A line house is a building deliberately located so that an international boundary passes through it. [1] [2] One such building on the boundary between the United States and Canada is the Haskell Free Library and Opera House in Stanstead, Quebec, and Derby Line, Vermont. The border is marked on the floor in a reading room and an auditorium. A number of single-family residences and some industrial buildings straddle the boundary in those two towns.
The International Boundary Commission encourages line houses to be abandoned as part of its mandate to clearly demarcate the Canada–United States border. The Haskell Free Library and most other line houses are on the Collins–Valentine line between Quebec and New York/Vermont. [3]
Line houses exist also in Baarle-Hertog and Baarle-Nassau on the border between Belgium and the Netherlands.
The border between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland passes through many houses and other buildings. [4]
In Sungai Haji Kuning at Sebatik Island, which is divided between Malaysia and Indonesia, there is a house divided by the countries' borders. [5]
Paul VI Audience Hall in Rome lies partially in the Vatican City but mostly in Italy: the Italian part of the building is treated as an extraterritorial area of the Holy See and is used by the Pope as an alternative to Saint Peter's Square when conducting his Wednesday morning General Audience.
Derby Line is an incorporated village in the town of Derby in Orleans County, Vermont, United States, slightly north of the 45th parallel, the nominal U.S.-Canada boundary. The population was 687 at the 2020 census.
The Webster–Ashburton Treaty, signed August 9, 1842, was a treaty that resolved several border issues between the United States and the British North American colonies. Negotiated in the US federal capital city of Washington, DC, it was signed August 9, 1842, under the new administration of US President John Tyler, who as the former vice president, had just recently succeeded and became chief executive upon the unexpected death of his running mate and predecessor, William Henry Harrison, who had only served a single month in office. The Daniel Webster–Lord Ashburton negotiations and new drawn-up 1842 treaty resolved many of the issues of the recent border conflicts and skirmishes between Americans and New Brunswickers in the Aroostook War of 1838–1839. It arose from disputes and controversies over the vague indefinite terms and text of the old peace agreement of the Treaty of Paris of 1783, which ended the American Revolutionary War.
Borders are generally defined as geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other subnational entities. Political borders can be established through warfare, colonization, or mutual agreements between the political entities that reside in those areas.
Stanstead is a town in the Memphrémagog Regional County Municipality in the Estrie region of Quebec, located on the Canada–United States border across from Derby Line, Vermont.
The Haskell Free Library and Opera House is a Victorian building that straddles the Canada–United States border, in Rock Island, Quebec, and Derby Line, Vermont, respectively. The Opera House opened on June 7, 1904, having deliberately been built on the international border. It was declared a heritage building by both countries in the 1970s and 1980s.
The Canada–United States border is the longest international border in the world. The boundary is 8,891 km (5,525 mi) long. The land border has two sections: Canada's border with the contiguous United States to its south, and with the U.S. state of Alaska to its west. The bi-national International Boundary Commission deals with matters relating to marking and maintaining the boundary, and the International Joint Commission deals with issues concerning boundary waters. The agencies responsible for facilitating legal passage through the international boundary are the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
The International Boundary Commission is a bi-national organization responsible for surveying and mapping the Canada–United States border and regulating construction close to the border. The commission was created in 1908 and made permanent by a treaty in 1925.
The Malaysia–Thailand border divides the sovereign states of Malaysia and Thailand and consists of a land boundary running for 595 km across the Malay Peninsula and maritime boundaries in the Straits of Malacca and the Gulf of Thailand/South China Sea. The Golok River forms the easternmost 95 km stretch of the land border.
Halls Stream or Rivière Hall is a 25.2-mile-long (40.6 km) tributary of the Connecticut River in eastern North America. For most of its length, it forms the Canada–United States border, with the province of Quebec (Canada) to its west and the state of New Hampshire to its east.
A quadripoint is a point on Earth where four distinct political territories meet. The territories can be of different types, such as national and provincial. In North America, several such places are commonly known as Four Corners. Several examples exist throughout the world that use other names.
Vermont Route 114 (VT 114) is a 53.094-mile-long (85.447 km) north–south state highway in northeastern Vermont in the United States. It runs northward from U.S. Route 5 (US 5) in Lyndon until nearing the Canada–United States border in the town of Norton; thereafter, the road continues east to the New Hampshire state line in Canaan. The vast majority of VT 114 is situated within Essex County; however, the route also passes through small, isolated portions of Caledonia and Orleans Counties.
The 45th parallel north is a circle of latitude that is 45 degrees north of Earth's equator. It crosses Europe, Asia, the Pacific Ocean, North America, and the Atlantic Ocean. The 45th parallel north is often called the halfway point between the equator and the North Pole, but the true halfway point is 16.0 km (9.9 mi) north of it because Earth is an oblate spheroid; that is, it bulges at the equator and is flattened at the poles.
Beebe Plain is an unincorporated geographically-contiguous settlement, split politically between Canada and the United States. An unincorporated village partially in Stanstead and partially in Derby Line, it is divided by the Quebec-Vermont border. This settlement was begun by David and Calvin Beebe in 1798.
Canusa Street is a road part of Quebec Route 247.
The Derby Line–Stanstead Border Crossing is a border crossing station on the Canada–United States border, connecting the towns of Stanstead, Quebec and Derby Line, Vermont. It connects Main Street in Derby Line with Quebec Route 143 in Stanstead. It is one of two local crossings between the two towns, which historically had many more. This was a major crossing point until the construction of Interstate 91 (I-91) and the Derby Line–Rock Island Border Crossing in 1965. The historic 1930s United States station facilities were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2014. Both stations are open 24 hours per day.
The Beecher Falls–East Hereford Border Crossing connects the towns of East Hereford, Quebec, and the village of Beecher Falls, Vermont, on the Canada–United States border. It is reached by Vermont Route 253 on the American side and by Quebec Route 253 on the Canadian side. Both the Canadian and the U.S. stations are open 24 hours a day. Whilst the Canadian station is open for commercial traffic, this is only on a more limited basis. The U.S. station facilities, built in the 1930s, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2014.
La Cure is a village located some 20 kilometres (15 mi) northwest of Lake Geneva, straddling the Franco-Swiss border. Administratively, the Swiss half of La Cure is part of the municipality of Saint-Cergue, while the French half is part of the municipality of Les Rousses. The international border bisects at least four buildings, notably the Hotel Arbez, in which the dining hall and other rooms are bisected by the border.
The Hotel Arbez, also called the Hôtel Arbez Franco-Suisse or l’Arbézie, is a hotel that straddles the international border between France and Switzerland in the tiny village of La Cure, which is itself divided by the boundary. Built by a private landowner and businessman specially to take advantage of an impending border adjustment between the two countries, the structure was originally used as a grocery store and a pub. Today, the entire building houses a hotel, whose dining room, kitchen and several rooms are bisected by the boundary.
The Collins–Valentine line, or Valentine–Collins line, is the boundary at approximately 45 degrees north latitude that separates the province of Quebec from the states of New York and Vermont. It was surveyed and marked by survey monuments in 1771–3 by John Collins, surveyor-general of Quebec, and Thomas Valentine, a commissioner appointed by the government of New York.