NAFTA superhighway grid

Canada has announced a plan to extend the NAFTA Superhighway network north in a way that would finish a continental grid designed to accommodate an anticipated tsunami of containers from China and the Far East. The Canadian Intelligent Super Corridor, or CISCOR, is a national transportation route designed to reach from the West Coast ports of Vancouver and Prince Rupert to Montreal and Halifax. The CISCOR case study provides strong evidence that the continent's ports, highways and rail lines are being reconfigured into an inter-modal system emphasizing technological logistics and "inland smart ports" designed to meet the demands of world trade, largely driven by the relocation of North American manufacturing to China. Inter-modal is a transportation economics reference to containers that can be transported on several different modes of transportation, including container ships, trucks and trains, without having to be unloaded or repacked. According to the CISCOR website, the Saskatchewan-based CISCOR Inland Port Network of the cities of Regina, Saskatoon and Moose Jaw is designed to serve "as the central logistics and coordination hub, creating a Canadian east-west land bridge connecting three major North American north-south corridors: North America's SuperCorridor, or NASCO, the Canada-America-Mexico Corridor, or CANAMEX, and the River of Trade Corridor Coalition."