Border tie-ups add $800 to sticker price: report

DETROIT — The car industries of the U.S. and Canada are so integrated that every vehicle that rolls off the assembly line represents about seven border crossings.

That’s how many times the various components that go into a car have to clear customs between our two countries before the vehicle is built.

So it’s easy to see why border delays can add up to $800 to the cost of a new car. Talk about an expensive and unnecessary addition to the sticker price.

According to some recent studies released by a group called the New International Trade Crossing Coalition (NITC), which is lobbying for a new bridge between Detroit and Windsor, delays at the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor cost Canadians big time: Somewhere between $15 and $30 billion a year.

By the year 2030, delays on the Detroit-Windsor corridor will have cost the Canadian economy between $17.8 billion a year and 70,000 jobs.

The NITC is using statistics garnered by the Departments of Economics at the University of Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier University. And while one might default to the notion that Canada’s economy is hurt more than that of the U.S. as a result of border delays, the study shows the impact cuts both ways.

"With future trade between the U.S. and Canada expected to grow 180 percent by 2015 along with corresponding truck traffic, it is time to improve international border infrastructure between the U.S. and Canada by building the New International Trade Crossing."