Duncan Dee is a former chief operating officer at Air Canada, and the air transportation lead on the panel that reviewed the Canada Transportation Act in 2016.
In an attempt to avoid a repeat of last summer’s airport chaos, the federal Minister of Transport, Omar Alghabra, has announced a long-awaited plan to speed up security screening for some passengers. The introduction of the “verified traveller” program comes 10 years after the U.S. Transport Security Administration introduced its trusted traveller program, and seven years after a federally mandated review of the transportation system recommended such a program. While the new program will only be available at six airports and won’t include all travellers to the United States, these are the most significant changes in air passenger screening since the ones that followed the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Beginning on June 21, trusted travellers – such as NEXUS members, police officers and flight crew – will no longer have to remove their liquids, gels or electronics from carry-on luggage or remove shoes, light jackets or belts during screening. If the experience in the U.S. is any indication, these travellers will soon be able to complete the preboard screening process in less than 60 seconds, often even quicker.
These changes may appear to be trivial, but Mr. Alghabra had to overcome nearly a decade of significant bureaucratic resistance to abandon the “one-size-fits-all” air traveller screening model Canada has clung to since 9/11. Ironically, the 1.7 million Canadian NEXUS members have been able to experience the benefits of expedited trusted traveller screening at airports in the U.S., but not at home.
It is unfortunate the program doesn’t include more airports, such as those in Ottawa and Halifax, as well as more travellers to the U.S. The rationale for excluding so many airports is unclear and stands in sharp contrast to the U.S., where airports as small as Altoona in Pennsylvania, Bemidji in Minnesota, and Grand Forks in North Dakota have TSA PreCheck. That program, on which this new Canadian program is modelled, is available at virtually every commercial American airport. This standardization is a huge benefit for efficiency in travel. When travellers know exactly what the processes and rules are before they arrive at the airport, they can plan accordingly. Yet, in Canada, the people who develop these processes seem to revel in their lack of standardization. Then they feign surprise when travellers miss flights, flights are delayed and traveller complaints mount.
But the more significant question is this: Why has it taken Canada so long to catch up? As Canada joins the 2010s with the introduction of these new screening procedures, airline-industry observers and frequent travellers alike are left wondering when Canadians can expect to see other innovations that have become commonplace at airports worldwide.
For years, several jurisdictions in Europe and Asia have allowed travellers to pack regular-sized containers of liquids, creams and gels in their carry-on luggage by deploying liquid-explosive detection scanners at airport checkpoints. At many U.S., European and Asian airports, regular travellers have already experienced the speed and convenience when air-security authorities deploy advanced computed tomography (CT) 3-D scanners, allowing even regular travellers to keep laptops and liquids in their carry-on bags.
Canadians who have travelled to Britain or certain EU member countries such as France or Italy over the past year have experienced eGates, where customs and immigration screening is done in advance while the traveller is still in flight, and clearance is completed at an unstaffed kiosk using fingerprint and facial-recognition scanners, often without the need to even see an officer prior to exiting the customs hall.
These innovations not only speed up the travel process and improve the customer experience, they also minimize flight delays while enhancing air and border security by allowing authorities to focus scarce resources on those travellers who require further scrutiny and inspection.
Will Canadians have to wait another decade for these procedures, or is this new verified-traveller process a sign that innovation in Canadian air travel is back? One of the first trusted-traveller programs in the world was CANPASS, a precursor to NEXUS that Canada introduced in 2005, three years before the U.S. introduced Global Entry. Back then, Canada led the world in the use of data to facilitate air travel. If Canada wants to minimize disruptions for air travellers, it needs to regain its competitive edge and innovate.