City Council to address community concerns on commercial truck traffic at the Bridge of the Americas
EL PASO, TX (KVIA) -- Today, City Council will discuss plans for the modernization of the Bridge of the Americas (BOTA). The focus of the discussion is to address the community’s concerns regarding commercial truck traffic at BOTA.
The federal government, through the bipartisan infrastructure bill that passed recently, invested $650 million in the modernization of the Bridge of the Americas. The General Services Administration is handling the project, currently in an early phase as they project construction to begin 2026-2027.
Responding to voiced public health concerns, Representative Chris Canales says he wants to ensure the federal government understands the community's priorities, “That's an investment that we welcome. We just want to make sure it's done in a way that's sensitive to the residents on both sides of the bridge to make sure that there's not so much of an impact on them.”
Canales says the GSA has presented different project alternatives for BOTA, most of them keeping commercial truck traffic, however one of them does not.
“In 2022, that year, we have in the most recent data, there was more than 180,000 commercial truck crossings at that port of entry. That's a lot of vehicles to have idling very near to homes and schools to the zoo,“ says Canales, “idling vehicles brings pollution, it brings noise. And those are things that the neighbors around the bridge have had to contend with for many years,” he continues.
In today’s meeting, city council will discuss a letter expressing the city’s preference to remove commercial truck traffic in any redesign of BOTA. This letter would have to be signed off by Mayor Leeser and then sent to the GSA.
Canales, member of the Metropolitan Planning Organization, says they plan to conduct a comprehensive traffic study of the ports of entry. “Looking at who's crossing and the capacities and the projected future use of all of them. That'll be an important study for us in figuring out how to move forward here, what we can recommend to the GSA, and how in the future commercial vehicles might be able to use the other ports,” he explains.
Canales mentions there's already been discussions about parallel expansions to the other ports of entry, like Tornillo. He says they are positioning it to be a key crossing point for commercial traffic, along with Santa Teresa, which recently received investments.
