Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - A technical glitch is to blame for a system outage at the U.S.-Canada border last week that resulted in commercial traffic being halted into Canada for several hours on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Because of the pause with commercial traffic into Canada, it also resulted in several tractor trailers being stuck on the U.S. side of the border, some for multiple days, creating chaos on highways and several arterial roadways surrounding the border crossings at the Peace Bridge, Rainbow Bridge and Lewiston-Queenston Bridge.
While not much is known about the nature of the technical glitch that gave the Canada Border Services Agency headaches, Western New York Congressman Tim Kennedy (D, NY-26) feels this was a good reminder to not just the local community, but also national and international leaders of how important this point of entry is to the United States and Canada.
"The amount of people in commerce and goods, and the services that depend on that freedom of movement across our Canadian border is essential. And when that gets backed up, the economy falters," said Kennedy in an interview with WBEN. "As soon as we saw that the backup was occurring, we reached out to the government leaders in Canada, made them aware. They were right at work dealing with the issue that apparently was a computer glitch of some sort that resulted in a tremendous backup at the Canadian border. We're pleased that they found a solution to it, and traffic is moving freely once again."
Kennedy adds it's essential to keep traffic and commerce flowing between both borders on a regular basis.
"We have to ensure that the billions of dollars that flow across the U.S.-Canadian border every single day, flows without interruption and without obstacles. That is a big part of what I'm doing as the co-chair of the Northern Border Caucus in the House of Representatives. And working with my Canadian counterparts and my colleagues in New York and in Washington, we're working every day to bring attention to the border, positive attention, and freedom of commerce across the border," Kennedy said.
He feels the traffic backups and massive delays that took place last week should open the eyes of everyone in Western New York to the needs and concerns over such problems.
"There's always safety concerns that come to light when you have a massive slowdown of traffic like that, particularly as it spills over to the New York State Thruway and the 190. I think it's incumbent upon the leaders at every level of government to pay attention to that and ensure it is safe and traffic is flowing," Kennedy says.
While he acknowledges these issues are not all too common on either side of the border, Kennedy does believe there needs to be more done to be prepared for any further potential problems at a local level.
"Again, If in fact the traffic backs up into the City of Buffalo and onto the New York State Thruway, there needs to be contingency plans from the various municipalities to deal with it," he said.
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