Burlington’s Canada Street Is A Preening Gesture That Solves Nothing
Canadians are not waiting for Burlington to declare its friendship. They are waiting for Burlington to do something that matters.
This week, the Burlington City Council voted to rename, temporarily, the Church Street Marketplace—Vermont’s signature pedestrian mall—“Canada Street.” For the next two months, visitors will see $3,000 worth of hastily erected signs celebrating the city’s northern neighbor in an act of supposed solidarity. Burlington’s leaders think they are sending a message to Canadian tourists: Vermonters are the good Americans.
But the message, like the new street name, will come down quickly. It is performative, fleeting, and fundamentally unserious. This is not diplomacy. This is preening, and Canadians know it.
A Street Sign Is Not a Border Pass
The Canada Street gambit is Burlington’s response to a very real problem: Canadian tourists are staying away in droves. Vermont’s summer tourism season has been gutted by a collapse in cross-border traffic. Canadians, particularly from Quebec, are steering clear of the United States this year in response to Donald Trump’s threatening rhetoric toward Canada and to heightened, more confrontational U.S. border enforcement. For many Quebecers, Trump’s words—promising tariffs, threatening trade retaliation, and publicly disparaging Canada as unworthy of independence—are not just idle campaign noise. They are insults worth answering.
Burlington’s council president told the local press, “It's very important we send a signal.” But what Burlington has sent is an empty virtue signal, a hollow, symbolic gesture that sidesteps the actual problem: the militarized border that remains squarely under the control of the Department of Homeland Security.
No street sign, no banner, no marketing campaign can erase the fact that it is now harder, slower, and riskier for Canadians to cross into the United States than at any time in the last 30 years. Since 9/11, Americans have become accustomed to tightened borders. Canadians, on the other hand, have memories of the pre-passport days—when crossing into Vermont was as casual as driving into the next province. The thickening of the border has eroded that comfort, and now, amid Trump’s anti-Canada tirades and the aggressive posture of U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, the risk simply feels too high for many Canadians.
It is not that Canadians do not understand Burlington’s predicament. They just do not think the city is offering a serious solution.
If Burlington’s councilors thought this stunt would soften hearts across the border, they misread the room. Canadians are not just offended by Trump—they are taking concrete action. Canadian media have reported widespread boycotts of American goods, American destinations, and even American academic conferences. A Montreal mother interviewed by The National Post shared how she has canceled her Amazon Prime subscription and deliberately shops at Canadian retailers. She is not alone. Tourism statistics show that Canadian visitation to U.S. destinations has plummeted this year.
The resentment is especially pronounced in Quebec. As one Montreal restaurateur put it plainly: “I think French people, in my opinion, feel much stronger about boycotting the States than English people.” French-speaking Canadians, who have often felt like second-tier citizens in U.S. tourist towns, are now leading the retreat. They see Trump’s language, which to a French-speaker threatens not only annexation but assimilation, as part of a larger pattern of disrespect, and no amount of street renaming in Burlington will overcome that. It is not a matter of marketing—it is a matter of dignity.
Burlington’s Selective Memory
It is ironic that Burlington is now scrambling to woo back Canadians after years of downplaying their importance. Since the post-9/11 tightening of the border, Vermont has steadily reduced its cultural and economic engagement with Canada. The border became less friendly, the requirement of passports dampened casual day trips, and the two-year closure during the COVID-19 pandemic pushed even more Canadians to find leisure alternatives within their own country.
Many Vermonters have simply stopped visiting Canada. Cross-border hockey tournaments and shopping excursions have dwindled. A generation of Burlingtonians has grown up with little personal connection to Quebec. The “Canada Street” gesture feels not like the rekindling of an old friendship, but the panic of a neighbor who just realized they have ignored a key part of their local economy for two decades.
Behind this is a quieter, more practical fear: the fear of empty hotel rooms and shuttered storefronts. Burlington’s business owners, whose margins have thinned since the pandemic, are increasingly desperate. They now face a cruel irony: after years of shrugging off the economic weight of Canadian visitors, they suddenly realize how much they depended on them. But instead of lobbying Washington for sensible border policy or aggressively courting Canadian businesses with lasting incentives, the city opted for the quickest possible public relations fix: a sign.
