Transportation

The road network in Interior Alaska connects to the seaports of Anchorage and Whittier. The port of Anchorage is 356 miles from Fairbanks via the Parks Highway. This highway is suitable for trucks utilizing tandem trailers year round. An upgraded tunnel at Portage, on the Seward Highway, also provides truck access to Whittier, about 48 miles from Anchorage.

Both ports are accessed by rail with service provided by the Alaska Railroad. The Port of Whittier has modern roll-on, roll-off rail shipping service that currently travels weekly to Prince Rupert, B.C. and Seattle. The Port of Anchorage has weekly service via several companies which operate container service to Seattle and Bellingham, WA.

A rail corridor through eastern Alaska and Canada has been identified, and acquisition of a right-of-way to the border has been authorized by the Alaska Legislature. In 2001, Congress authorized the Secretary of Transportation to make a $6 million grant to the Alaska Railroad for a feasibility study. A joint U.S. - Canadian commission is conducting the study.

The Port of Valdez is 366 miles from Fairbanks and reached via the Richardson Highway. The highway is suitable for trucks utilizing tandem trailers year round and with loading infrastructure development could easily accommodate bulk shipments. Another possibility, as an adjunct to value-added production, is to move chips 349 miles to Point McKenzie (on Cook Inlet) where a proposed chip handling facility would allow for stock-piling and transfer to south-bound vessels. And finally, logs can be moved up the Tanana River to a transfer point at Nenana, then either by highway/rail to a Fairbanks area mill or directly to a plant in Nenana.