Road link & third US-MX border crossing to be toll financed in San Diego area

Governor Schwarzenegger this week signed a law giving toll financing powers to a local association of governments for an $800m project to build a third US-Mexico border crossing in the San Diego/Tijuana area. The new border crossing or 'port of entry' (POE) called East Otay Mesa is to be a bit over 3km (2 miles) east of the existing Otay Mesa crossing.

SB1486 gives toll financing powers to the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) and explicitly prohibits them from a toll concession procurement or public-private partnership ensuring that it will be built as a traditional governmental toll operation.

The project consists of a 4km (2.5 mile) toll road called State Route 11 (CA11) and a 19 lane East Otay Mesa Port of Entry (EOMPOE) on the US side of the border.  The project is designed to relieve congestion at the two existing ports of entry at  Otay Mesa which is at the southern end of the South Bay expressway (CA125) and the San Ysidro crossing at the southern end of I-5.

The CA11 tollroad of 2+2 lanes would be an extension eastward of CA905 from the interchange with CA125 (South Bay Expressway). On the Mexican side of the border the D-2  is nearby and readily connected.  It links to the Tijuana-Ensenada tollroad and the tax-supported highway to Tecate.

Rationale for the project is that the Otay Mesa POE is over full capacity with 1.6m trucks/year (4,400/day) and an expected doubling by 2025. Wait times for trucks are said by SANDAG to frequently exceed 4 hours already, seriously adding to costs of US-Mexican trade. The Otay Mesa POE also handles about 12m passenger vehicles a year (33k/day) with wait times frequently over 2 hours.

The project would also provide a truck bypass lane northbound to a state vehicle inspection post.

Estimates of the cost of the tollroad works are $250m to $360m. SB1486 gives SANDAG the power to issue toll revenue bonds for the project, toll setting and collection powers, land acquisition powers, and the power to make rules and regulations and to operate the tollroad.

Cost of the POE itself are around $400m. The state will be appealing to the US Government for funds for the project under a border crossing improvement grant program.

SANDAG is explicitly not authorized to "lease or otherwise convey a tollroad to a private sector entity." It is also prohibited from converting any existing road or lane of a road to tolls.

Tolls on the CA11 may be adjusted every two years, SB1486 says. The toll structure may provide for variable pricing to manage traffic.

The aim of the new POE would be to move trucks through with maximum wait times of 20 minutes for unregistered trucks and 6 minutes for trucks registered for the SENTRI program of priority clearance.

Most planning clearances have been obtained although the US Government has yet to give its approval. Given the hysterical and hateful demagoguery surrounding relations with Mexico (Will someone will dub this NAFTA Highway West?) that approval cannot be taken for granted.

see http://www.sandag.cog.ca.us

TOLLROADSnews 2008-10-02