Opening Canadian Border “Extraordinarily Important,” says U.S. Travel President
March 4, 2021 Jim Byers
Getting the Canadian border open is a top priority for the U.S. Travel Association.
Speaking with the media on a Zoom chat on Thursday, USTA President and CEO Roger Dow said opening the border “is extraordinarily important.”
“A billion dollars a day goes across that border,” he said in response to a question from Canadian Travel news.
Dow said he’s currently in St. Petersburg, Florida and can look out at nearby condos at night and see ones that are dark because they’re owned by residents of Canada.
“We need to get the Canadian traveller back. It’s the largest country for travel to the US and over 20 million Canadians come here, and it goes back and forth. We have to get that going. It’s one of the most important things, especially for leisure markets like California, Arizona and Florida, Mississippi and Louisiana.”’
Dow said the USTA is lobbying to get all markets open when it’s safe to do so, “but the Canadian market may be one of the easiest to get open based on protocols both countries are doing, and it would make to me the most sense to start stepping out in Canada fairly quickly and then look at the rest of the world where getting different treaties and agreements with countries is going to be a little more challenging. But it can be done.”
Tori Emerson Barnes, US Travel’s Executive Vice President of Public Affairs and Policy, said a number of US senators who represent states along the Canadian border, including Susan Collins of Maine, are publicly talking about the need to get borders open.
“It’s something we expect congressional engagement on on a continuing basis.”
Dow also said the USTA would love it if the US government could at least provide a target date for when travel might resume.
“I think the US government could really set a specific date that they could push towards. Nothing’s a guarantee, we have to see how things go, but push towards opening travel. How about saying mid-May or May 30th, we’re going to look to get the steps in place and we’re going to be prudent and smart. But set a date so that people can then do some planning.”
Canada’s border with the US has been closed to all but essential traffic since March 21 of 2020. The Canadian government last month extended that closure to March 21 of this year.
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