Keep Aldergrove crossing open

May 31, 2009

Canadian Border Services Agency wants to limit commercial traffic
 
By Brian Lewis, The ProvinceMay 31, 2009

Is there no limit to bureaucratic irrationality? Or, as Greater Langley Chamber of Commerce executive-director Lynn Whitehouse so aptly puts it: "Have you ever heard of such a bone-headed idea in all your life?" Whitehouse was commenting on a new proposal by the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) to close the Aldergrove border crossing to commercial truck traffic.

This facility at the south end of Highway 13 is described by Transport Canada as the 12th busiest commercial truck crossing in the country. It handles an average of 100,000 trucks annually, says the B.C. Trucking Association.

The CBSA proposes to close Aldergrove to commercial traffic for security reasons, then divert all those trucks to the nearby Pacific Highway and Huntington/Sumas crossings -- which, by the way, are already congested.

Its rationale -- and I use the word loosely here -- is that Aldergrove isn't properly equipped to monitor trucks for illegal drugs, guns, etc., so rather than spend money to upgrade it, the CBSA's solution is to ban all commercial traffic.

Never mind that Aldergrove has handled commercial trucks for years now, even though its original intent was to handle passenger vehicles only.
But wait, this gets even sillier.

The CBSA is planning a major reconstruction at Aldergrove anyway. Why not incorporate upgraded facilities for commercial trucking? "The government's position," a CBSA spokeswoman says, "is that when replacing an existing facility it only replaces what already exists -- so since Aldergrove was designed as a passenger vehicle crossing only, that's what is being planned." Then she proudly informs me that the new Aldergrove facility will include a dedicated Nexus lane for passenger cars, which the existing crossing doesn't have.

So the bureaucrats are prepared to break the rule about only rebuilding what already exists for a Nexus lane, but they won't break it to accommodate commercial traffic.

All silliness aside, business groups, the region's mayors and the trucking sector are flabbergasted that the CBSA would even consider such a policy when simple logic says growth in commercial trucking crossing the border -- especially in the high-growth Fraser Valley -- will soon require more, not less, customs capacity, especially once the economy recovers.

Next month's opening of the Golden Ears Bridge between Surrey and Maple Ridge will only increase that need.

"The closure will be devastating for us," says Langley Township Mayor Rick Green. "It doesn't make any sense, especially in a tough economy when business is struggling. I think they're simply trying to rationalize costs." In fact, for several years now stakeholders have tried to convince the CBSA to expand Aldergrove's operations to 24/7 from its current 8 a.m. to midnight schedule.

And their current consensus is that if more infrastructure is needed to bring Aldergrove up to the required commercial traffic standards then, as the Nike commercial says, just do it.

"We must provide that infrastructure at Aldergrove to secure it," says Mark Warawa, the Conservative MP for Langley, who is appealing to Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan to block the closure.

In its letter to Van Loan, the BCTA also recommends that facilities for handling commercial trucking be incorporated into Aldergrove's new design, says vice-president Louise Yako.

So public response thus far to the CBSA's proposal has been a resounding thumbs-down -- but is there a part of "no" these bureaucrats don't understand? Let's hope not.

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