Devastating Storms Leave El Paso Swamped With Infrastructure Concerns
The summer's disastrous flooding in West Texas raised serious questions about whether traditional flood control systems are still viable. El Paso's rapid recent growth in private and public construction has been spurred in large part by expansions at the U.S. Army's nearby base at Ft. Bliss. This in turn put added strain on the city’s infrastructure and sparked debates about issues such as whether the city can handle the additional stress on its water, roads and other infrastructure and whether development on the city’s arroyos is a plus or a problem. The arroyos serve as natural runoff areas.
Perhaps of more immediate concern are issues surrounding the stability of the earthen dam, La Frontera Baja (also called La Montada), that spans the U.S.-Mexican border at the Rio Grande River. During the summer’s “Storm 2006,” as the flooding was called by the city and local media for lack of a better name, the 30-year-old earthen dam overfilled and threatened to deluge El Paso and her sister city, Ciudad Juarez.