SAN DIEGO — State Route 11 is nearly finished after 25 years in the making. The 2.4-mile connection from Otay Mesa to Mexico is just a quarter mile to the border.
“Otay Mesa East Port of Entry we are creating is going to be a game changer for access between Mexico and the United States,” said Toks Omishakin, the Secretary of Transportation for California.
The new 12-lane freeway is being built to reinvent the way businesses can be done between the U.S. and Mexico.
“The San Ysidro Port of Entry, I think many people know it’s not a cargo base of entry, it often sees extensive wait and delay times. The existing Otay Mesa Port of Entry has a lot of cargo coming through it including passenger, same thing there significant wait times, a lot of trucks idling for hours,” Omishakin said.
Amazon warehouses are already popping up in anticipation for the major shipping connections, and other major trading partners are also building up their presence in Mexico at the same time.
“As business identifies border crossings as more efficient, they’re going to want to locate, for example, from China to Mexico and then from Mexico bring those goods to the U.S., so it’s going to make us a stronger economy. Mexico is already our number one trading partner, this is only going to strengthen that,” said David Alvarez, an Assemblymember from the 80th District.
There is one major difference between this Otay Mesa East Port of Entry and the others.
“This port of entry is not going to be a free port of entry like the others. You will have to pay a toll to use this port of entry, both going north and southbound, but you will have a guaranteed wait time that is going to be much shorter than what you will expect at the free ports of entries,” said Gustavo Dallarda from Caltrans.
In the first few years, officials believe the new Otay Mesa East Port of Entry will be mostly patronized by semi-trucks shipping goods north and south. The federal government is now on the clock to finish their port complex to complete this decades-long plan, possibly opening as early as 2026.
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