The Vancouver International Airport Authority's (VIAA) top executive is urging Ottawa to consider accepting U.S. visas for admittance to Canada as a way to make it more convenient for foreign visitors.
"Is there that much difference between the two countries' processes and desired outcomes?" asked VIAA's new CEO Craig Richmond during a recent speech to the Vancouver Board of Trade. "Why couldn't you enter Canada with a U.S. visa and vice versa?"
Last year the Canadian government made the first baby steps toward allowing Chinese visitors with U.S. visas, and not a Canadian one, to enter Canada.
The China Transit Program (CTP) allows Chinese nationals to pass through Canadian customs without a Canadian visa on their way back home from the U.S. as long as they have an onward ticket to one of six Asian destinations, a U.S. visa and are travelling on an approved airline, such as Air Canada or Air China.
Representatives at China Southern Airlines and China Eastern Airlines told Business in Vancouver that they expect to be approved for CTP within the next few months.
While these Chinese visitors are only momentarily in Canada, the precedent is clear.
Richmond said if Canada expanded its acceptance of U.S. visas, it would stimulate Canadian tourism because visitors would not have to suffer through the long processing times for Canadian visas.
Chinese citizens can expect their application for a Canadian visa will take 16 days whereas, in the U.S., it tends to be about four days, he said.
"Canada's visa application process is onerous," Richmond said. "Among the issues: too many forms, language barriers and even having to submit your original documentation."
Richmond plans to meet with Transport Minister Lisa Raitt in early November along with a group of CEOs representing Canada's major airports.
Entering Canada using U.S. visas and changes to allow Chinese nationals to transit visa-free in Vancouver when en route to South America are issues expected to be on the agenda.
For more on the debate over visas and air travel, see next week's issue of BIV.
