Advocates continue to criticize the federal government’s decision to erect a new border wall along Friendship Park, a binational park that sits both in the United States and Mexico.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has defended the project by claiming the existing wall is deteriorating and unsafe.
However, Friends of Friendship Park believe the new 30-foot border walls will “dramatically alter — for the worse — the experience of visitors” to the park, said John Fanestil, one of the leaders of Friends of Friendship Park. He said CBP has been reducing access to the binational park for decades.
“The experience across the last two decades has been the gradual and progressive and steady eradication of this landmark,” he said.
Fanestil remembers being able to walk right up to the border wall at Friendship Park and buy a taco from a street vendor in Tijuana. He could also practice his Spanish by chatting up people on the Mexican side of the park.
It’s that kind of unique access that made Friendship Park special, Fanestil said.
It was the kind of place where a deported grandmother could meet her U.S.-citizen granddaughter for the first time. Or an undocumented teen could hug their Mexican uncles who can’t afford a visa.
But that access has slowly been restricted.
There was a special section of the park where visitors from either country can interact with each other. In 2018, Customs and Border Protection reduced the number of people who could visit that section from 25 people to 10.
The agency also reduced visitation hours from four hours to 30 minutes and prohibited photos and videos.
Then CBP closed the park during the pandemic. It has not reopened.
“People from all over the world come to San Diego and think, ‘I want to go to the zoo, I want to go to Balboa Park,’” Fanestil said. “Friendship Park should be on that list because it’s such a remarkable, beautiful site.”
CBP did not respond to a request for comment.
Tijuana’s side of Friendship Park is a bustling tourist destination filled with restaurants, a boardwalk, public art, and even an outdoor gym. In contrast, the San Diego side is barren, inaccessible, and militarized.
“It is this beautiful public space on the Mexico side and on the U.S. side, the federal authorities have completely missed this opportunity to create a binational space,” Fanestil said.
The latest blow to Friendship Park has been the destruction of its binational garden — a series of flower beds on both sides of the border that grow local fauna and produce.
Construction crews removed the U.S. side of the garden while replacing the secondary border wall.
Last week, people successfully stopped construction of the border wall for one day by forming a blockade. They carried a banner that read, “Stop the Wall,” and criticized the federal government for building a taller wall that has led to more migrant fatalities.
Advocates pointed out one silver lining from the new construction.
Customs and Border Protection told Friends of Friendship Park, in writing, that the agency plans to reopen the section of the park used for binational visits on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. once the project is done.
