The Deck is Coming

Here’s a message I received from TxDOT contractors via the Sunset Heights Neighborhood Association:

As an interested party in the potential Downtown 10 Project, we are writing to inform you that in order to further evaluate pavement conditions along I-10 through the Downtown 10 project limits (Executive Center Boulevard to Copia Street), the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) El Paso District has contracted with HDR Inc., Terracon Consultants, Inc., and Apache Barricade & Sign, to collect and analyze soil core samples. This will help in the development of alternative engineering designs. The work will take place from January to February 2021 at various locations in the downtown El Paso area, and may require daytime road closures in at multiple locations. Please watch for crews and be prepared to follow any detours. Closure details will be published at www.reimaginei10.com/Downtown10, txdot.gov, and on our social media platforms once finalized.

Do you think that they’d be testing the pavement condition if the decision to widen I-10 downtown hadn’t already been made?

That decision was made way back when Ted Houghton was the Texas Transportation Commission Chair. TxDOT don’t turn on a dime. They lay their plans out years, decades, in advance.

And even though TxDOT is posturing like they’re evaluating the option to widen the Trench, and lay a deck over the freeway, that decision was made years ago.

Remember what Mr. Houghton said when he was only a Commissioner, and not yet the Chair:

“I am Ted Houghton, the most arrogant commissioner of the most arrogant state agency in the history of the state of Texas.”

Our local leaders are not only arrogant, they’re contemptuous. They don’t even like you. You, citizen, are an obstacle to be overcome in their quest for personal enrichment.

Remember, the arena, and the deck, are only means to the true goal, a soccer arena over the freeway.

If you feel a squeeze, it’s because you’re a turnip, and MountainStar thinks you might still have some blood left.

10 comments

  1. The I-10 boosters and their authoritarian friends who reign over us in TX make me want to vomit, then plan a move to NM.

  2. Also. Widening I-10 is part of the Borderplex Alliance’s plan to make us a transportation hub for semis and warehouses. Our dreams of cleaner air, better jobs, and less traffic (jams, accidents, noise) be damned.

    1. Already when you look to downtown from, say, Rim Road, the air is often so polluted that you can barely see it. Who would want to work or live there? Visit for a concert and then get out! It can only get worse.

  3. I do not want no stinking deck!

    Seriously, we do not need to widen I 10 in downtown. We need a bypass that goes through Anthony Gap along the 404.

    1. The Anthony Gap loop is the most logical, but as our neighbors in the Land of Enchantment would never cooperate, it will never happen. Santa Fe has no eye to regional development.

  4. Invite Elon Musk to bore a tunnel from Horizon to I-10 just south of the TX-NM state line at Anthony. Problem solved. Now watch El Paso dry up like a grape left on the vine and turning into a raisin.

  5. Happens all over Texas. They have been “improving” I35 thru Austin for at least the last 25 years.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *