The Town of Inuvik is Canada's largest community north of the Arctic Circle, 2000 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, and was the first completely "engineered" northern community. Inuvik is situated on permafrost, which proved to be a significant challenge to engineers and contractors. Design and construction of Inuvik pioneered cold region engineering practices such as pile construction, freeze protection of water and sewer systems and construction techniques associated with isolated northern communities.
removal of the ground cover or by excavations will cause the permafrost to melt.
The design and construction of the Town of Inuvik was pioneering work in the area of cold regions engineering. Previous cold regions engineering work was limited to linear structures such as the Alaska Highway of the 1940's, and this work was undertaken in a region of intermittent permafrost. This was the first time that a permanent settlement was to be designed and constructed above the Arctic Circle in permafrost conditions.