Airports have recognized that the travelers who pass through them are a captive audience, and sometimes are stuck in that space for hours on end. As such, they provide travelers with bathrooms, cafes, places to sit, spaces for nursing mothers and more.
The U.S.-Mexico border, to put it mildly, does not provide spaces like these for the many people who pass through it each day. But, as Maya Srikrishnan explores in our Rethinking San Diego series, it might if locals had more of a say in what the border could look like.
One mother and artist who lives on the opposite side of the border from her children envisions a park with stations where people could charge their phones and buy food.
“I see it from the perspective as a mom,” she said. “What do people need? To sit, breathe, go to the bathroom, eat, communicate with loved ones.”
Other stakeholders want to see the opposite of a wall – more options to facilitate cross-border travel, like bike lanes, a cross-border trolley or even, yes, a gondola.
What’s Behind Tijuana’s Deadly Year
Tijuana is on track to register virtually the same amount of homicides this year as it did in 2019, one of the deadliest years ever for the city.
In this week’s Border Report, Srikrishnan spoke to Laura Calderón, program director of the Justice in Mexico program at the University of San Diego about what’s driving the high numbers.
Some experts believe the numbers would be even higher if it weren’t for the coronavirus, but others believe that because Tijuana is an industrial city with lots of areas for storage, the pandemic hasn’t necessarily impacted cartels and the cross-border drug trade the way it has impacted other sectors.
Also in the Border Report: New rules being implemented by the Trump administration could severely hinder LGBTQ asylum-seekers’ chances of being granted asylum in the United States.
Vaccines Are Arriving in San Diego
San Diego County is starting to receive the 28,000 doses it’s set to receive as part of the first batch of Pfizer coronavirus vaccines.
“Those doses are about 72% of what is needed to administer the first dose of all identified heath care recipients in the first tier,” the county wrote on its website.
The various health care systems get to decide for themselves how to prioritize and administer vaccines to employees.
Residents and employees of skilled nursing facilities are also among those being prioritized for the vaccine, but that’s being handled separately by the state, the county wrote.
Two military sites in San Diego will also be receiving early shipments, Fox 5 San Diego reports.
In Other News
- More than 500 child care businesses in San Diego have closed amid the pandemic. (Union-Tribune)
- San Diego researchers are hoping to help make some of the most widely used crops more adaptable to climate change. (KPBS)
- Pacers is still open and vowing to fight a warning from the attorney general that it must comply with stay-at-home orders. (Associated Press)
The Morning Report was written by Sara Libby, and edited by Scott Lewis.