The important thing isn't the crossing, it's not needing to be accompanied by an icebreaker. The oil tanker SS Manhattan [1] made the trip in 1969, but unassisted crossing makes this economically competitive.
Goodbye, Polar bears, we like you, but we don't think your survival is in our "national interests". Meh.
Do you think there will such a furore over Canadian tar sands, when the oil from the middle east comes to a trickle ? When the fertilizer plants stop, plastics manufacturing ends, and transporting coal becomes harder ? Should governments care for the Earth or its subjects ? I'm sorry for being so dystopian, but I don't think Science has the ability to bear the burden of, what will be, 10 billion people. This will happen sometime, I just wish I'm not alive to see the day; climate change makes it much worse.
on that side. Other side is already full steam: