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The Growing Environmental Disaster Unfolding On The US-Mexico Border
A ballooning problem for California that is getting no national attention
The US-Mexico border has received an outsized amount of national media attention in recent years. Despite the coverage, there is one story about the border that has garnered no serious national attention. Many people are wringing their hands about the number of people flowing over the border, but no one is concerned about the raw sewage that is pouring into San Diego County by way of the Tijuana River.
If you have explored the waters in San Diego County in recent months, you may have come across warning signs and barriers warning people to stay away due to the presence of raw sewage or contaminated water. These are some of the only visible signs of the crisis that is slowly unfolding on the border between San Diego and Tijuana.
The population of Tijuana has exploded in the past two decades. Since 2000, the population of Tijuana has grown by a million people, jumping from 1.3 million to 2.3 million. That rapid growth put a huge strain on the city’s infrastructure. The city, in short, was not designed to accommodate so many people. Critical infrastructure is outdated, underfunded, and poorly maintained. And that includes the city’s water and sewage systems.
