The Common Travel Area is a travel zone that comprises the islands of Ireland, Great Britain, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. In general, the Area's internal borders are subject to minimal or non-existent border controls and can normally be crossed by British and Irish citizens with only minimal identity documents, however, the use of a passport is required by the airline Ryanair. The maintenance of the Area involves considerable co-operation on immigration matters between the British and the Irish authorities.
However, the Irish government has imposed immigration controls on people entering the state from the United Kingdom since 1997. These controls have been compulsory for air travellers, selective on sea crossings and occasional for land crossings. In 2008, the British government announced that it planned to impose similar controls on travellers entering the United Kingdom, which would, if implemented, effectively bring an end to the passport-free zone.
Read more about Common Travel Area: Immigration Regulations, Schengen Area
Famous quotes containing the words common, travel and/or area:
“No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.”
—Bible: New Testament, 1 Corinthians 10:13.
“There is the grand truth about Nathaniel Hawthorne. He says NO! in thunder; but the Devil himself cannot make him say yes. For all men who say yes, lie; and all men who say no,—why, they are in the happy condition of judicious, unincumbered travellers in Europe; they cross the frontiers into Eternity with nothing but a carpet-bag,—that is to say, the Ego. Whereas those yes-gentry, they travel with heaps of baggage, and, damn them! they will never get through the Custom House.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Prosperous farmers mean more employment, more prosperity for the workers and the business men of ... every industrial area in the whole country.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)