Legislature(1993 - 1994)
03/08/1993 03:40 PM Senate TRA
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
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+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
SENATE TRANSPORTATION COMMITTEE
March 8, 1993
3:40 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Bert Sharp, Chairman
Senator Randy Phillips, Vice Chairman
Senator Jay Kerttula
Senator Georgianna Lincoln
MEMBERS ABSENT
Senator Tim Kelly
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
Yukon Government Presentation on Arctic Transportation
Routes
WITNESS REGISTER
John Ostashek
Government Leader
Minister of Finance
Yukon Territory
Doug Phillips
Minister of Tourism and Education
Yukon Territory
ACTION NARRATIVE
TAPE 93-12, SIDE A
Number 001
CHAIRMAN SHARP called the Transportation Committee meeting
to order at 3:40 p.m. and invited the Honorable John
Ostashek, Government Leader, Ministry of Finance, Yukon
Territory to give his presentation.
MR. JOHN OSTASHEK thanked him for having the meeting and
began with an overview of the Dempster Hwy. that goes
through Canada to the Arctic Coast. It starts about 500
kilometers north of Whitehorse and is built over tundra most
of the way. It was started in 1958 and completed in 1979.
It cost $127.6 million. During the months of June, July,
and August there are about 100 vehicles a day using the road
and for the remainder of the year, it is about 30 vehicles a
day. About 7% of that is truck traffic. He said the
highway goes through environmentally critical country with a
lot of permafrost and caribou. The caribou migrate across
the Dempster Highway.
He said the difficulty is the cost of maintaining it,
because it travels through a lot of open country. He
believes in future years it will be a real lifeline to the
Arctic and McKenzie Delta.
Number 172
SENATOR LINCOLN said she didn't want to put him on a spot by
asking these questions, but she is interested because the
majority of the Dalton Highway is within her district. She
said there are a lot of unknowns if the road should be
opened to the public.
SENATOR LINCOLN asked him about the truck traffic. MR.
OSTASHEK said 7% of the traffic was commercial trucks. He
said that people were using the highway more, because it is
well maintained.
SENATOR LINCOLN asked him if communities along the road were
mostly native. MR. OSTASHEK explained there were many
native people in the communities along the road.
SENATOR LINCOLN asked if the public traffic was primarily
people who lived in the two communities on the road. MR.
OSTASHEK said the majority of the traffic is tourist. They
allow people to hunt and fish in the road area, although
there is a five kilometer no-hunting corridor along the
highway which is patrolled by their conservation officers.
There are very few infractions. He said there are public
camp grounds along the route and the foremen at the three
highway camps patrol the road once a day.
SENATOR LINCOLN asked if they have a problem with people who
leave old vehicles along the road. MR. OSTACHEK said old
vehicles and litter, in general, wasn't a problem. He said
the road is also in good condition.
Number 304
SENATOR LINCOLN asked if he had any feed back from
indigenous people in that area on the increased tourist
traffic. He emphasized that they have encouraged tourism
and want to further enhance it, because it is a benefit to
their community.
Number 360
SENATOR KERTTULA asked if they have the policy of using
local materials for structures their tax payers support?
MR. OSTASHEK said that policy has not worked as good as the
administration would have liked it to work.
SENATOR LINCOLN asked how big were the communities of Inuvik
and Fort MacPherson. MR. OSTASHEK said Enuvik was about
1,500 people and Fort MacPherson was about 600. He said
there was a phone at Eagle Plains and at the other two
highway maintenance camps.
Number 432
DOUG PHILLIPS, Minister of Tourism and Education, said the
winter ferry schedule did not coincide very well with the
weekends so that people in White Horse could not travel
between the two countries very conveniently. He thought it
would be in the best interests of both countries to consider
this.
MR. PHILLIPS also endorsed building the road from Juneau to
White Horse. He thought it would tie together about 50,000
people. It would give Yukon another port and give other
Alaskans another route to Alaska. It would open up many
mining opportunities between Juneau and Whitehorse.
Dawson City over the next six years is going to be the focal
point of tourism for the Yukon, because of the gold rush
centennial and other celebrations. If we were to look ahead
at tourism opportunities for both of us, MR. PHILLIPS said,
loop roads would be the way to go.
Another problem is the bottleneck at the American Border,
because the hours they keep there do not coincide with ferry
connections.
MR. PHILLIPS said a road to Juneau would create access to
tidewater for the Atlin area that has good mining potential.
Number 562
CHIP THOMA, Juneau resident, noted that the indigenous
people on the Dempster Highway have encouraged that road
being opened. They have not done that on the Dalton
Highway.
Number 570
SENATOR LINCOLN asked if the corridor along the Dempster
Highway was owned by the Canadian government and if the
indigenous people owned any portion of it. MR. PHILLIPS
said their land claims weren't settled yet. Right now the
corridor belongs to the government.
CHAIRMAN SHARP adjourned the meeting at 4:25 p.m.
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