which is on the routing that this traffic will use.
Heady days for freight rail in North America!
Mike