Fort Smith Region, Northwest Territories Great Bear Lake, which is now entirely within the modern-day Region 2. It contained more than 77 percent of the population and more than 54 percent of the land area of the Northwest Territories. Its main economic centre was the territorial capital of Yellowknife; it also contained the town of Fort Smith. The 2006 census reported a population of 32,272 spread over a land area of . Fort Smith Region, Northwest Territories Fort Smith Region was a former Statistics Canada census division, one of two in the Northwest Territories, Canada. It was abolished in the 2011 census, along with the
Yellowknife Yellowknife began with the discovery of diamonds north of the city in 1991. The last of the gold mines in Yellowknife closed in 2004. Today, Yellowknife is primarily a government town and a service centre for the diamond mines. On April 1, 1999, its purview as capital of the NWT was reduced when the territory of Nunavut was split from the NWT. As a result, jurisdiction for that region of Canada was transferred to the new capital city of Iqaluit. Consequently, Yellowknife lost its standing as the Canadian capital city with the smallest population. Yellowknife is on the Canadian Shield,