ANC Podcast Replay | The APMA’s Flavio Volpe on the need for the Gordie Howe bridge

ANC Podcast Replay | The APMA’s Flavio Volpe on the need for the Gordie Howe bridge Automotive News Canada Podcast · Jul 2, 2026

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Place

Gordie Howe International Bridge

This is a massive new bridge being built between Canada and Detroit. It is designed to make it much faster and easier for trucks carrying car parts and other goods to cross the border without getting stuck in traffic.

Person

Flavio Volpe

Flavio Volpe is the head of an organization that represents Canadian companies making car parts. He helps these companies talk to governments and make sure trade deals benefit the automotive industry.

Person

Matty Moroun

Matty Moroun was a wealthy businessman who owned the Ambassador Bridge, which was the only main bridge connecting Detroit and Canada for decades. He fought hard against the government building a second bridge because it would end his highly profitable monopoly.

Place

Ambassador Bridge

The Ambassador Bridge is a famous, busy bridge that connects Detroit and Canada. It carries a massive portion of the trade between the two countries, especially parts used to build cars.

Concept

just-in-time delivery

Just-in-time delivery is a system where car parts arrive at the factory right as they are about to be put onto a vehicle. This saves money on storage, but if a delivery truck gets stuck at the border, the entire car factory can be forced to shut down.

Term

USMCA

The USMCA is a trade deal between the US, Canada, and Mexico that replaced the old NAFTA agreement. It sets rules on how much of a car must be built in North America to avoid paying extra taxes when crossing borders.

Place

Ford Oakville Assembly

This is a large Ford factory located in Ontario, Canada. It has built popular SUVs for years and is a key hub for Canadian automotive manufacturing.

Car

Hyundai Tucson

The Hyundai Tucson is a popular, family-friendly compact SUV. It is a common sight on roads worldwide, known for offering good value, modern tech, and a comfortable ride.

LIVE

Hi everyone, a belated Happy Canada Day and an early Happy Independence Day to our U.S.

audience and welcome to the July 3rd, 2026 episode of the Automotive News Canada podcast.

I'm your host, Greg Lason, the digital and mobile editor at Automotive News Canada, coming

to you from just outside Windsor, Ontario, the automotive capital of Canada.

Today on the show, since it's a short holiday work week on both sides of the border and

we're celebrating two great nations who are allies, partners, neighbors and friends, we're

going to revisit a previous podcast, one about a bridge that's supposed to bring us closer together.

Today, we'll replay my conversation with Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association President

Flavio Volpe. Back in May, he spoke to me about the need for the Gordy Howe International Bridge

to open, connecting Windsor, Ontario and Detroit. The new span is a key link in the North American

automotive supply chain. Take me back to when the unnamed Gordy Howe bridge was first discussed.

What was the logistical situation like in automotive transporting parts to and from

Ontario and the United States? Well, look, if you want to send goods, you got to go over

at the time Matty Maroon's Bridge. It's capacity constrained, but it's also constrained by someone

in charge of what he wants, when he wants. It's not just the most important commercial crossing

between two G7 economies. It's the only privately held one. There was a really good discussion

between a conservative Prime Minister, the Stephen Harper here up on my wall,

and Barack Obama. How do we do this? What do we do? Certainly fought by the owner of the

Ambassador Bridge and the Maroon family now, like any other private business would want to defend

its spot there. The American side said, look, we understand the value in it,

but we don't have the money to put into it, which is amazing. We don't have the money to put into

it at the moment, but let's work on tolling the agreement, so that you guys front the money

and then you make it back on tolls. We did that. The bridge is financed by Canada. It's financed

by Canada with a very specific return agreement that worked for Canada, but mostly worked for

Canada because Canada had to find another way in, from Windsor to Detroit. Because at that time,

much like it is today, but with more volume, the most important things that went from Canada to

the US and vice versa were manufactured goods. The center of manufactured goods is Detroit,

Windsor. What were you flagging at that time, you and your members? Were you saying this is

costing us time and money? This is a bottleneck. I just wonder what you were flagging or what the

parts industry and auto industry's stance was and what their recommendations were to both sides

of government, whether it was US or Canadian government officials.

Look, on the Canadian side, the argument was more about a bottleneck and what that bottleneck cost

versus the toll on the bridge. But the toll on the bridge is, look, you got two lanes,

anytime you got an issue, you're stuck getting that cost money. But you got to go through

town to get to that bridge. And if we're going to spend some money on infrastructure,

going around town, build the highway to a new bridge and get you right out there, get it off

center, and then see if we can't get the capacity right through town than we did. And so we did a

couple of things. We built capacity to the current bridge, and we've also built that long-term

capacity to the new bridge. And the travel and goods is really balanced in either direction.

