Ice roads on track.

• Author: Katz, Helena
• Position: !Ojo!

IT'S NOT THE SMOOTHEST stretch of road--and for much of the year it's not a road at all. As in many other parts of northern Canada, this ice road is built every winter over rivers, lakes, and muskeg, once the weather is sufficiently cold.

Winter roads provide a lifeline to isolated communities that are accessible only by plane the rest of the year. During the two or three months the winter road is open, trucks haul in a year's worth of fuel and other supplies, and residents can travel easily to other communities. For people who live in these regions, the effects of climate change are all too real. Warm weather can delay the winter road's opening or keep it closed entirely.

Geography professor Stephen C. Lonergan, from the University of Victoria in British Columbia, says the winter road season has shortened by a couple of weeks in the past twenty years--although the length varies from year to year. This cuts isolated communities off from resupply trucks for longer periods each year. For residents, it means paying higher prices to have goods flown in and creates more uncertainty about road travel to other communities. Flying goods in is nearly double the price of hauling freight by truck.

Each winter, Fort Chipewyan--a small isolated community in northern Alberta--relies on a 341-mile winter road to connect it to the rest of Alberta and the Northwest Territories (NWT). A shorter winter road season in 2006 led to fuel and food shortages as businesses in town ran out of such supplies as propane, bread, milk, and eggs. Perishable food had to be flown in, dramatically increasing the price. When milk was available, two pints could cost as much as CAN$16. This wasn't the first time; fuel and supplies had to be airlifted into the community in 1997 because it was too warm to build the winter road. And Fort Chipewyan wasn't alone in its problems.

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The Northwest Territories has eight all-weather highways and dozens of access roads covering 1,367 miles. It builds another 870 miles of winter road each year. The longest stretch is the 354-mile Tibbitt to Contwoyto Winter Road north of Yellowknife, which brings supplies to three diamond mines.

In 2006, the mild weather closed the road weeks ahead of schedule. Only about 60 percent of truckloads had reached the mines. The...