The group overseeing the feasibility study into the proposed Alaska-Canada rail link has nominated Kells Boland to serve as its project manager.

Boland, a consultant with Calgary-based PROLOG Canada Inc., was selected by the joint Alaska-Yukon working group from a pool of four candidates, said Peter Laight, a special projects manager with the Yukon's Department of Economic Development.

'We were looking for someone with a lot of experience,' said Laight.

Boland has experience on both the Canadian and American side of the border and is well-known in the United States.

Boland said in an interview last week that he has worked in the Yukon, N.W.T., Alaska and Nunavut over the last 30 years.

'What's going to be helpful in this project is understanding the North ,and I think I do,' said Boland.

'It's much more important to understand the North in terms of its development opportunities and the traffic that currently comes into the North and to have an understanding of the transportation infrastructure that it already has here.'

Boland will be overseeing the Yukon and Alaska side of the study.

'I'm responsible for the cost, schedule and quality of the study,' said Boland.

'I am also directing the study. I have developed the scope of work for the study and I've been given a mandate by a working group composed of representatives of Yukon and Alaska and I've taken that mandate and identified the work that would be required to determine the feasibility in several different areas.'

The Alaska legislature has already put $1 million US toward the feasibility study and the U.S. Congress has contributed an additional $4 million US.

The Yukon Party government agreed to put $3 million Cdn. toward the study. Canada's federal government has yet to commit any funds.

Boland said he has been told he has approximately a year to have the study completed.

The feasibility study will be looking at the railway in terms of market, technical, financial, opportunity and risk analysis, he said.

'Each of those will be broken down into a whole array of work packages that can be individually bid on,' he said.

The first 66 packages, focusing on market, technical and financial aspects of the railway, will be posted on a website for consultants to review.

An example of a work package that will be available for consultants to bid on will be looking at traffic data, said Boland.

That package will ask the consultant to review, update and document traffic flows and transportation rates for all surface modes of transportation associated with inbound resupply and ongoing support for public and private activity in the Yukon and Alaska, said Boland.

Consultants will be required to examine the near-term, mid-term and long-range opportunities associated with the railway, he said.

'Each one of those is broken down to go out and figure out what the current market is, evaluate that in terms of where it's going and explain what that means for a railway project.'

After the website is posted, consultants will have approximately two weeks to look at the information and submit their CVs, said Boland. He hopes to have the resumes in hand by Aug. 1.

'All they have to do is submit their CV, and if they fit the bill and they're the best, then they're on the team,' he said.

'The approach we're taking is quite different, and, I think, exciting from Yukoners' perspectives, at least smaller consultants' perspectives, because it provides the opportunity for them to bid on individual pieces of work that I've made small enough so that anyone can access.'

Boland hopes to have his team selected and their contracts signed by Sept. 1.

Opposition Leader Todd Hardy said today he isn't sure how Boland's 66 work packages will fare in the long run.

Hardy said he's heard some people jokingly say that they're going to start consulting firms because of the seeming availability of the work.

'There's a degree of disbelief,' said Hardy, adding he'll have to wait and see what happens and how Boland's plan plays out.

But there does seem to be potential for an extreme waste of money, said Hardy.

The NDP leader also expressed concerns that there have been no announcements to the Yukon public about the selection of Boland as the project manager.

The railway is a controversial issue that has strong public concerns surrounding it, said Hardy.

'This is a group of people (the Yukon Party government) who only have a small amount of respect for the public's right to know,' he said. 'They think people should shut up and stay out of their way.'

Economic Development Minister Jim Kenyon told reporters while he was in Washington in June that the new project manager had been selected. Boland has been working out of Whitehorse's Economic Development offices for over a week.

'It raises some very serious concerns,' said Hardy.

But Boland said he is committed to keeping the public aware of what's happening on the project.

'The whole idea here is to keep people informed about what we're up to and to also to sort of unveil some of the thought process that has been going on, not behind the scenes, but to put numbers to what we're talking about to move from a conceptual stage to quantification about what can make sense in the economic real world,' he said.

Boland said he doesn't have any preconceived notions about the feasibility of the railway. The purpose of the study is to look at it in terms of quantitative numbers, he said.

'The whole point of this study is to get away from subjective points towards whether a railway is viable. That's what I've been hired to do to manage this study that will determine that in a quantitative way instead of an emotional way.'