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[kphoger]

I get your points though among various things like planning for growth even if currently there isn't much going on doesn't hurt. Safety is another benefit of grade separation and having a solid, fully controlled access facility between the states two largest cities is a win-win all around, IMO. Sure it is what I suspect and I guess we will see where those cities go. Good planning never hurts.

It's not a win-win when money that could be spent on more worthwhile projects gets wasted on upgrading a highway that doesn't need it.

Good planning never hurts, but building things that don't need to be built does hurt.

[Plutonic Panda]

I get your points though among various things like planning for growth even if currently there isn't much going on doesn't hurt. Safety is another benefit of grade separation and having a solid, fully controlled access facility between the states two largest cities is a win-win all around, IMO. Sure it is what I suspect and I guess we will see where those cities go. Good planning never hurts.

It's not a win-win when money that could be spent on more worthwhile projects gets wasted on upgrading a highway that doesn't need it.

Good planning never hurts, but building things that don't need to be built does hurt.

This was only my vision for Alaska. If what I proposed isn't needed now then it should be planned for, IMO.

[Alps]

I get your points though among various things like planning for growth even if currently there isn't much going on doesn't hurt. Safety is another benefit of grade separation and having a solid, fully controlled access facility between the states two largest cities is a win-win all around, IMO. Sure it is what I suspect and I guess we will see where those cities go. Good planning never hurts.

It's not a win-win when money that could be spent on more worthwhile projects gets wasted on upgrading a highway that doesn't need it.

Good planning never hurts, but building things that don't need to be built does hurt.

This was only my vision for Alaska. If what I proposed isn't needed now then it should be planned for, IMO.

Please stop injecting your opinion for future unbuilt freeways - that belongs in the Fictional Highways part of the forum. A 2000 AADT on a 2-lane wilderness road does not need any help. Please limit discussion here to actual proposals. Thank you.

[Plutonic Panda]

I get your points though among various things like planning for growth even if currently there isn't much going on doesn't hurt. Safety is another benefit of grade separation and having a solid, fully controlled access facility between the states two largest cities is a win-win all around, IMO. Sure it is what I suspect and I guess we will see where those cities go. Good planning never hurts.

It's not a win-win when money that could be spent on more worthwhile projects gets wasted on upgrading a highway that doesn't need it.

Good planning never hurts, but building things that don't need to be built does hurt.

This was only my vision for Alaska. If what I proposed isn't needed now then it should be planned for, IMO.

Please stop injecting your opinion for future unbuilt freeways - that belongs in the Fictional Highways part of the forum. A 2000 AADT on a 2-lane wilderness road does not need any help. Please limit discussion here to actual proposals. Thank you.

Sure but perhaps you should be a bit more reasonable.

First off, this forum is littered with posts outside of the fictional sectional section with suggestions of what to do with freeways. While I can see your point about my opinions I’ll keep expressing them how I see fit. I don’t however wish to break forum rules and so I’ll make my second point.

2. If you bothered to read my initial post it were more of a question to what the plans were for Alaska and more specifically Anchorage’s plan. Maybe I didn’t phrase it right, maybe you felt I put too much emphasis on my suggestions, maybe you agree Kphoger my ideas are ridiculous.? Either way I didn’t post with simply a fantasy about what I’d like to see happen, I provided my opinions of what I’d like to see in a single post and in that same post asked about Alaska’s plans. I am well aware of the fantasy subsection and if I wanted to only provide my input I would have just done so with no questions.

[Alps]

I understand. Please know I'm a moderator, and therefore I can break out the purple text: Back to on-topic discussion.

[Plutonic Panda]

Gotcha. Thought I was at any rate. 

[Kniwt]

Anchorage Daily News reports today on the Denali Park Road and how, despite assurances from the National Park Service, the road is becoming increasingly susceptible to landslides and other road-closing events:
https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/2020/02/23/worries-about-the-fate-of-denali-park-road-persist-as-tourism-season-looms/

But dramatic changes are making the road increasingly vulnerable to landslides. The park service closed parts of the road multiple times last summer amid heavy rains, rockfall and mudslides, including an incident in August that left around 300 people and 17 buses stranded for a few hours about halfway down the road.

... A slowly advancing slide near the road’s halfway point, known as the Pretty Rocks landslide, is one of many areas along the road that is unstable.

Recent National Park Service surveys found that since September, the speed of the landslide at Pretty Rocks has increased dramatically: The road was slumping nearly 2 inches every day after August, according to a report from the park service.

... There are multiple solutions proposed for fixing the road, including rerouting a segment or building a bridge across the unstable areas, according to park service reports. Tunneling below the landslide or building up supports against landslides was deemed unfeasible.

[cpzilliacus]

Washington Post [Washington, D.C.]: Steep budget cuts left Alaska with only one operating mainline ferry. Then it broke down.

