The Office of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reopened this Monday with limited hours the West Pedestrian border crossing, in San Ysidro, California, after almost three years of closure.
The crosswalk, dubbed Ped-West, is now open from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. Pacific time, and for now only in the direction of the Mexican border city of Tijuana in southern San Diego County .
A CBP source told EFE that the operations of the crosswalk will gradually return to normal, as needed by the public and that agency has inspectors available.
On its first day of restart, CBP assigned only four inspectors.
Mrs. María León, a United States citizen who lives in Tijuana and works in a shopping center in San Ysidro, said that she was already heading to the East San Ysidro Pedestrian Crossing when the driver learned of the reopening of the Pedestrian Center from the news she was listening to. West.
León said that during the closure of the western access, San Ysidro only had a pedestrian entrance for tens of thousands of people who cross daily, so “it would take up to four and sometimes five hours to cross” the border. This Monday she took about five minutes to walk through the pedestrian crossing between the two countries.
She indicated that with the closure of pedestrian access, sales at her work fell to less than half of what they had been in previous years.
The pedestrian crossing, known as El Chaparral on the Mexico side, became operational in 2016 as part of the San Ysidro port of entry expansion project and was closed in April 2020 as a preventative measure during the covid-19 pandemic.
It remained that way for almost three years except for specific periods of time to process certain asylum seekers or to deport people to Mexico.
Through San Ysidro, up to 30,000 pedestrians cross daily from Mexico to California. During the Ped-West closure they had to use the pedestrian access next to the vehicular flow in San Ysidro.
During the recent holiday sales season, it took pedestrians more than five hours to cross the border at the east side access.
Members of the border communities and business leaders in both the United States and Mexico had repeatedly demanded the reopening of the crossing to expedite the crossing of the dividing line.
CBP had already announced in a statement last week the limited reopening of Ped-West.
“In an effort to provide greater crossing and service flexibility to our binational communities, we are working to restore our services to their pre-pandemic status,” Mariza Marín, director of the San Ysidro port of entry, said in the January 4 statement.
She added that agency staff “will continue to effectively manage wait times to improve the border crossing experience for travelers entering through the San Ysidro Port of Entry.”