Edmonton: Gateway to the North....via Salt Lake City!

So how's this for the craziest bit of lunacy ever?

According to How Far Is It?, the distance from Anchorage, Alaska to Edmonton, Alberta is 2,227 kilometres.

So what happens when you use Expedia to try to fly down to E-town from the Alaskan capital?

You can take 6 hours and 49 minutes flying to Seattle and then into Edmonton.

Or you can take 10 or 11 hours and fly to Seattle and then Salt Lake City, or Anchorage to Salt Lake and then into Edmonton. This seams perhaps a little odd, partly because Edmonton is 1419km north of Salt Lake and Salt Lake is 3383km south of Anchorage.

So Anchorage-Salt Lake-Edmonton is 4802 kilometres to travel less than half that.

Meanwhile Anchorage-Seattle-Edmonton is 3181 kilometres travel distance, and Anchorage-Seattle-Salt Lake City-Edmonton is 4821 kilometres. And remember that you end up going horrifically south only to fly back north again!

Again, to call attention to the title of this thread, Edmonton prides itself as "Gateway to the North". Isn't it slightly realistic to think that say a person in Chicago wishing to go to to Alaska might just stop off in Edmonton along the way? (Of course, Edmonton to Chicago goes through Denver....)