The change in the noise coming from the Matanuska’s engines was a clue something was wrong with the ferry. A peek out the window was confirmation.

“We were creeping along,” said Adrianne Milos, one of the passengers making what should have been a three-day trip from Bellingham, Wash., home to Alaska in late January.

The crew came on loudspeakers and announced they’d be bringing the ship into Juneau at half speed.

When they finally arrived, Milos, her husband and their cat, Squeaks, were only 70 miles from home in Haines, a small community up the Lynn Canal from Juneau. But they were effectively stranded.

A 30 percent budget cut imposed on the ferry system last year and unforeseen maintenance problems meant the Matanuska was the only mainline ferry operating on the Alaska Marine Highway System. Now it was broken down, presenting more than an inconvenience to Milos and fellow passengers: Communities already reeling from service cuts faced a month with next to no ferries at all.

[vdeane]

Cordova?  Seems they'd be a lot better off if they had just finished AK 10, but why do I suspect they'd rather let the town die completely rather than finish the road?

The end of the article certainly makes the case for why elected officials are bad decision makers when it comes to transportation.

[cpzilliacus]

The end of the article certainly makes the case for why elected officials are bad decision makers when it comes to transportation.

And there are apparently a lot of people unhappy with the current governor of Alaska, as there is an active effort to recall him from office (details can be found here).

[Plutonic Panda]

This isn’t necessarily road related but isn’t mass transit either. Still, this worthy of a mention as a 1,600 rail line will be built from Alaska to the US. I’m not sure if the entire rail line will have to be constructed or it already exists for the most part and only needing a permit to cross the border. Either way, this seems like a pretty big deal.

https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/2020/09/26/trump-tweets-intent-to-issue-permit-for-rail-line-connecting-alaska-to-canada-and-rest-of-us/

[oscar]

This isn’t necessarily road related but isn’t mass transit either. Still, this worthy of a mention as a 1,600 rail line will be built from Alaska to the US. I’m not sure if the entire rail line will have to be constructed or it already exists for the most part and only needing a permit to cross the border. Either way, this seems like a pretty big deal.

https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/2020/09/26/trump-tweets-intent-to-issue-permit-for-rail-line-connecting-alaska-to-canada-and-rest-of-us/

Most of it is unbuilt, including all of the Yukon segment, everything in Alaska east of Delta Junction, and everything in British Columbia northwest of Dease Lake. There is some partially developed right of way between Fairbanks and Delta Junction, and southeast of Dease Lake, but no tracks.

As the linked article notes, one possible use of the new rail line is for the export of oil from Alberta's oil sands. Especially given the history of the planned Keystone pipeline from Alberta to Texas, this is guaranteed to stir up intense controversy.

[zzcarp]

This CBC article gives more information about the routing:

The project would build a new rail line from Fort McMurray, Alta., through the Northwest Territories and Yukon to the Delta Junction in Alaska, where it will connect with existing rail and continue on to ports near Anchorage.

Googling from that article, I found a website a2arail.com where they have maps of the proposed routes. Looks like it will avoid Whitehorse entirely and also cut a new terrain route along the BC/NW Territories border and through Alberta to Ft. McMurray.

[vdeane]

I wonder what the potential for Amtrak service would be if this gets done.  I could see Canada pushing for an auto train running between Alaska and the rest of the US "just in case", given their recent experiences with the Alaska exemption to their ban on non-essential border crossings - especially since the experts consider another pandemic to be a matter of when not if.

Aside from that, I also remember when the lack of a rail connection between Alaska and the rest of the continent was cited as a challenge for a Bering Strait rail tunnel.

[Alps]

It's going to take more than 4 days to get to Anchorage by rail, why is it a benefit to be 4 days closer to Asia...

[mgk920]

IIRC, from discussions that I have followed over the past several years, it is indeed to allow the Canadians to export Tar Sands oil to Asia.  However, there is no place left to build a commercial sea port on Canada's west coast.

What they propose to do is to build a standard gauge railroad from the Fort McMurray, AB area to Delta Junction, AK in order to feed that oil into the Trans Alaska Pipeline.  The Pipeline is seeing a steady long-term decline in traffic volume due to the North Slope oil fields being played out, so there is capacity in it to carry the Tar Sands oil from Delta Junction to the sea port at Valdez, AK.

The expected volume of traffic that I have seen discussed could very well require that that rail line be built as double track, so it would certainly be doable from an economic standpoint and Delta Junction is close enough to the end of ARR's (Alaska Railroad) track at nearby Eielson Air Force Base, just southeast of North Pole, AK, that connecting them would not be a major stretch.

It is not proposed to go anywhere near the never completed BCOL line at Dease Lake, BC.

