Donna Texas: Border Crossings Come in Many Forms

Nowadays, most Texas border crossing come in the form of bridges, such as the Alliance Intenational Bridge in Donna Texas or the Laredo Bridges, boasting bridges that can be considered as construction marvels, huge and modern. It is interesting to find other forms of border crossings as well.

• The Los Ebanos Ferry, formally known as the Los Ebanos-Diaz Ordaz Ferry, is a hand-operated cable ferry that travels across the Rio Grande between Los Ebanos, Texas and Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, Tamaulipas. It is the last of its kind along the entire stretch of the Rio Grande. There are also train ferries that are still operational sauch as the MV Bali Sea and the MV Banda Sea on the Gulf of Mexico. They carry reilway vehicles and are usually called car ferries, as distinguished from auto ferries used to transport automobiles.

• Falcon Dam is an earthen embankment dam on the Rio Grande between Starr County in the U.S. state of Texas and the city of Nueva Ciudad Guerrero in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. The dam was built for water conservation, irrigation, hydroelectric power generation, flood control, and recreational purposes and as an international border crossing between Zapata and Starr Counties and Tamaulipas.

• The Nogales-Morley Gate in Arizona is open to pedestrians only.

• There are some rail crossings that are still operational. The El Paso and Southwestern Railroad has a very rich history, with the construction in the late 1880s. Today, many of the sections of the El Paso and Southwestern Railroad has closed down. Some are still in use, though mostly for freight only although a handful still has passenger transports.

With the advancement of construction techniques and technology, these border crossings are slowly being replaced by modern bridges, which are easier to manage, control and maintain. An example is the Alliance International Bridge, which is about 1,000 feet in length, yet having 4 lanes in each direction, a total of 8 lanes, that would surely ease the expected traffic between Mexico and Donna Texas.