Manitoba Conservation and the East Side Road Authority posted the provincial environmental impacts statement for public comments in late 2009. Engineering studies are underway for future projects, for several hundred kilometers of all weather road in the region.

The decision to move from a screening of this project to a comprehensive study is, according to the formal posting, "as a result of the January 21, 2010 Supreme Court of Canada ruling in MiningWatch Canada v. Canada (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans et al.), it was determined that the environmental assessment in relation to this project will be continued as a comprehensive study."

Connecting First Nations communities that currently have only ice and winter road access, the 'East Side Road' phase one is a fraction of the potential future project to connect over a dozen communities to permanent all weather road services. The region is currently non roaded, intact boreal forests. Climate change has dramatically reduced winter road access for the communities. The region is also the site of a proposal for a huge new boreal world heritage site which First Nations initiated with an Accord among their communities in 2002.