3 July 2002

Border Infrastructure Needs Investment

The following article is excerpted from the Toronto Star of July 3rd, 2002

DEPUTY PRIME Minister John Manley and U.S. Homeland Security Adviser Tom Ridge are making significant progress in speeding up legal and regulatory impediments to cross-border movement of goods and people, something that's essential for our economy.

Following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks there were fears by Canadian businesses that the United States would clamp down on border security and slow cross-border traffic to a crawl, badly damaging Canadian exports and hence Canadian jobs and future investment.

Such fears were exaggerated because it was also in the U.S. interest to keep the border open.
But the terrorism crisis did lead to much-needed attention to the border — attention that would have been needed even if there had been no terrorist attack.

Last week Manley and Ridge released a progress report on their December Smart Border Declaration and its 30-point action plan.

Significant improvements are being made so that border crossings for legitimate travellers and products could actually end up being easier than before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

But despite this progress, there's still a big problem — overloaded border-crossing infrastructure with bridges, tunnels and highway approaches becoming bottlenecks due to years of neglect of much-needed investment.

The two countries hope to overcome some of the growing bottleneck problems by using high-technology processing systems and by doing more of the border clearing work some distance away from actual border-crossing points.

But despite these measures, there's also a need for greater border investment.
In his budget last December, then finance minister Paul Martin allocated $600 million over five years to help eliminate border bottlenecks.

The funding was for new or improved highway access to border crossings, processing centres for vehicles to speed up clearance and so-called soft infrastructure such as high-tech transportation systems, which electronically monitor trucks and trains crossing the border.

Since then, though, little has been heard of this funding, suggesting delays in needed border improvements.

The federal government's requirement that provinces, municipalities and the private sector share the costs could add to delays.

It also has to work with the United States. Manley is expected to make a statement on the fund later this summer.

Since the most urgent need is in Ontario, much of the shared-cost money will have to come from Ontario.

The six busiest border-crossing points are all in Ontario due in large part to the presence of the auto industry.

Last November, Manley acknowledged years of neglect were compounding border problems.
"The system was not perfect before Sept. 11," he said. "Ninety per cent of Canada-U.S. road traffic was crammed through only 11 ports of entry, most of which are on tunnels and bridges."
Daily commercial vehicle traffic had gone from 20,000 in 1991 to 37,000 in 2000, and is expected to grow in the future.

This was not simply a logistics challenge; there were also security issues from Canada's point of view.

For example, in 2000 — while American border officials stopped 14,000 criminals from entering the United States, Canadian border officials stopped 21,000 from trying to enter Canada from the United States.

Some 50 per cent of guns used in crimes in Canada were shipped illegally from the United States. Moreover, more than 60 per cent of Canada's refugee claimants were entering Canada from the United States.

The need for action had been highlighted well before the Sept. 11 terrorist acts in a December, 2000, report of the Canada-U.S. Partnership Forum.

The forum had been launched by Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and former U.S. president Bill Clinton in 1999 to improve border management.

"While traffic volumes are projected to increase by 10 per cent annually over the next decade, border infrastructure