Deputy, I do not believe that an East/West road would be used for large scale extraction of resources. It would predominantly be used to move personnel and equipment in and out of the region, and perhaps to a small extent for extraction of products with concentrated value. For the "bulk" products with lower values per volume unit, the railway would ultimately be the best solution.

Ex.

Nickel is valued at $12,500 per ton.
Chromite is valued at $330 per ton.
(These are approximate values).

In order to ship $1m gross value of product out of the Ring, a nickel producer would have to move eighty tons, or a few truckloads.

In order to ship $1m gross value of product out of the Ring, a chromite producer would have to move about three thousand tons. Far more traffic, and far more damage to a road.

There is no question that rail is ultimately going to be the best long-term solution for extracting bulk products from the Ring.