UTEP students delayed by I-10 shutdown

Thursday’s traffic shutdown on I-10 delayed residents all across El Paso, especially students at the nearby UTEP campus.

“I only live 4 minutes from my job but it took me like 30 minutes to get there,” said student Kyra Lewis. “So it was really bad. It was backed up all the way down Mesa and down Schuster.”

As the backups got worse, officials with the Texas Department of Transportation were monitoring the situation and trying to help.

“We tried to alert the public with our dynamic message signs,” said district traffic engineer Eduardo Perals,” We give them advanced notice, we give them alternate routes which we did going up the 375 and around the mountain so they could bypass the actual closure on I-10.”

Any yet many of those alternative routes were still chocked with cars.

Department of Transportation officials monitor 160 cameras every day, covering 121 lane miles of road.

Moving forward, the department is encouraging the public to subscribe to their email alerts for a heads up that will hopefully help with future incidents.