Tough road for Yukon railway

The White Pass and Yukon train was a crucial transportation link when construction began in 1898 during the Klondike gold rush to carry people and supplies from the coast at Skagway, Alaska, over the mountains into the Yukon interior.

But by January 1979, the 180-kilometre rail link between Skagway and Whitehorse was facing extinction. 

"Now the government says it won't provide a subsidy," said Knowlton Nash, host of CBC's The National, as he introduced the report. "That could mean the end."

As reporter Colin Hoath explained, the railway was once part of a transportation chain that also included steamships to continue the journey from Whitehorse to Dawson City.  

Still an important supply link

"The railway remains today Yukoners' primary supply line of pretty well everything from apples to whisky," he said.

The White Pass and Yukon train company said the the railway was losing $2 million to $4 million a year. The closure of a mine that hauled its product to the ocean port at Skagway on the train meant the business was less viable. 

The news was alarming to the Yukon government.

"It affects virtually everybody that lives in the Yukon because it is ... still the major source of getting goods and services into the territory," said Yukon government representative Chris Pearson.

He said the railway should not just be protected but extended further into the interior.

"It means a lot to the future of the territory," he added.

The possibility of new mines and a pipeline in the region in the 1980s could make continuing the train more feasible, said Hoath. 

But according to the Globe and Mail, the train stopped operating in 1982 but reopened in 1988 as a tourist train for travellers.

In 2018 the Carnival cruise line purchased the railway for $290 million. The railway has said that on a typical day, an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 passengers take the scenic 30-kilometre journey to Carcross, Yukon.