🇨🇦 Why the Gordie Howe International Bridge was 'a bad deal for Canada from the start'

Canada paid $6.4 billion for a bridge to the U.S., then got dragged into a last-minute revenue surrender just to open it. Perfect summary of the Trudeau-Carney era: Ottawa bankrolls the asset, absorbs the risk, and still acts grateful when Washington lets Canadians use what they already bought. The reported terms are almost comical in how one-sided they sound.

The deeper scandal is that this was apparently rotten before Trump squeezed it harder. A project sold on rising traffic arrives after Ontario-U.S. cross-border traffic dropped 41 per cent from 2000 to 2024. Canada funds customs plazas, gives the U.S. a rent-free footprint, then now shares half the revenue for 15 years after operating costs but before repaying debt. That is not tough negotiating. That is managerial nationalism in its purest form: flashy infrastructure, bad assumptions, no leverage, and taxpayers left holding the ceremonial ribbon. The governing class loves grand cross-border symbolism right up until Canada ends up paying for everybody else’s prosperity.

🍁 Maple Chronicles