GUWonder

Time for some iced coffee given the consideration being given to expanding the governmental authority to shut down the bridge between Denmark and Sweden.

If the bridge between Denmark and Sweden gets shut down for much more than very fleeting extreme weather conditions, CPH airport isn't going to be as effective an airport in serving southern Sweden as it has become in the past 15/16 years.

fassy

More important... what should all the daily commuters do? That is a very poor plan. Come on - just do solid checks at the two single points (Hyllie station and the toll station) of entry and send everybody they do not want to have back. Not that difficult.

GUWonder

They need a process engineer to help them. I had reports that they were checking people who shouldn't have been checked, but I wanted to experience it myself. So I started a trip in Sweden at Hyllie recently where I boarded a train at Hyllie. And I, along with all passengers on board the train, got asked for ID by the police -- regardless of whether or not the passengers had boarded the train in Denmark or not. With checks like this, it seems like they are making it more difficult than necessary.

It would be sort of funny if I was removed to Denmark and had to fly to Sweden only to make my way back by air or train or car to get to wherever in Sweden I want to go. As I could more easily do that without an ID check.

Lesson: take the Pagatag/purple trains instead of the Oresundstag train, if wandering without passport/ID and starting a trip at Hyllie.

FT Guest xyzpdq

Insanity - what happened to Reinfeldt's "humanitarian superpower"

GUWonder

I can't go there and back -- unless going via a circuitous route that nets me more airline miles/points -- if my passport is stuck at an embassy in any country other than the one where 200,000 or so people, on a humanitarian inclination, were admitted just this year into a country of just under 10 million people prior to that.

The US lost Vietnam; Russia lost Afghanistan. It seems like both those Cold War superpowers' people were better off long after losing. In the meantime, I can't afford to lose my US passport or I end up in limbo on or off "The Bridge".

It will be interesting to see what pushback I get back when asking for another ordinary US passport (with 2 year concurrent validity) because I need it due to Swedish border controls.

The Chinese embassy in Copenhagen loves to squat on my passport for one or more nights, just because they want to make a point. Meanwhile most every other Chinese embassy seems happy to turn my passport back with the Chinese visa even on the same day as application.

oliver2002

Get:
-a US Passport card, and
- a 10 yr Chinese visa

GUWonder

I have various ten year visas from various countries, but I also need other visas to visit some of those countries since the purpose of my travel isn't eligible under some of those visas.

China, for example, doesn't issue ten-year visas for all China travel purposes to all Americans. Ten-year general purpose type visas from China aren't applicable to all of my travels. Still need more China visas.

My US passport card was looked at curiously by Swedish border control yesterday and refused by Swedish border control, even as I still use in to enter and exist Canada by road with it. [Even the Canadians refuse my US passport card when I fly into YVR and YYZ, but that is because they read the card literally.] After self-removal at Hyllie, I had other arrangements that got me admitted. But that involved a US passport. A US passport card is not a US passport, even as US body law on the matter has in some part tied the two together when it comes to how the US views them. But Sweden doesn't acknowledge a US passport card as being a US passport.

In two weeks, I'm told, I should anticipate 20 or more minute delays at CPH airport when taking a train from Denmark to Sweden, at least if I am starting the journey in Denmark at any point beyond CPH (the airport). Why? Because they are seriously considering to require that all passengers on the train get checked at CPH and to do so by clearing the trains of all passengers at the airport and making them get in line to board the next train to Sweden. Basically the plan is this: anyone starting a train trip from beyond CPH airport will have to shuffle trains at CPH. They want to trial this during the Christmas holiday vacation period and have it "lagom" in time for the post-vacation/post-holiday traffic.

Skanetrafiken management has serious concerns about the delays this will create; and Danish and Swedish employers in the Oresundstag region should too. 20-60 minute delays are what is expected by them. For a train journey that can be as little as 12 minutes, that is a big increase in commute costs in a world where time is valuable.

