The popular media of the past two decades has been full of prognostications of a boom in traffic in the Arctic. In many instances, attention-grabbing headlines and titles have leveraged valid public concern for global climate change to produce an expectation of near-immediate changes in global marine traffic patterns. The concern over global climate change is well-placed, and the inevitability of change a fact of life, but the realities of maritime traffic in polar waters are more nuanced, deliberate, and cautiously progressive. Arctic traffic is increasing, and this is somewhat driven by decreasing ice coverage, but perhaps not in such a rapid and dramatic way as expected. There are many reasons for this. Unavoidably, shipping economics is a leading constraint, which is related to the predictability of transit times, fuel expenditures, specialized ship costs, practicalities of routes, and varied risk appreciations such as availability of icebreaker assistance. But there are other issues at play also, including localized governance, which in some cases works to constrain the unfettered advance of industrial development. Our purpose here will be to touch on some of these issues to explain the current drivers or inhibitors of arctic maritime traffic, and how they interface with the geographic constraints of the area.
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