PHARR, Texas (ValleyCentral) — Big changes are happening at a pair of Hidalgo County ports of entry.
The cities of McAllen and Pharr have decided to increase the toll rates for vehicles crossing back into Mexico from the U.S. at their international bridges.
The changes in McAllen will go into effect in March and the changes in Pharr will affect salvaged vehicles crossed into Mexico. People are divided on the issue.
“It’s going to be difficult, and even more money is needed to come here to buy regularly,” Blanca Rodriguez said.
On Monday, the City of McAllen approved a toll rate increase at their ports of entry from the current $3.50 to $4 starting on March 1. Some people say this cuts down on their spending power when crossing the border.
Others like Hugo Alexis hope this brings improvements to the bridges.
“People need to understand that almost everything is going up,” Alexis said. “So, it has its advantages and disadvantages, but I think it’s also good to see if this helps improve things like the bridge infrastructure or traffic flow.”
Alexis hopes more personnel will be hired to speed up the wait times at both the McAllen-Hidalgo International Bridge and Anzalduas International Bridge
In a statement, the City of McAllen said they’re increasing mirror rates at surrounding bridges for the first time since 2015.
Neighboring cities like Pharr are also making changes to improve bridge infrastructure. Pharr did not increase their toll rate for passengers but did increase the fee for people crossing salvaged, crashed, or transmigrante cars into Mexico from $5 to $50.
“With the projects that we have $100 million invested into our bridge, you know, sometimes we need to increase rates and things of that nature to alleviate some of that burden,” said Pharr City Manager Jonathan Flores. “To be able to better serve our citizens, to be able to increase capacity at our bridge and all of those things and all of that, you know, comes at a cost, and we’re trying to alleviate some of that cost, some of that burden from the taxpayers.”
With this change, the city is expected to get a boost of around $1 million. Money that will be used to improve travel for frequent users, according to Flores.
“You have the lane expansions and the twin bridge project and everything, again, just to help our customers coming from Mexico and going to Mexico,” Flores said. “As you know, our bridge is top producer in top crossover produce. And so again, with that comes heavy investment and the need to make these tough decisions at times.”
Other border cities like Laredo are also considering toll rate increases.
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