Just curious. What happens at international railroad border crossings? Given what you go through in a car, I am interested in how they handle all that freight?
Good question, and I am not really sure. I do see a Guilford switcher pushing a few boxcars and such across the trestle between Calais and St. Stephen most days over the noon hour. The St. Criox river is only about 20 feet wide at that spot. There is a gate across the tracks on the US side but it swings right open. You could easily walk right across. I do see the US Border Patrol watching down there but they are not watching the trains, they are watching for people trying to cross illegally. The freight is not inspected or anything so I assume everything has been pre-cleared. Charlie
Probably works alot like the trucking industry. I know a little about it cuz, my dad drove truck and would move freight from Canada to US. The place its loaded at usually fills out a customs form, and seals the door with a seal tagged with a certain number to correspond with the paperwork. Then it goes through customs, they usually don't bother you, but if they spot check you, the usually just check that the paperwork is good and the seal isn't broken. Its pretty rare that they'd rip into a load, cuz man thats A LOT of work. A tractor trailer can haul 22 tons, imagine the amount of work to disect a 100 ton boxcar load! The system is pretty secure, so they don't really have to check each load. They just spot check to keep everyone honest. Hope this helps explain a bit!
At the Blaine WA crossing they have a different system. The trains pull into the siding at Swift and a contractor walks the train and closes and locks all the doors. Customs just looks at the paperwork and off it goes. COming south I know they sometimes set out cars at White Rock for a lack of a valid waybill, but I don't think the inspection itself is any more rigerous.
I remember taking a passenger train across Ontario in the late 50's to New York. This was on the NYC. They sealed the doors and warned us not to get off the train if it should stop in Ontario. As I remember it the train didn't stop at all on that part of the trip. It was moving very slowly at times but didn't come to a halt. Hope this helps some. Doug
