Ontario negotiating to build Ring of Fire toll road – by Shawn Bell (Wawatay News – September 13, 2012)

Northern Ontario’s First Nations Voice: http://wawataynews.ca/

The Ontario government has confirmed it is planning to help build and operate a pay-per-use road to connect the Ring of Fire mining development to the existing highway grid.
 
A government spokesperson told Wawatay News that the province is “committed to sharing the cost” of building an all-season road to the Ring of Fire, and that discussions continue over how Ontario plans to recoup its investment in the road.
 
“It could be a toll, it could be a monthly invoice,” Ministry of Northern Development and Mines spokesperson Andrew Morrison said of the pay-per-use plan for the access road. “It’s difficult to characterize how a payment system would work at this point.”
 
According to a Noront Resources press release on Sept. 4, Ontario has assured the mining industry that all industrial users would be permitted to use the access road, which was proposed as part of Cliffs’ Ring of Fire chromite project. Noront also noted that the road plan involved some sort of toll for companies to pay-per-use. 
“Our discussions with the province have confirmed that the all-season road will be accessible to all industrial users, including Cliffs, and that the costs to use the road will be based on proportional usage, a critical consideration for Noront as our concentrate shipments represent less than seven per cent of the currently identified ore haulage along the corridor,” Noront CEO Wes Hanson said in the release.

Following Noront’s release, Morrison noted that the proposed road would be solely for industrial users, for “developers to go in and get ore and minerals back out”. The proposed plan does not connect to any First Nation communities, and residents of the region would not have access to the road.
 
Morrison said negotiations over revenue sharing for First Nations in regards to the road are ongoing.
 
The province has also requested that the federal government get involved in the Ring of Fire in some form, Morrison said.
 
A number of First Nations in the region have adamantly opposed construction of the road, including Aroland, Constance Lake and Neskantaga First Nations.
 
Cliffs’ proposal has the road winding over 300 kilometres along the top of an esker through the James Bay Lowlands. Bridges would be required to cross a number of major rivers, including the Attawapiskat River.
 
Neskantaga Chief Peter Moonias has pledged to ‘lay down his life’ to prevent a bridge being built over the Attawapiskat River.
 
The land that the road would be built on is also under dispute before Ontario’s Mining Commissioner, as KWG Resources currently owns mining claims for nearly the entire length of the proposed road – claims that Cliffs needs before proceeding with the road construction.
 
Further complicating matters, both Ontario and Cliffs admitted before the Mining Commissioner that they had not yet consulted Neskantaga First Nation over the proposed road.