The City’s Real Problems Go Unaddressed
What makes the Canada Street renaming so frustrating is that Burlington’s real problems are not symbolic. They are visible, structural, and worsening.
Homelessness in the downtown core has become more visible, with encampments, public drug use, and a rise in petty crime. These are not right-wing scare stories—they are lived realities that have pushed locals to avoid Church Street and the rest of downtown altogether. Burlington also has the highest meals and hotel taxes in New England, which squeeze tourists and locals alike. Yet these issues remain largely unaddressed while the council pours its energy into a summer-long name change.
The council seems more interested in preening for social approval than in governing. Burlington has built its identity as a liberal stronghold—one that prides itself on its progressive values, its cultural openness, and its gentle defiance of national trends. But here, that instinct has curdled into something hollow: a desperate attempt to be seen as “the good Americans” by Canadians who no longer care.
The Canadians who once flocked to Burlington’s markets and festivals are not looking for gestures of moral redemption from U.S. cities. They are looking for practical changes that make crossing the border less risky, less invasive, and less confrontational. That is a change that has to happen in Washington—not on Church Street.
Canadians See Right Through It
Canadian commentators have not been impressed. In both French and English media, they have dismissed the Canada Street move as pure optics. “A temporary sign is not going to change my vacation plans,” one Canadian traveler told reporters. Social media responses from Canadians have been overwhelmingly cynical, with Reddit threads mocking Burlington for what they see as a cheap ploy to save the summer’s tourist season.
It is not that Canadians dislike Burlington. It is that they do not believe Burlington’s leaders are capable of doing the hard work to solve the problems that actually matter. For a city that prides itself on its authenticity, this all feels uncomfortably fake. If Burlington genuinely wants to rebuild its relationship with Canadian visitors, it needs to start by taking itself—and its challenges—seriously.
That means:
Addressing border issues at the federal level. Burlington’s leadership should be pressuring Vermont’s congressional delegation to push back against Trump-era border policies and advocate for streamlined crossings for trusted Canadian travelers, including permanently opening a NEXUS lane at Highgate Springs. Bernie Sanders, Peter Welch, and Becca Balint need to own this issue, as does Phil Scott.
Investing in downtown safety and livability. Cleaning up Church Street—not just for tourists, but for Burlingtonians who increasingly feel pushed out of their own downtown.
Rethinking its tax structure. Meals and lodging taxes that target tourists actively deter the visitors the city is desperate to attract.
Building lasting cultural connections. Instead of a two-month sign, the city could establish long-term partnerships with Quebec cities, support French-language signage that is not rusting and full of bad grammar, and invest in cross-border festivals and events that make Canadians feel genuinely welcome.
Canadians are not waiting for Burlington to declare its friendship. They are waiting for Burlington to do something that matters. Until then, the renaming of Church Street to Canada Street is just a well-meaning performance—a virtue signal fluttering in the summer breeze, destined for the recycling bin by September.
References:
https://burlingtonvt.portal.civicclerk.com/event/8177/files/attachment/9598
https://dailyhive.com/canada/trump-canada-rename-burlington-vermont-street
https://www.mychamplainvalley.com/news/burlington-designates-church-street-as-canada-street/
https://www.mynbc5.com/article/burlington-church-street-canada-street-reactions/65094344
https://www.mynbc5.com/article/church-street-burlington-canada-street-renaming/65090048
https://www.mynbc5.com/article/northeast-governors-meet-with-canadian-leaders/65075184
https://www.noovo.info/nouvelle/une-ville-americaine-rebaptise-une-rue-en-lhonneur-du-canada.html
https://www.sevendaysvt.com/guides/are-vermonters-welcome-in-canada-right-now-43584476
https://www.sevendaysvt.com/news/church-street-temporarily-renamed-canada-street-43782162
https://www.thetravel.com/vermont-burlington-renames-church-street-canada-street/
https://www.wcax.com/2025/06/16/burlington-may-rename-church-street-canada-street/
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