Iqaluit is the capital of the Canadian territory of Nunavut. Located on Baffin Island, it is the territory's largest community and only city, and the northernmost city in Canada. It was known as Frobisher Bay from 1942 to 1987, after the large bay on the coast on which the city is situated. Its traditional Inuktitut name was restored in 1987.
In 1999, Iqaluit was designated the capital of Nunavut after the division of the Northwest Territories into two separate territories. Before this event, Iqaluit was a small city and not well known outside the Canadian Arctic or Canada, with population and economic growth highly limited. This is due to Iqaluit's isolation and heavy dependence on expensive imported supplies, as the city, like the rest of Nunavut, has no road or rail connections to the rest of Canada, and has ship connections for only part of the year. Iqaluit has a polar climate, influenced by the cold deep waters of the Labrador Current just off Baffin Island, which makes the city cold, although it is well south of the Arctic Circle.
As of the 2021 Canadian census, the population was 7,429 (population centre: 6,991), a decrease of 4.0 per cent from the 2016 census. Iqaluit has the lowest population of any capital city in Canada. Inhabitants of Iqaluit are called Iqalummiut (singular: Iqalummiuq).
History Iqaluit has been a traditional fishing location used by Inuit and their predecessors, the Paleo-Eskimo (Dorset culture) and Thule, for thousands of years.Iqaluit at The Canadian Encyclopedia The name, Iqaluit, comes from Inuktitut (), which means .
World War II caused an influx of non-Inuit to the area when in 1942, the United States built Frobisher Bay Air Base there, on a long-term lease from the Government of Canada, in order to provide a stop-over and refuelling site for the short-range aircraft being ferried to Europe to support the war effort. Iqaluit's first permanent resident was Nakasuk, an Inuk guide who helped United States Army Air Forces planners to choose a site with a large flat area suitable for a landing strip. The wartime airstrip was known as Crystal Two and was part of the Crimson Route. It operates today as Iqaluit Airport.
The US and Canadian authorities named it Frobisher Bay, after the name of the body of water it borders.
In 1949, after the war, the Hudson's Bay Company moved its south Baffin operations to the neighbouring valley of Niaqunngut, officially called Apex, in order to use the airfield. In the mid-1950s, the population of Frobisher Bay increased rapidly during the construction of the Distant Early Warning Line (DEW line), a system of defensive radar stations—see NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command).
Hundreds of mostly non-Inuit construction workers, military personnel, and administrative staff moved into the community, and several hundred Inuit followed, to take advantage of the access to jobs and medical care provided by the base operations. By 1957, 489 of the town's 1,200 residents were reported to be Inuit. After 1959, the Canadian government established permanent services at Frobisher Bay, including full-time doctors, a school, and social services. The Inuit population grew rapidly in response, as the government encouraged Inuit to settle permanently in communities supported by government services.
Naval Radio Station (NRS) Frobisher Bay (HMCS Frobisher Bay), callsign CFI, was established in July 1954 as a result of the closure of NRS Chimo, Quebec. Station CFI was part of the Supplementary Radio network. Because of its remoteness and size, it was very expensive to operate. Renamed CFS Frobisher Bay in 1966, advancing technology eventually forced the closure of CFI later that year.
The American military left Iqaluit in 1963, as the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) diminished the strategic value of the DEW line and Arctic airbases. Canada continued to operate an administrative and logistical centre for much of the eastern Arctic at Frobisher Bay. In 1964, the first local elections were held for a community council, and in 1979 for the first mayor. The founding of the Gordon Robertson Educational Centre, now Inuksuk High School, in the 1971 at Iqaluit confirmed the government's commitment to the community as an administrative centre. At the time of its founding, this was the sole high school operating in what constituted more than one-seventh of Canadian territory.
On 1 January 1987, the name of the municipality was changed from "Frobisher Bay" to "Iqaluit". This aligned official usage with the name that the Inuit population had always used, although many documents were made that referred to Iqaluit as Frobisher Bay for several years after 1987. In the non-binding 1995 Nunavut capital plebiscite, held on 11 December, the residents of what would become the new territory selected Iqaluit (over Rankin Inlet) to serve as the future capital. On 19 April 2001, it became an official city.
Canada designated Iqaluit as the host city for the 2010 meeting of the G7 (Group of Seven) finance ministers. It was held on 5–6 February. The requirements for the international meeting strained the northern communications technology infrastructure and required supplemental investment.
