Provided that one is coming from Winnipeg or points west, and headed to Toronto, Ottawa, or points east, it actually isn’t all that bad at first glance—one crosses the border twice, and according to mapquest, it will only add five hours to go via Minneapolis/Chicago/Sarnia instead.
Of course, that will mean a ton of extra traffic at a few key border crossings. Great fun.
Wow, you’re right. Times on Google are close. I guess the limited access highways in the US pretty much offset the longer runs. Customs will still be a pain, especially for truckers...and getting through Chicago will be a real pain for all involved.
...and shorter runs are really out of luck.
I was looking at Google maps, and it listed three different routes from Winnipeg to Toronto: the all Canadian route, one through northern Minnesota-Wisconsin, and one through Minneapolis-Chicago-Sarnia. All routes were close in time (around 20 hours), but the route through Minneapolis-Chicago-Sarnia was the featured route and the shortest time-wise.