International Bridge Between Detroit and

International Bridge Between Detroit and Windsor The Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor is one of the busiest border crossings in North America. Where, it handles over 9 thousand cars and trucks daily. However, the age of the structure (82 years old) means that a number of challenges are being faced. As the bridge must carry increasing amounts of traffic and is facing continued deterioration. At the same time, there have been complaints that the different routes to Canadian highways (from the bridge) are disrupting several local neighborhoods in Windsor.

To address these challenges the Canadian government has introduced an ambitious project, to build another bridge down river called: the Detroit River International Crossing (DRIC). This is a joint effort between: Canada and the United States to build another structure that can address the current, along with future challenges affecting commerce throughout the region. Where, the project will provide a number of distinct benefits, while addressing the different concerns of numerous parties.

(Dennis, 2010) Political Politically, the project has a tremendous amounts of support from the different agencies in the U.S. And Canadian governments. Recent evidence of this can be seen with the State of Michigan receiving $500 million in matching funds from the U.S. government (for their part of the project). (Dennis, 2010) Social From the social standpoint, the new bridge would help to address the concerns surrounding many of the neighborhoods in Windsor. This is because the increasing amounts of traffic have caused several communities to experience excessive amounts of noise.

Once another structure is built, this will reduce the negative impact of: the traffic from the Ambassador Bridge on these neighborhoods (helping to improve their quality of life). (Dennis, 2010) Environmental The different environmental concerns about the project are unfounded. This is because a study was conducted by the LGL Limited. They found that the negative environmental impact of the project was limited (especially since it provides a number of design features that will protect the Ojibway Prairie Grasslands).

("Protection of the Natural Environment," 2007) Economic Cost Benefits The economic benefits of new bridge are: increased tax revenues and it will create additional jobs. The increased tax revenue would be realized from: the tolls that the Canadian and state governments receive. According to the Michigan Department of Transportation, they found that when completed, the DRIC would generate $70.4 million for the City of Detroit alone (in the first year). By the year 2040, this is expected to increase to $240 million.

The reason why so much revenue would be generated from the project is: both Canada and the United States can jointly operate the bridge. This is a much better situation for these governments, in comparison with the Ambassador Bridge (which is privately owned). At the same time, the new project would create an additional 10 thousand jobs from the added: toll booths and maintenance staff to operate the structure. (Berr, 2010) Clearly, the proposed DRIC Bridge linking Detroit and Windsor can provide a number of distinct benefits.

The most notable are: it can generate significant amounts of tax revenues and it will create jobs. At the same time, it will have: limited environmental effects, reduce the amounts of noise in.