Originally Posted by
Flying Lawyer
As I said earlier, the Swiss land border ended to be a real boarder long before Switzerland joined Schengen. As Siwtzerland is surrounded by Schengen countries and secured its few (from a Schengen perspective) international borders (five airports) quite strictly there was no real need of border checks at the land borders. I studied there in the eighties and crossed the border in Geneva quite frequently. Customs showed interest when I used a car with Swiss number plates, nobody showed real interest when I used a car with German number plates.
Today you will not find too many land borders and eg those with Russia, the Ukraine or Turkey are somehow protected in a US style.
In the manner I noted earlier, even after Switzerland signed up for the Schengen arrangement, the land border between Switzerland and the EU Schengen countries did not stop being a real border even as there was a liberalization in enforcement actions along the border. Even then the favorites of the paranoid neo-nationalists in Germany made sure of that, what with their hunt for money/financial instruments amongst other things and their hunt for some persons when going by surface travel. Even in the years between 2004 and 2008.
About your second paragraph above, your comment really makes no sense as it is written because it confuses land borders with officially-sanctioned land border crossings -- there's a tremendous difference between the two.