TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Pre-Clearance Controversy?

https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/ports-entry/operations/preclearance


Some background information .....

Great to see you back Bobcat!

Hi Elaine,

How are you?

Hope island life is returning to normal again.

And what is even more interesting to me is that the PM says that the Dutch financing is basically almost in place, so why is the Tourism Minister attending a briefing about possible other financing.

Daily Herald story

But looking at the numbers, the alternative financing is for over $200 M, versus $100M for the Dutch financing. Does US Pre Clearance cost $100M to put in place? Although I guess the new financing would pay off existing bond holders also, which I have no idea how much that is. I'm thinking this is what all the hoo-ha has been about, the past few days--that some people are seeing a way out of taking the Dutch money. And then there wont' be that pesky Integrity Chamber..

We need roofs, not TSA

I have no idea what is going on or what the government people are thinking but I figured this would stimulate some spirited conversation.

Welcome back Bobcat. Where have you been. Miss you on TripAdvisor too.

Exactly!!! With the advent of global entry and mobile passport this is a giant waste of money that could be spent elsewhere. Now if the US was footing the bill then that’s different. But if SXM is paying it should NOT be a priority at this point.

Bobcat, Welcome back from me also. Missed your posts both here and on T/A. Hope all is well.

Hello everyone, glad everyone is well.

Having done this before coming from the Bahamas the only things that I found as an advantage was 1) if you wished to purchase duty free liquor or other non carry on products AND you were going to have to connect once arriving in the US you didn't have to deal with putting it in your luggage. 2) Easier to make your connecting flight.

Personally, I did not like waiting in line to leave and would rather do it in the US with Global Entry and my carry on bags.

Cheers!

I agree completely with both these statements.
And this is not rocket science just good old common sense, seems common sense isn't so common after all in government.

Welcome back, Bobcat!!!

Is there an incentive to US Airlines for SXM to have Pre-Clearance? Pre-cleared flights are treated as domestic flights on arrival in the US. Does that free up an international arrival slot for a US airline, using a domestic slot instead? I don't know, but I'm curious. If so, would that perhaps be an incentive for US airlines to increase service to SXM?

SXM politics is a mess..

They are doing everything they can to avoid that Integrity Chamber. Must sure have something to hide.

It doesn't make any sense to me that a dime would be spent on pre-clearance considering the state of the airport.

JimandBeth--right.. Americans aren't the ones pushing for this, it's some SXM officials, because there's something in it for them..

A few days ago, maybe 3, I can’t keep up, we saw a small air force 1 jet land. Looked as if they were met by a few dignitaries. One man got off with a rather large square brief case, they got into a suv and went to the airport. Fuel truck came, topped of the tanks, by then the suv returned with only that one man, he got out of the suv, now no case in hand, jumped in the jet, and they were GONE. Thought it kinda of weird since the hole thing might of lasted maybe 30 mins. Also weird is that happening along with all this talk about US pre-check. Anyway just my observations. Off to the pool or beach, getting harder to make a decision! LOL

UPDATED ARTICLE

Sarah Wescot-Williams weighs in.

SXMFOX

That sure does seem weird to me also.
I wonder what was in that case. 🤔

Maybe some secret special security equipment.
Couldn't be 💰 that would just be too 😝 crazy.
And I don't believe it would be a large brief case full of documents.
Hmm 😒.

As it has been explained to me, there are two key advantages to SXM having US Customs pre-clearance at PJIA.

One, because passengers traveling to the US will clear customs while still in SXM, airlines will be able to schedule flights to and from SXM from any US airport they choose, rather than only being able to fly from an international airport as is the case currently. So, passengers who might normally have to connect through JFK, or MIA or CLT or any other international airport, might find themselves with direct flights instead. It will, of course, depend on airlines determining that there is enough traffic to justify flights from certain domestic airports. There are bound to be some where it makes sense though.

Two, because airlines will not have to schedule their arriving flights to accommodate US Customs load factors, meaning coordinating their arrivals so that Customs does not have too many arriving passengers all getting in at the same time, airlines will be able to schedule flights at times that may be more convenient for everyone. This opens up the possibility of morning flights back to the US and so forth.

