Fair summary but you got the N/S road (Cliffs) vs railway ( KWG) backwards. It was all railway from the start and both companies were working cooperatively. My interpretation is, things broke apart because Cliffs wanted to take over (or dictate) to KWG, who would not budge.
So KWG was left alone with the railway and Cliffs wanted to force their fallback alternate which became the road. It came to an end when road access to the route was denied. Not to mention that Cliffs's assets started to be less valued and they had to save costs. Hence they sold.

Another wrong:
"EW route does not connect all FN communities"
No it does not, none would but it does twice as many as the N/S route so your excuse is false.

As for Noront, it does not care much about which route (my interpretation). What Noront wants is all year transport for it's nickel ore at lowest price. Rail is the final answer of course. But in the mean time the E/W is favoured because it serves more communities and when it comes to push or shove we have to have as many of the nearest comunities on side. The nearest is Webequie to whom N/S is a non entity. So would we please distant neighbours at the expense and perril from the nearest?

Ed.