By Greenlandic standards, Qaanaaq has a regular network of streets, albeit they are of poor quality and unpaved. The town has quite a few paths, but no coherent system of paths.
Qaanaaq is one of the least accessible towns in Greenland, but it does have an airport, which opened in 2001. The airport is located some 3.5 km east of the town and has a 900-metre gravel runway. It is operated by Air Greenland via the airport in Kangerlussuaq (with a stopover in Upernavik). A road runs from the airport to the town, but it is often flooded during the meltwater season.
In its 2001 report, the Transport Commission proposed to close the airport in Qaanaaq and transport passengers by helicopter from Thule Air Base – just as was the case before the airport opened in 2001. The argument is considerable cost savings, but to realise the plan, an agreement has to be made with the USA, among other things addressing the need for supplementary overnight accommodation in the town and at the base. Avannaata Kommunia is to assess this need in more detail in the next planning period and only then make any necessary changes to the spatial planning in force.
The primary means of transport in the Qaanaaq area are aircraft, dog sledge and motor vessel. In the summer, transport to settlements can be by boat, whereas winter transport is by helicopter, dog sledge or snowmobile.
Qaanaaq is one of two towns in Greenland without any real port facilities, and a reef makes it difficult to construct one as this would mean blasting a channel. To load and unload, barges are used, which means that such activities can take days to complete. Qaanaaq is navigable for s short period of time from July to September, some years for only one month. Royal Arctic Line calls on the town. There are limited storage facilities.
Power, water and heat are provided by Nukissiorfiit. Power is produced using a diesel-driven power plant, and the town also features an emergency power plant. Heat production consists of electric heating as well as residual heat from the power plant, and was established at the establishment of the town. In the western part of the town, the heat production is oil-fired. Water production is based on surface water in the summer, and melted ice from frozen icebergs on the fiord in the winter. The water is distributed via a network of preinsulated, electrically heated frost-proof lines, water tank trucks and bottling houses. The water supply can meet the current demand, but it is unreliable in transition periods. Many of the town’s inhabitants fetch ice blocks to meet their own water demand.
Refuse services include day-time refuse and night soil, but the town is not sewered. Grey wastewater is discharged above ground, posing a problem and a nuisance to the citizens. Day-time refuse is collected, deposited and burnt in the open, even though there town does have a (non-functional) incineration plant. Night soil presents a problem because it is gathered in one place and in yellow bags, but without discharge. Previously, night soil was discharged to the water or taken on to the ice. Chemical waste is collected and stored at a disposal site.
TELE Greenland handles the telecommunications installations in the town and operates a satellite dish installation and associated buildings in the northeastern part of the town. At a central location lies a magnetic observatory with an observing station that registers the earth’s magnetic field. Relocating the observatory would make it possible to use the area for other urban purposes – e.g. new housing – and to create a higher degree of physical and functional coherence in the town.
Not least, the town’s filling station is located in the middle of town, close to existing buildings.