Posted on 11/15/2018 7:49:54 AM PST by 11th_VA
MEXICO CITY (dpa-AFX) - The US government has awarded a $167-million contract to a Galveston, Texas-based construction company to build a levee wall in south Texas along the United States' border with Mexico to prevent the flow of drugs and illegal immigrants to the country.
The contract was awarded the day hundreds of U.S.-bound Latin American migrants, who started their grueling journey on foot from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, arrived at the border fence that separates Mexico from California.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced Wednesday that as per the contract, SLSCO will build an 8-mile stretch of levee wall system in the U.S. Border Patrol's Rio Grande Valley Sector.
The contract for this project, referred to as RGV-02, was jointly awarded by CBP and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Construction work will begin in February.
The project consists of five segments located south of Alamo, Donna, Weslaco, Progreso and Mercedes, within Hidalgo County. The wall is constructed in two stages. A reinforced concrete levee wall will be built as foundation, and 18-foot tall steel bollards will be installed on top of it. The levee wall system will include detection technology, lighting, video surveillance, and an all-weather patrol road parallel to the levee wall.
This is the second border wall contract that CBP is awarding in Texas. The first one, a $145-million contract to build a 6.21 mile-stretch in the Rio Grande Valley, also was awarded to SLC.
A wide area of vegetation along a 150-foot enforcement zone throughout the levee wall system will be felled for the construction, which has already evoked concerns from environmental activists.
Four US states share border with Mexico, stretching more than 1900 miles - California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.
The House of Representatives, when it had a Republican majority last year, had approved a bill that includes $1.6 billion fund for building the wall.
Meanwhile, the first batch of Central American migrants have reportedly reached the southern border Wednesday, and a larger 4000-strong migrant caravan dramatically accelerated its pace to join them at the Mexican border city of Tijuana.
Trump has vowed to prevent them from crossing to the United States, and has deployed some 5,900 troops to the border.
Wait a minute.... I thought they weren’t getting here until January!
“I thought they weren’t getting here until January!”
Somebody provided buses to some of them. Might well have been one of the State or local Governments in Mexico, that don’t want them in their town.
A few busloads arrived in Tijuana the day before yesterday (13 Nov), 22 busloads are supposed to arrive today. It will be a big burden on the local Government in Tijuana, until they can offload them onto someone else.
Some Mexicans are reportedly going to protest against having them, in the central plaza of Tijuana today.
“Some Mexicans are reportedly to protest against having them’’. What hypocrites.
These are small task orders being awarded as part of a large contracting effort that was built over the last two years.
This big standing contract is titled the Border Infrastructure Eastern MATOC for horizontal construction, primarily located in Rio Grande Valley, Laredo, Del Rio, Big Bend and El Paso Border Patrol Sector. There is another one for the Western half of the border - California, Arizona, New Mexico). Those two big contracts are now ready to roll in earnest (just add money).
Everything is already planned out, and the vendors have been pre-certified into a pool that bids on each segment task order, so the Government continues to get a competitive price. The awards will just be doled out in small chunks like this individual task order. The long lead time contracting work is done, so task orders can now be awarded in a few months. There is a backlog of already funded segments that are now starting to drop.
Work will start on these segments in February (or earlier), and construction will probably run six months to a year.
San Diego is already getting a double layer of solid new barrier from the Ocean to Otay Mountain, and they are halfway done with the first run already.
The West side of the Port of Entry in Calexico, California is now finished with 30 foot bollards, and Secretary Neilsen announced that the East side will be getting 11 more miles on the East side next year.
20 miles of new bollards has recently been completed on the Western flank of El Paso, and now we are building in downtown El Paso. The Secretary also mentioned that some amount in Arizona is also included in what has already been funded.
The bottom line is that we are going to have many more concurrent segments being constructed in 2019 than we had in 2018. These include totally new barrier where none previously existed, and a big effort in the Rio Grande Valley, where more than half of illegals currently enter.
Thanks for the excellent, comprehensive report
““Some Mexicans are reportedly to protest against having them’’. What hypocrites.”
Its just like here - different opinions within the country. Some sanctuary cities and Leftist groups are aiding and abetting illegals, while other people are opposed and want the laws enforced.
These are the people of Mexico, not the govt. Perhaps law-abiding patriotic Mexican citizens resent this flow of illegal immigrants into their nation as much as the citizens of every other nation does. Maybe they hate the cartels and the human trafficking.
Correction … as much as the citizens of every other nation do!
Brownsville got more the last time, and traffic has since shifted to McAllen, which is getting the first of the new barrier. 60-70 miles got built the last time.
We need about 100 new miles to button up the Rio Grande Valley. At least 33 new miles have already been funded, for which we are now seeing contracts awarded.
“the racism they have for each other is astounding!”
There is still a sharp divide between wealthier elites of Spanish descent, and poorer Indians (like Maya) and mixed race (Mestizo) in Mexico. They have nowhere near the level of PC self-censorship that exists here.
There seems to be a strong element of wanting to dump their poor, unskilled (sometimes illiterate) underclass off their streets and welfare rolls (although wealthy Mexicans come and go for their own education, investment and entertainment as well). Also as you say, Mexicans also often seem to feel superior to Central Americans in general, and don’t want a bunch of them spoiling their neighborhood.
If we mirrored Mexico’s tough laws against illegal immigrants here, we would not have the problem with them, that we do.
Oh hell yeah. If we adopted Mexico’s immigration laws you’d never hear the end of the howling.
Another contract awarded today - the first in Arizona.
Construction to start in April in Yuma.
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3706135/posts
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We will likely have a dozen different segments going up at the same time next year, where they are needed most.
Absent a military presence or vastly increased Border Patrol numbers, that wall will be nothing that decent ladders can't defeat.
Until these invading tools understand that their lives may well be forfeit when attempting to storm our gates, the invasion will continue relatively unchecked.
People assuming that the mere presence of 'the wall' will be some final deterent are fooling themselves.
Think Maginot . . .
To have effective control of the border, you absolutely need all three fundamental components - people, technology and infrastructure.
The reason that Democrats hate infrastructure so much, is that they can’t turn it off when they take power.
Strong Infrastructure like Trump is building is of course not a standalone “silver bullet” to the problem without police guarding it, but it is a powerful force multiplier for the Border Patrol.
The building of these fortifications is somewhat historic, and they will have enduring impact where installed. We are not that long from robotic patrols. When you look at drone aircraft, some could argue that we have already begun.
The new infrastructure includes sensors and cameras in urban environments that support AI monitoring and robotic response - so fielding of new capability could be very swift in those areas.
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