I suppose that once things are up and running, it could also be attractive to passenger operators to offer multi day excursions through some of the most wild and unspoiled scenery on the planet, much like Amtrak does on some of their current long distance runs (ie, the ever popular Empire Builder and California Zephyr), but it would primarily be a freight route.

Mike

[Stephane Dumas]

I agree about Dease Lake, it could bring an opportunity to revive that project who could became an alternate link.  Also the proposed line will meet the CN line who was fermely known as Mackenzie Northern Railway and way back then as Great Slave Lake Railway who linked Alberta to Hay River, NWT.

[mgk920]

I agree about Dease Lake, it could bring an opportunity to revive that project who could became an alternate link.  Also the proposed line will meet the CN line who was fermely known as Mackenzie Northern Railway and way back then as Great Slave Lake Railway who linked Alberta to Hay River, NWT.

CN took over the BCOL (British Columbia Railway) several years ago, too.  I'm not sure how interested they'd be in ever completing BCOL's partially built line to Dease Lake.

Mike

[oscar]

IIRC, from discussions that I have followed over the past several years, it is indeed to allow the Canadians to export Tar Sands oil to Asia.  However, there is no place left to build a commercial sea port on Canada's west coast.

That didn't stop the effort to build a pipeline to the coast across British Columbia. First Nations in the way of the pipeline route were the main problem.

Could existing ports in BC, including Stewart's deep-water port, handle extra volume from the tar sands oil?

CN took over the BCOL (British Columbia Railway) several years ago, too.  I'm not sure how interested they'd be in ever completing BCOL's partially built line to Dease Lake.

One of the reasons it's only partially built is that the potentially exportable resource from the Dease Lake area was asbestos. That market died around the time BCOL pulled the plug on the Dease Lake line.

[The Ghostbuster]

Even if this project is fully funded (which I'm skeptical it will be), how many years of construction will it take to complete the route? If all goes smoothly (which pretty much never happens), I'd say this line probably won't open for at least a few decades, at minimum. With all the litigation I expect this project will endure, it might be faster to walk the entire length of the project, and carry all the freight via muscle power than to do it by train along this corridor.

[mgk920]

Even if this project is fully funded (which I'm skeptical it will be), how many years of construction will it take to complete the route? If all goes smoothly (which pretty much never happens), I'd say this line probably won't open for at least a few decades, at minimum. With all the litigation I expect this project will endure, it might be faster to walk the entire length of the project, and carry all the freight via muscle power than to do it by train along this corridor.

Yes, I know that there was a strong incentive to get it done (a establish a supply route that was out of range of enemy fire from the Pacific Ocean), the original Alaska Highway was completed and opened in less than one year.

Mike

[Bruce]

I suppose that once things are up and running, it could also be attractive to passenger operators to offer multi day excursions through some of the most wild and unspoiled scenery on the planet, much like Amtrak does on some of their current long distance runs (ie, the ever popular Empire Builder and California Zephyr), but it would primarily be a freight route.

Realistically, I think a private operator like the Rocky Mountaineer will be the first to try and set up an Alaskan excursion on the line. They already run on routes that don't have Amtrak/VIA service.

[triplemultiplex]

The consequences of this rail project would go far beyond the direct impacts of laying track through the wilderness.

Funny that oscar mentioned a proposed rail project that would have served an extraction industry in the same region; one where the material was found to be extremely detrimental to our well being.  So we left it in the ground.  And the rail project was cancelled.
Seems like a blueprint worth duplicating.

[splashflash]

IIRC, from discussions that I have followed over the past several years, it is indeed to allow the Canadians to export Tar Sands oil to Asia.  However, there is no place left to build a commercial sea port on Canada's west coast.

That didn't stop the effort to build a pipeline to the coast across British Columbia. First Nations in the way of the pipeline route were the main problem.

Could existing ports in BC, including Stewart's deep-water port, handle extra volume from the tar sands oil?

CN took over the BCOL (British Columbia Railway) several years ago, too.  I'm not sure how interested they'd be in ever completing BCOL's partially built line to Dease Lake.

One of the reasons it's only partially built is that the potentially exportable resource from the Dease Lake area was asbestos. That market died around the time BCOL pulled the plug on the Dease Lake line.

The northwest extension of BC Rail was abandoned in the mid 1970's.  Coal, copper concentrate and asbestos were commodities that were projected to be extracted to justify the line.   Asbestos extraction stopped around 1992 while copper extraction only started large-scale in 2014.  Coal extraction never materialized because of price-drops and more recently First Nations opposition.  The line extends a ways beyond Fort St. James for forestry products, but likely not for mineral commodities.  The roadbed is still visible in many locations.

The projected line would completely bypass BC and likely not connect to the former BCRail, CN Fort Nelson extension.

[hurricanehink]

Have there been any updates/discussions on the Glenn to Seward Highway connection in Anchorage? This seems to be one of the largest potential transportation projects in the state, by virtue of affecting its largest city.