According to some government projections, SXM forecasts a five fold increase in the number of passengers arriving by air, as opposed to via cruise line, once pre clearance is established. I have no way to know how accurate this projection is but the economic impact of such an increase in visitors to the island is the reason that pre clearance is being pushed so heavily by some.

Sounds reasonable but I doubt many US cities would see additional non-stop flights beyond the hubs or major airports they now originate from.

Agree with you completely, ruralcarrier. And can you imagine the chaos at PJIA if they did? Just my opinion.......

It is interesting to me, unless she's putting on a show, which could be, that Sarah doesn't even know if there is an agreement in place for the World Fund financing for the airport.

I understand that there are some advantages to having pre clearance, but the costs seem to be huge and to me what is more important is to improve the function of the entire airport for everyone, and then work on pre clearance eventually. At a time when almost everyone still has to climb stairs to access planes, to talk about pre clearance in absolute necessity terms is folly.

Exactly. Five times more arrivals? The infrastructure can't handle what we have.

Bruce--I can't imagine that there are ANY airports where it would make sense for the airport to run a nonstop flight to SXM that are not already international airports. There are some pretty dinky airports that are international airports now.

As far as the stats, I think for cruise pax, the numbers are around 1.8 million per year, something like that. I honestly don't know at all what the current numbers are for air pax, but if they really mean 5 times the number of cruise pax, you would be talking approximately 10 million a year. Sounds like more of that 'funny math' that was in play for a while, when they were talking about Pearl of China. And if the government falls, and William Marlin happens to get back in somehow, guess Pearl will be back ON the table...

Yes I don't think that airlines will be scheduling flights from any non international US airport to SXM.
Airlines are always thinking of the bottom line.
Demand from small airports may not make direct flights feasible.

Most people who have to connect to meet a flight for SXM would also prefer to do so at MIA or JFK and not via BUF.
Connecting via a smaller airport will also cost more as there will be less flights to do so.

Carol - Back in the day, and by this I mean in the early 70's, we couldn't imagine there would be as many daily nonstop flights to SXM as there are today and yet, look what happened. At first, we could only fly to SXM via San Juan, then we got nonstop flights from JFK and it was only over the course of years that MIA, CLT, BOS, and others were added. It isn't just about adding new cities though. Airlines operating out of New York and Chicago could choose to fly to/from LaGuardia and Midway because landing fees are lower for them there then they are at JFK or O'Hare. The same is true in many cities. It will just depend on what is most efficient for the airlines and passengers will adapt as they always have. Again though, the bigger prize for the airlines is being able to avoid scheduling their arriving flights to coordinate with US Customs and Border Patrol here in the US.

As for as the stats, in 2016, the last full year of stats pre-Irma, there were 528k "stay over" visitors who arrived in SXM by air. Some of those continue on to other nearby islands so perhaps we can assume the right number for SXM is about 500k. A five fold increase would mean 2.5 million arriving by air or 2 million more than there are currently. As some have rightly noted, this would overwhelm the current infrastructure of the island. A five fold increase may be a wild over estimate though. But, even a three fold increase, from 500k to 1.5 million, would mean an extra 1 million stay over visitors a year. These kinds of numbers get the attention of the island's government because it means there will be increased investments made in the island, more hiring of local workers, more taxes paid by both businesses and tourists and so forth. All of which is good for the economy of the island.

In terms of the order of things, I agree there is no question that the airport has to be restored to at least its prior operating capacity before adding additional traffic. However, since the powers that be are, hopefully, planning a design with an eye to the future, it makes sense to include pre-clearance facilities in the design. The timing of when pre-clearance goes live, can be decided once regular traffic is back to normal.

Midway is already an international airport and my understanding is that LeGuardia has distance restrictions that could come into play regarding SXM. I still don't see there would be any nonstops that would come into being because of being able to be a 'domestic' flight. Now there definitely would be advantages of not having to clear C & I upon the first landing in the US, but I still don't see how that is going to increase the number of visitors though.

Thanks for the info regarding stay over visitors, which I had no idea what the number was.

When I 1st started coming to SXM in the 90's, Northwest had a nonstop from Detroit. It was full every time I was on it. No idea why Delta doesn't have a nonstop from Detroit. I would think it would be very popular with all us mid-westerners.

I thought that United has a nonstop from Detroit?

United would have likely been Chicago. Detroit was a Northwest hub at one time.

Sorry!