State road planners have stopped work on an environmental impact statement for the 90-mile Yukon-Kuskokwim road project in Southwest Alaska, part of the administration's "Roads to Resources" effort to encourage development of Alaska's natural resources.
Mike McKinnon, industrial roads program manager for the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, said the move is not a reflection of the viability of the primary mineral deposit the road would have accessed. That deposit, Donlin Creek, is currently being examined by mining giant Placer Dome for a potential open-pit, hard-rock gold mine.
"I felt very good about what I heard from Placer Dome about their movement forward on the project, overall," McKinnon said. "I feel good walking away from the road development element."
DOT planners contemplated state construction of a two-phased transportation project. The first would include a port facility on the Kuskokwim River and a 24-mile road linking it to an access road to Donlin Creek, located about 16 miles north of Crooked Creek. The second would be a mainline barge port on the Yukon River and a 65-mile road to connect to the first phase route.
State planners, through prime contractor HDR, started work last fall on an environmental impact statement and held scoping meetings in Holy Cross and Crooked Creek.
"We got a little bit ahead of (Placer Dome) in our work so we went into standby mode in August," McKinnon said.
After recent consultations, the state stopped EIS work and is preparing to turn over data to Placer Dome. The mining company will incorporate road construction costs in its feasibility review of the mine project. "If we make a decision to build Donlin Creek, we will build the road ourselves," said James Fueg, acting project manager for Placer Dome.
Factors playing a role in that decision include the timing of the state's work on a road EIS, which could be competitive and confusing if Placer Dome initiates a similar environmental review of a mining project.
A publicly funded road would likely be slower to build, cost more and carry some associated taxation issues, Fueg said. Preliminary state estimates for the route carried a price tag of $1.5 million per mile, McKinnon said.
Public access, which could be anticipated on a publicly funded road, was another issue. "It's certainly a concern. If you are running an industrial operation and trucks up and down the road, you need some ability to manage access to the road for safety reasons," Fueg said.
Currently, Placer Dome has identified a suitable port location on the Kuskokwim River, near the mouth of Junjuk Creek, a few miles down river from Crooked Creek. Additional engineering work must be completed on the port site and route before Placer Dome releases estimates for the road cost, Fueg said.
"Our current project plan does not show a need for a road to the Yukon," he said. "The state does not want to build a road to the Yukon that arguably wasn't going to be used."
DOT spent about $500,000 on a reconnaissance engineering effort for the Y-K road project, McKinnon said. That data will be available to Placer Dome.
"As a state, we essentially provided some engineering and baseline environmental services," McKinnon said. "Our goal is to help mining projects to move forward. While we're not moving forward completely, it's not wasted material."