I'm picking up an additional US passport this week just because of this changed border control situation for Denmark-Sweden crossings.

nacho

Did you get checked by the police or Tull? Got checked at the bridge by TULL (didn't see any police last night), only Tull and a Tull dog.

I wonder if just check ID or they check if you are "entitled" to enter Sweden (whether a Chinese tourist has a visa on his/her passport).

GUWonder

Police not customs/tull. They just glanced at the passport page, which clearly notes that it is a US passport. They aren't looking for my stamps or asking about my legal allowance to be admitted when I have my passport. For passports issued by countries with people who are generally required to get visas to visit the Schengen Zone? I don't know how that goes. I know some Chinese citizens who are Swedish residents but I haven't asked around to see what they are experiencing. They would likely need their passport and their resident card or visa.

The checks being planned for implementation just before the Christmas vacation period are even worse than I had initially expected. The plan seems to be this: DSB rail will hire a private contractor and put people (both passing via CPH to Sweden and people starting at CPH to go to Sweden), through a holding/processing center above ground at CPH and then allow people to proceed back down to the tracks to go to Sweden but only be subjected to another check at Hyllie of the sort already in play.

A train shuffle at CPH is going to be a mess at rush hour. And it wouldn't surprise me if it makes some parts of a CPH terminal far more crowded.
This is more likely going to add 40-80 minutes to some of my journeys. I guess this may end up driving me to use MMX/Malmo-Sturup more than I otherwise would.

And on a nice day I may as well take a boat then.

FlyerTalker01565

Must be so hard for you that it's not the so-called "racist" Danish govt. that made this incredible move. The PC Parade has been awfully silent compared to when we enact the will our people

GUWonder

I really couldn't care less who did it; it's still an inconvenience when it comes to my travels, regardless of who is or is not involved in whipping up these border control iterations and putting them in place.

If CPH stops being as effective in serving Southern Sweden along with Denmark, what good would it to do for the CPH flight schedules? Balkanized SAS hasn't been all that great for SAS's financial success, so not sure why it would do any good for flights to/from CPH if wanting a more solid flight network at CPH.

FlyingMoose

Its better to have people's travel inconvenienced than not having border control in current times.

FlyerTalker01565

Amen. Americans have been doing it to us for a decade and a half now, time to pay back a little. Just hope we can do it a little smarter; seems the American version is just a welfare programme for, um, Canadians.

GUWonder

Beggar-thyself border controls with easily gamed/circumvented checks is sort of an inconvenient joke and then some. It's like locking one door when you leave the house but leaving all the windows and other doors unlocked and wide open while gone. Worthy of an Emil or Pippi Long-stocking type story from Astrid Lindgren, but with a more modern incarnation.

Sometimes they are even checking people who aren't crossing borders and who haven't even crossed a national border for days, weeks, months, years or even decades. And now they want to outsource some controls to companies. It's workfare; but at least there are a lot more cute cops around, even in my hotels.

nacho

That's what the whole Schengen treaty is used for - but the politicians are stupid enough to not making it works. They were supposed to build a "Fortress of Europe" and obviously they failed.

Yes, that reminds me of the long immigration queue at IAD, LAX, SFO...... because of this I avoid transit in the US.

This holy mess started by Germany and Sweden telling the whole world to open their hearts and welcome anyone to come as long as you don't fly in. If they haven't said this and "opened" their hearts, this would have never happened.

Definitely - it has been like that since the Schengen started. Chinese "students" get a tourist visa to Spain and then travel north to work illegally. When I was flying AF and transit at CDG, the immigration officer just waived us through as soon as he spotted us having a onward boarding pass. Basically he knows that we are not going to bother France so why bother.

I think it's because they were told to check ID and that is, not to find out where he/she is going. It's the "following order" mentality. I think they might as well replace it with robots or automated gates.

Putting a check like this between DK and SE is going to harm a lot of commuters and they are definitely making people drive than taking a train. It's a step back from integrating the oresund region.