And so the industry writ large said, yeah, this works for us. This also allows us to grow that

capacity. At the time that we'd come to the bridge decision, this cluster, this Detroit-centered

cluster, was losing investment decisions to the US Southeast. And in a lot of cases to Mexico,

when some of those US Southeast conversations were, well, access to deep water ports. And so

you're going to make this stuff and you're going to export it out. And then the Mexican argument

was, look, cheap labor, cheap this, cheap that. But also we've got trade agreements for 45, 46

different countries. So you can use Mexico as a base. And the Detroit cluster was seen as what

you're servicing the Midwest and you're servicing American markets. But you're also, you've got

a lot of inertia in the way you move goods. And this bridge was one of the solutions

in moving goods in the air. To put it in context for the listeners who don't know,

there was an old joke around Windsor that went as follows. You could get from Quebec to Miami

and pass 13 stoplights and 12 of them were on a stretch of basically residential roads leading

into Michigan. And then there was one on the other side of the bridge before you hooked up with the

interstate system that could get you all over America and avoiding stoplights. That is the

bottleneck you were talking about, correct? That residential street, essentially. Now,

and now it's free flowing to a brand new eight lane bridge. How does that change

the way auto industry moves goods? And how does that change in terms of monetary savings

just in time delivery? Because we know that's how the industry operates.

Yeah, it's all the obvious changes. Look, you can predict when a shipment's going to arrive.

You can bulk up on shipments and not necessarily worry about whether there's excess capacity.

We're all stuck in a straight up hormones right now. There's a better calculation on fuel consumption

when you're not stuck in Windsor for half an hour, when you're rolling. And reverse is true.

And also, it's a clear signal to the industry that all three levels of government understand

that movement of goods is important because we built the monument to it. I remember talking

to Eddie Francis, former mayor of Windsor about this so many times. And from a municipal point

of view, of course, they didn't have the infrastructure dollars to commission something.

So expansive. But he was dealing with General Motors had closed a transmission plant there.

There was a series of closures and slowdowns on the American side. And the whole issue

in Windsor was, look, how much longer is Windsor going to be in the auto business

if we don't fix some of these things? We closed Essex Engine. We reopened it with

money from the federal and provincial government. But at that time, a major infrastructure project

was good for Windsor rights in Ontario companies. And it was very good long term vision for anybody

that knew that you had to go through Windsor to get to the US. Let's do that in the most

painless way possible. And Eddie was a real champion of it. He was the mayor. And Eddie's no

longer the mayor. It's been a long time since Eddie's been the mayor. He probably has all his

hair grew back. But this bridge couldn't be arriving at a better time. Politics aside,

I think we're going to get peace on the USMCA front. I think we're going to see

volumes pick back up. And the U-turn that the Americans are going to make

on how they view the USMCA region as critical to their competitiveness with China and the

rest of the world may actually cause a real glut of business when this stuff gets announced.

You know, outside my window here, I could see the Ford Oakville plant. That's going to be online

later this year and better to have a romantic idea that you can get that stuff across

rather quickly, like when you look at pictures of the 401 from the 60s.

You know, you brought up USMCA and you seem to believe a deal is possible and probably likely.

The other sort of monkey wrench that's been thrown into this is Donald Trump saying he won't

open the bridge. So even if we get a USMCA deal, do you believe that Donald Trump will indeed

approve it? Does he have any leg to stand on when he says he won't open it? Or is this going to

open no matter what? Well, he's never wasted an opportunity to create a negotiating friction.

And I think you could file this into that. That bridge will open. It may not open the

minute that we said it's going to open, but the bridges go two ways. And the American companies

that are relying on the shipment of goods into Canada, like $29 billion worth of auto parts that

come into Canada every year from the US, where do they go? They go on many maroons or the maroons

family bridge, you know, some of it sneaks through in other places, like in through.

Sarnia, for example, or here on. Yes, or New York, Ontario bridges, but

for the bulk of it goes through there. So I think he's just pressurizing the situation

and making him in the way that he does. But it's not, there's no way.

I want to go back to a couple of things that you mentioned. First, I want to talk, you liken this

to the Strait of Hormuzor, at least you showed why one passing is not enough, right? And we've seen

this in auto. If you go back to the COVID-19 crisis and the blockade at the Ambassador Bridge, was

that really a signal to all parties involved that, hey, we need a second span in case there is an

emergency of any kind at Matty Maroon's Bridge or any other crossing for that matter?

Yeah, somewhere on my wall over here that you can't see on your screen is a framed copy of the

emergency injunction, the APMG, to reopen that bridge. And the way that we did it was to argue

that there was irreparable harm being done on production that would never be rescheduled.

