Mar. 18, 2023 at 1:01 pm

San Luis, Yuma request millions in funding to improve border road

March 18, 2023no commentNo tags

The border town of San Luis applied for $25 million of federal funding to revamp a major roadway connecting San Luis’ two ports of entry, a project which received support from Arizona’s United States senators.

The city of San Luis applied for the Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity grant to upgrade five miles of roadway on Cesar Chavez Boulevard, the only east-west corridor that connects San Luis’ two ports of entry. It also provides access to Arizona highways and eight schools in the Yuma County city.

In a letter to Pete Buttigieg, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Senators Krysten Sinema and Mark Kelly asked Buttigieg to consider San Luis’ proposal.

The project, called the Cesar Chavez Boulevard Multimodal Improvements project, will increase the current two lanes to a four-lane road that will also have a shared use path, sidewalks, signalized pedestrian crossings, street lighting, bus bays, transit stops and shelters, according to a press release from Sinema’s office.

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The project will also add bike lanes to give commuters an alternative to driving with the hopes of decreasing congestion. San Luis is a busy border crossing with more than 2.3 million people crossing per year, as stated in the letter.

San Luis’ economic growth relies on cross border trade and border crossings to support its agricultural industry, Sinema said, adding that modernizing Cesar Chavez Boulevard will increase jobs and boost the economy.

Agriculture contributes more than $3 billion annually to Yuma County, supplying 90% of the U.S. supply of winter vegetables.

“Modernizing Cesar Chavez Boulevard would help enable people on both sides of the border to access jobs and education opportunities and improve the quality of life for community residents that struggle with poverty,” the senators said in the letter.

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Funding for the grant comes from the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs law that includes $7.5 billion over five years for the grant program. This year, the grant will disperse $1.5 million with half going to projects in rural areas, and half to urban areas.

“By fixing roads, bridges, and more, RAISE grants to help Arizonans visit loved ones, go to school or work, and travel. They make our communities safer and stronger,” Sinema said. She co-authored the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which provides $350 billion to highway programs.

Although the cost of the project was originally projected at $54.8 million, because of inflation the cost has risen to $61.6 million. Other sources of funding for the project include $33 million from the state legislature and $1.2 million from congressionally directed spending under Senator Kelly’s office.

This is the third RAISE application San Luis has submitted for the project, following a $267 million allocation to modernize the San Luis Port of Entry, which will double the port of entry lanes from 8 lanes to 16 lanes. With this upgrade, traffic will increase in the area, Jenny Torres, San Luis assistant city manager, said. Construction for the port is scheduled to start this summer and be completed in Fall 2028.

“It’s not just going to be a road that is going to impact us locally, it’s a regional road that connects people going to the rest of the county,” Torres said.

Torres noted that this year, the city’s application is more competitive because of the funds already allocated to the project.

She added the importance of the roadway for commercial trucks that cross the border and deliver products throughout the nation.

“This is a project that impacts the state of Arizona in terms of movement of commerce,” she said.

Grant recipients will be announced no later than June 28.

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Coverage of southern Arizona on azcentral.com and in The Arizona Republic is funded by the nonprofit Report for America in association with The Republic.

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San Luis, Yuma request millions in funding to improve border road

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