'It’s about time': Albertans react to plans to reopen Canada-U.S. land border
After a record long 19-month closure, many Albertans are excited to hear the United States will reopen its land and sea borders to fully vaccinated Canadians in early November.
The White House confirmed Tuesday night that Canadians and Mexicans will be welcome again for non-essential travel, though officials did not specify a date.
“The potential we’re going to see an opening in early November has everybody excited,” said Coutts mayor Jim Willett. “If they knew when there’d be a countdown clock on the Main Street. It’s a big deal!”
The small village is a port entry into Montana and was one of the busiest border crossings on a typical year before COVID-19 concerns resulted in travel restrictions.
“I would guess that we’ve seen maybe 10 percent or less of normal traffic,” said Willett. “You’d have lineups of traffic halfway from here to Milk River it would seem like, and that hasn’t happened.”
The restrictions on non-essential travel at the U.S. border have been in place since March 2020, when the pandemic was spreading worldwide.
Tyler Nickel is a Calgarian who currently lives in Washington and has been eligible himself to fly into Canada but his parents haven’t been limited on their abilities to travel to see him in the U.S.
“Before I would drive with no issues obviously but I wasn’t even able to fly for a little bit so I couldn’t come across the border. So, as soon as the border opened up I was able to fly up and see my parents and now we’re just trying to go trip by trip and try to figure out what it looks like in a month, six months, in a year.”
Canadian vacationers and day-trippers have perhaps been the greatest casualties of the land-border closure.
“It’s about time,” said Sandra Beattie in Calgary, who is anxious to visit her sister who lives in San Francisco. “It has been a long time yes it has, so it’ll be wonderful to open up and see her.”
JUST IN TIME FOR SKI SEASON
John Walton, the president of the Calgary Ski Club, said the reopening arrives just in time for ski season.
“A lot of them are itching for something a little different and it’s always nice to have a variety of hills to ski and it adds a few more to the repertoire of where you can ski,” he said.
The reopening is designed to dovetail with the U.S.’s existing plan to allow international travellers from further afield to resume travelling to the country.
VACCINATION REQUIREMENTS
There are still several questions about vaccine requirements as the U.S. prepares to reopen its land and sea borders to travellers next month.
Officials have yet to confirm which vaccines will be accepted or if mixed doses will meet eligibility tests.
More than 3.9 million Canadians have two different doses of Health Canada approved COVID-19 vaccines, not including Quebec which doesn’t categorize data by vaccine product. Of those, around 1.6 million people have had a dose of the AstraZeneca formula followed by an MRNA vaccine.
In Alberta, a third or additional dose of an mRNA vaccine such as Pfizer and Moderna are being offered to eligible Albertans who originally received an AstraZeneca shot, which has not yet been approved in the U.S. (https://www.alberta.ca/covid19-vaccine.aspx)
Michelle Noble with the AMA says there are a lot of unanswered questions and reminds travellers that Canada still has a level three, non-essential travel advisory to the U.S.
“A lot of snowbirds that will be driving across will certainly be looking to take that trip and it’s getting late in the season for them, so we should see a boost when those borders open,” she said. “We have seen an increase of requests to travel by air and we expect the same when land borders open and people who’ve been waiting to travel by car.”
Noble said it’s important that travellers make sure they have adequate insurance to ensure they’re protected heading to the states, and to ensure that insurance covers COVID-19 concerns.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
Toxic testing standoff: Family leaves house over air quality
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
Decoy bear used to catch man who illegally killed a grizzly, B.C. conservation officers say
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
B.C. seeks ban on public drug use, dialing back decriminalization
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
OPP responds to apparent video of officer supporting anti-Trudeau government protestors
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An emergency slide falls off a Delta Air Lines plane, forcing pilots to return to JFK in New York
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau on navigating post-political life, co-parenting and freedom
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
Last letters of pioneering climber who died on Everest reveal dark side of mountaineering
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
Loud boom in Hamilton caused by propane tank, police say
A loud explosion was heard across Hamilton on Friday after a propane tank was accidentally destroyed and detonated at a local scrap metal yard, police say.