Timeline 1576 – Englishman Martin Frobisher sails into Frobisher Bay believing he has found the westward route to China. He held the first Anglican church service in North America here. 1861 – Charles Francis Hall, an American, camps at the Sylvia Grinnell River and explores the waters of Koojesse Inlet, which he names after his Inuk guide. 1942 – The United States Army Air Forces selects this area as the site of a major air base to support war efforts in the United Kingdom and Europe. 1949 – The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) moves its trading post from Ward Inlet to nearby Apex. 1955 – Frobisher Bay becomes the centre for the United States/Canada DEW Line construction operations. Many Inuit continue to settle here for local services. 1958 – Telephone exchange service established by Bell Canada. 1963 – United States military moves out, resulting in some population loss. 1964 – First community council formed. The population of Frobisher Bay is 900. 1970 – Frobisher Bay officially recognized as a settlement. 1974 – Settlement of Frobisher Bay gains village status. 1976 – Inuit present a proposal for a separate Nunavut Territory to the Federal government. 1979 – The first mayor elected, Bryan Pearson. 1980 – Frobisher Bay designated as a town. 1982 – Government of Canada agrees in principle to the creation of Nunavut. 1987 – Frobisher Bay is renamed as Iqaluit, its original Inuktitut name meaning "place of (many) fish". 1993 – The Nunavut Land Claims Agreement is signed in Iqaluit. 1995 – Nunavut residents select Iqaluit as the capital of the new territory 1 April 1999 – The territory of Nunavut is established. 19 April 2001 – Iqaluit is chartered as a city. 2002 – Iqaluit, along with Nuuk, Greenland, co-host the first jointly hosted Arctic Winter Games; the Arctic Winter Games Arena was constructed in Iqaluit for the event. 5 February 2010 – Canada designates Iqaluit to host the finance meeting as part of the 2010 G7 summit. 29 July 2022 – Pope Francis visits Iqaluit to meet with a group of former residential school alumni on his penitential apostolic visit to Canada. He is the first Pope to visit Nunavut.
Geography
Iqaluit is the northernmost city in Canada, at 63 degrees north of the Equator. Iqaluit is located in the Everett Mountains, which rise from Koojesse Inlet, an inlet of Frobisher Bay, on the southeast part of Baffin Island. It is well to the east of Nunavut's mainland, and northeast of Hudson Bay.
Climate
Iqaluit has a tundra climate (Köppen: ET, Trewartha: Ftkd) typical of the Arctic region, although it is well outside the Arctic Circle. The city features long, cold winters and brief, cool summers. Average monthly temperatures are below freezing for eight months of the year. Iqaluit averages just over of precipitation annually, much wetter than many other localities in the Arctic Archipelago, with the summer being the wettest season. Temperatures of the winter months are comparable to other northern communities further west on the continent such as Yellowknife and to some extent even Fairbanks, Alaska, even though Iqaluit is a few degrees colder than the latter. Summer temperatures are, however, much colder due to its easterly maritime position affected by the waters of the cold Baffin Island Current. This means that the tree line is much further south in the eastern part of Canada, being as southbound, in spite of low elevation, as northern Labrador.
Although it is north of the natural tree line, there are some short, south-facing imported black spruce (Picea mariana) specimens protected by snowdrifts in the winter, in addition to a few shrubs, which are woody plants. These include the Arctic willow (Salix arctica). The Arctic willow may be up to around horizontally, but only tall.
The climate of Iqaluit is also colder than Gulf Stream locations on the same latitude. For example, the Norwegian city of Trondheim has an annual mean temperature that is milder.
The lowest temperature ever recorded was on 10 February 1967. The highest temperature ever recorded in Iqaluit was on 21 July 2008.
Iqaluit's climate is changing. In 1979, the mean temperature was , but in 2023, it was . Furthermore, during the first 23 years of that period, there were 14 years which displayed a negative temperature anomaly and 9 which displayed a positive one, whereas in the second 23 years, there were only 3 negative and 20 positive temperature anomaly years.
Cityscape Neighbourhoods
Downtown (central) Happy Valley (north) Lake Subdivision (north) – residential area Lower Base (south) Lower Iqaluit (southeast) North 40 (northwest) – located on the north side of the airport Plateau Subdivision (northwest) – residential area Road To Nowhere (north) Tundra Valley (west) Tundra Ridge (west) – home to two of the city's schools and youth centre West 40 (southwest) – commercial area
Suburbs Apex (Niaqunngut), officially and functionally part of the City of Iqaluit, is a small community about southeast () from Iqaluit's centre and is known in Inuktitut as Niaqunngut. It is located on a small peninsula separating Koojesse Inlet from Tarr Inlet. There is a women's shelter, a church, a primary school (Nanook Elementary School), a design shop and a bed and breakfast in the community. Apex was where most Inuit lived when Iqaluit was a military site and off-limits to anyone not working at the base.
Architecture and attractions
Much of Iqaluit's architecture is functionaldesigned to minimize material costs, while retaining heat and withstanding the climate. Early architecture runs from the 1950s military barracks of the original DEW line installation, through the 1970s white hyper-modernist fibreglass block of the Nakasuk School and Municipal Offices and Arena, to the lines of the steel-reinforced concrete high-rise complex on the hill above it. A number of older Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and early 1950s buildings have been retained and restored in Apex (the former nursing station has been revived as the Rannva Bed and Breakfast, the HBC buildings as an art gallery). The newer buildings are more colourful and diverse, and closer to the norms of southern architecture.
The principal exception is the Nunavut Legislative Assembly Building, which is remarkable for its colourful interior, adorned with some of the very best in Inuit art. A new legislative building is in planning to be developed and built outside the city on the Apex Road.