Conclusions

In the following chapters an attempt has been made to
condense, so far as possible, in narrative form, the work of
the Canadian section of the North Pacific Planning Project,
a study initiated under the authority of the Joint Economic
Committee of Canada and the United States in 1943. This
study was designed to explore the economic possibilities
of the North Pacific Region for the mutual benefit of the
two countries in the development of its natural wealth,
the defence of its shores and skies, and the welfare of its
people, and in the best utilization of the works and facilities

provided there for joint defence in the war now happily
ended.

Twelve chapters or sections, prepared as individual
memoranda or papers, by competent authorities, are pre-
sented. Their subject matter, while necessarily put for-
ward from a Canadian view-point, retains the basic idea
or objective of the original project and carries much that
will have a bearing on the broad international scene in

the North Pacific.

The Canadian North Pacific Region, as finally designated
for the study, comprises approximately 1,000,000 square
miles, more than one-quarter the area of Canada. In
all this area there were, prior to the war, less than 1,000
miles of highway, other than trails and winter roads.
Owing to the remoteness, vast distances, natural barriers,
and sparse population, transportation facilities, except in
the southerly portion (Peace River and Grand Trunk
Pacific sections), were of an order sufficient only to permit
the few people to conduct their limited industrial and

commercial activities, mostly in the fur, mineral, and fisheries
industries.

As the menace of war and even possible invasion threat-
ened, a through highway was built at great effort and cost
between a rail head at Dawson Creek, British Columbia,
and Fairbanks, Alaska, along the route of a line of airports
already established by the Canadian Government and
integrated with the airport system in Alaska. Canadians
and Americans have not generally understood the purpose
of this facility or its war-time and present significance.
It was built primarily to service and support this frail
though vital air channel between the producing heart of
the two nations and the isolated and vulnerable territory
of Alaska, on which the enemy had already found a foothold.

While this Alaska Highway could not of necessity be
oriented on lines of greatest future economic adv
the easiest and probably most advantageous highway route
lying to the west of the airport chain—it did serve to connect
and integrate detached local road systems and subsequent
extensions and connections, such as the extension through
Yukon and the neck of the Alaska Panhandle to the seaport
of Haines. It established, in addition to the main objective
and in conjunction with the railways of Yukon and Alaska,

antage—

a unified if tenuous overland transportation system through
the North Pacific Region.

The chain of airports which this highway was built to
serve has established the air path from the heart of America
to cities of Soviet Russia, the Orient, and India. In this
air channel the road is an integral part, as an airport-
servicing facility, and there can be no question of its abandon-
ment either from a point of economy or expediency.

Land Transportation

While the highway was under construction, the building
of a military railroad to connect the Canadian rail system
with the rail system in Alaska was considered by the
United States Army Command, and a route survey made.
This survey took advantage of a remarkable natural feature,
the Rocky Mountain Trench, which lies just west of the
main chain of the Rockies and which provides easy gradients
and a straight alignment with few natural obstructions,
from a junction with the Canadian rail system near Prince
George, B.C., into Yukon Territory. Because of the
improvement in the strategic and tactical situation in the

North Pacific following the naval action at Midway, the
project was abandoned.

The establishment of substantial means of land transport
to Alaska of greater capacity and reliability than can be
provided by highway or air seems inevitable. In this

connection, there are two points that generally may not
be appreciated:

(1) Permanent hard-surfaced highway is more costly to
construct and maintain than a railway line, particularly
through remote and rough terrain. The establishment
and maintenance of crews, with their equipment, for the
upkeep of a long and remote highway system require
an extensive and widely dispersed organization, difficult
to establish and costly to house, service, and maintain. The
maintenance of a railway is inherent in its operation, and
patrol, with minute inspection of the seven- to ten-mile
sections, is carried out by the section crews daily.

(2) Such a railway, while of prime interest to the
United States, not only as a defence measure but in the
interest of the development of the territory of Alaska—
particularly in its effect in controlling freight costs—would
be vastly more important in the economic development of
northern British Columbia and Yukon than any highway
System, since it would give improved access to some of the
Most promising mineral territory in Western Canada.
While any basis of allocating the cost of such a line between
the two countries would be purely speculative, it may be
significant that a current rail-extension project has proposed
the construction of a line northward from the Canadian
National Railways main line to the Peace River that would

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