[Dr Caleb]

[QUOTE BY= N Say] <br /> They want to take advantage of our location to increase our trade to the east & west, which is a very "vivelecanada.ca" thing to do unless I'm mistaken. & to make a long story short I'm still not too worried about what the government of Texas is doing. Although if our governments tried expropriating land they wanted for a highway right-of-way or create totally private toll highways I would oppose both those things... Whether people in Texas go for it or not is up to them.[/QUOTE]<br /> <br /> I agree with you totally, N. <br /> <br /> The Prince Rupert port will have huge benefits to my home town of Edmonton. Large warehouses to store all the incoming Asian market goods; better, faster and cheaper access for Western companies to the Asian markets . . . all good things.<br /> <br /> But looking at the 'big picture' of the NAU, I just wish they would come out of the closet and say what they are doing. Seeing the same sorts of behaviours in the shadows as the FTA and NAFTA makes me wonder if what we think the big picture is, really will be good for us or not. I don't like not having a say, and I don't like being kept in the dark. I don't care what Texans do in Texas. But their plans may be synchronized with others who's plans include long term goals that affect me.<br /> <br /> And I don't like public officials meeting with CEO's to decide these things in private meetings. They are elected to represent us, they are accountable to us. They should have their report about those meetings on our desks 9:00 Monday morning.

[N Say]

[QUOTE BY= Dr Caleb]And I don't like public officials meeting with CEO's to decide these things in private meetings. They are elected to represent us, they are accountable to us. They should have their report about those meetings on our desks 9:00 Monday morning.[/QUOTE]<br /> <br /> that's true also. there should be more transparency. & of course if someone ever said "hey we're trying to get rid of bottlenecks and the border is a bottleneck, so we need a common market or customs union etc etc" I wouldn't like that too much either.<br /> <br /> At this point it's a bit hard to know what the current government thinks of north-south trade. In their Building Canada infrastructure plan there's a $33 billion fund available but their priorities haven't been announced yet. They're still discussing the spending with the provinces. It will be interesting to see how much is spent on streamlining the border crossings with the US. So far out of that $33 billion, $400 million for a bigger/better Ambassador bridge between Detroit & Windsor, and border security has been mentioned.