A major incident on a metropolitan freeway segment poses several problems and hazards, including travel delays, congested detours, and the potential for secondary crashes and for injuries to first responders. To minimize the risks and ensure that traffic flows as smoothly and quickly as possible, officials from multiple agencies must effectively coordinate their actions. But this coordination does not begin at the scene; instead, it begins well in advance of the incident, with the agencies working together, developing a comprehensive Incident Management Plan (IMP).

Responsible agencies in the city and county of El Paso did just that: they came together to design an IMP that defined their various roles and responsibilities during freeway incidents. Developing this plan was especially critical because of El Paso’s unique situation. El Paso and its Chihuahuan sister city, Ciudad Juárez, comprise the largest metropolitan area on the border between the United States and

Mexico. Located along the Rio Grande in the desert of extreme western Texas, El Paso is situated on the border of two nations and two states. El Paso serves as one of the key junctions for traffic moving cross-country between the Southwest and Southeast and for traffic moving between the United States and Mexico. El Paso’s location and size—approximately 248 square miles—present a unique array of challenges to effective incident management.

Three controlled-access highways serve El Paso. Interstate Highway 10 (IH 10), the major east-west route in El Paso, carries a large percentage of truck traffic and is a coast-to-coast interstate highway. US 54 is a north-south route that serves the main border crossing to Juárez also serves the Fort Bliss Military Reservation north of IH 10 and continues to the northeast through New Mexico and several other states. Loop 375 partially circles the City of El Paso, following the US-Mexico border in the south and passing through the northeast part of El Paso County and through the Franklin Mountains in the north...