WASHINGTON -- A new report says relieving bottlenecks at the U.S./Canada border should be made a high-profile issue during the U.S. presidential election.

The report says Canada and the U.S. must work together to develop a "border of the future" that would take advantage of new technology to smooth the flow of people and goods across the frontier.

The report also calls on both countries to improve border infrastructure such as bridges, ports of entry, rail lines and seaports.

The report was published by several groups, including the Brookings Institution, the Washington think tank.

John Austin, director of Brookings Great Lakes Economic Initiative, said decision makers must think of the region from upstate New York to Minnesota, including the southern portions of Ontario and Quebec, as a single region linked by the Great Lakes.

"We're not islands; we're mutually dependent," Austin told a wire service. "We need an attitude adjustment. We have powerful attributes that we can build on and benefit from, if we have effective leadership."

He said that growth in the region must be a federal priority.

"There's an obsession with China around the globe," Austin said. "We do more trade with Canada in one day than we do over weeks and months with China."

The report points out that trade crossing the Ambassador Bridge in a single day matches the annual total of U.S. exports to Japan.

The report is critical of increased security initiatives.

"What really alarms us is the speed at which these new requirements are being put on border crossings," said Sarah Hubbard, vice president of government relations with the Detroit Regional Chamber. "We depend on a free flow of traffic with Canada."

The report says both countries should have a strategy in place by 2015 to reduce congestion and red tape at the border.