News Digest

BTS Releases 2011 Border Crossing/Entry Data. 

The number of commercial truck crossings into the United States from Canada and Mexico was 10.4 million in 2011, 1.7 percent more than in 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation's Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), a part of the Research and Innovative Technology Administration.  The 2011 increase follows a 9.4 percent rise in 2010 after two years of decline during the recession period of 2008 and 2009. The truck-crossing numbers are included in the 2011 border-crossing data posted today on the BTS website. Collection of border-crossing data was begun in response to signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994. The data allow tracking of cross-border traffic since the signing and are used for transportation planning, port studies, travel analyses, and corridor assessments. The database also includes numbers of incoming trains, buses, containers, personal vehicles, and pedestrians entering the United States through land ports and ferry crossings on the U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Mexico border. The database shows that 151.0 million people crossed into the U.S. from Mexico in personal vehicles or as pedestrians in 2011, an 8.9 percent decrease from 2010.  Also, 59.6 million people entered the U.S. from Canada in personal vehicles or as pedestrians in 2011, a 4.2 percent increase from 2010.  Border crossing/entry data from 1995 to 2011 can be found on the BTS website.