And subsequent reports showed, third-party analysis showed that was about a billion

dollar cost to the auto industry. That's in five days. What we argued in the moment was

this thing is so absolutely critical. It has to be cleared today. And you'll remember that

everybody bitched and moaned about it. But everybody like, well, is it Windsor Police

Services? Is it the OPP? CBSA? And we went and got clarity on it. But I spent maybe

the next six months apologizing for a bunch of idiots with hockey sticks and Hyundai Tucson

who caused a wreaked havoc because they understood. I shouldn't call them idiots because they did

understand one thing. It was the only way in. Right. And it was owned by a private company

that said, I'm not going to intervene. And by the way, the blockade is at the bottom of the bridge.

Yeah, you're right. It was on public roadways and public roadways. It was not on the actual

physical structure of the bridge, which is privately owned, as you mentioned by the Moorgi family.

Yeah. So I think it helped to make the case for what was emerging physically as the

second bridge over there. We're not going to have that problem over there. No, of course,

we made some legislative changes and the provincial government was said, hey, by the way,

you go to jail and we can charge you a 100000 dollars. It's not a traffic ticket.

Don't fool around. But that moment was exactly why that was our straight up for a moose moment.

Exactly why you should have other paths.

The other thing I want to circle back on is you brought it up and I wanted to discuss this.

It was a conservative prime minister and a democratic US president that announced the

deal that got together and got this done at two parts. One was the political relationship back

then better. And two, was there a better understanding of automotive supply integration

between the conservatives under Harper and the Democrats under Barack Obama?

What was the relationship politically better and was there a better understanding of

how tied together North America is in the auto industry?

Well, I'll say all the relationships on either end of the spectrum on both sides of the 49th

parallel have been better than any relationship that Donald Trump is the counterparty on.

Mostly because American presidents, while they always understood that they had

size and leverage over Canada, always said, okay, well, Canada is our most important

trading relationship. So we're not going to be self-destructive while being mean spirited to them

and caught off our noses by their face. They know how exposed they were.

And so it made those relationships easier to manage because it was an expectation of

professionalism. Nixon hated Pierre Trudeau and there's a famous story where he called him an a-hole

and Trudeau having heard that said, I've been called the worst things by better people.

And neither one of those two sides of that conversation meant better relations between

the two countries. But the relations in Nixon put a tariff on Canadian automotive goods in 1971

to cause a crisis as well. But we don't remember that. We don't get taught that because it was

within the regular spectrum of how these two countries would operate with each other. So

Stephen Harper worked very well with Barack Obama, even if they may not exactly have liked each other.

Now, your question on whether this administration or this Canadian government really understands

and or appreciates the integration of the automotive trade, I would argue that Donald

Trump and his administration probably understands better than many of their predecessors. And that's

why he pushed that button. And that's why he's using it as the wedge. Like, I know how much

pain this is. And by the way, I don't care about you. Here you go. That makes sense. My last

question to you, as we all know, you're a sports fan, do you approve of the name,

the Gordy Howe International Bridge? It seems like it's right up your alley. I just wonder

your thoughts to get us out of here on something like your thoughts on the name.

You know, we've all kind of spent a better part of the last year cringing at a phrase that really

worked for about a month, which was elbows up. But but Gordy Howe was known for his elbows. And he

was he was very good. He was not flashy. But he was the best player on the ice. And he was the

story with his elbows and and the curve of his stick. But he did it for the Detroit Red Wings.

And he was Captain Canada, when he was the captain of the team in the industrial heartland

of the USA, that bridge could not have been named after anybody else. And frankly, they should have

called it the Gordy Howe Gordy Howe Bridge twice, because he will stand as a testament to Canada,

US culture, family and relationships. Long after all of us are gone, and everybody who poked

everybody else's eye. There was only one number nine. Appreciate it as always, Flavio. Always a

pleasure. Great. And once again, like to thank Flavio for his time. If you'd like to be a guest

on the show, have a suggestion or simply want to comment, email me at glason at auto news.com.

And remember, you can listen to all our previous podcasts on Spotify, iTunes, Google Play,

or on our website, automotivenews.ca. Just scroll to the podcast hub in the middle of the home page.

And don't forget, you can follow Automotive News Canada on X, where we're at Auto News Canada.

You can find me there too under at glason, A-N-C. Finally, look for us on LinkedIn. Just search

Automotive News Canada. That does it for this holiday episode of the Automotive News Canada

podcast. We hope you'll join us next time. So long, everybody.

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17:17

Gordie Howe International Bridge

Flavio Volpe

Matty Moroun

Ambassador Bridge

just-in-time delivery

USMCA

Ford Oakville Assembly

Hyundai Tucson

About this episode

Original notes