The Road System
Only 16 of the 33 communities are serviced by all-weather roads. Most existing highways are sub-standard and only about 30% are paved.
The NWT makes extensive use of winter roads. Every mine and most communities are linked by winter roads at least part of the year.
Notes:
Roads are critical to development in the NWT. However, we are also one of the most sparsely populated areas in Canada, making it hard to justify development costs without some economic offset. Compared to the Yukon, which is less than ½ the size of the NWT, we have very few roads. Further, most roads in the Yukon are paved or finished with an oil surface.
In recent years the private sector and government have attempted to reduce some development costs by building an extensive system of ice roads. Public ice roads tend to service isolated communities. The system of ice roads is shown on the map as white lines.