[...] prototypes for President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico have been completed and will be subjected to punishment to test their mettle — by workers wielding sledgehammers, torches, pickaxes and battery-operated tools.
The testing lasting up to two months could lead to officials concluding that elements of several designs should be merged to create effective walls [...]. That raises the possibility of no winner or winners.
— Associated Press
The six companies that were awarded contracts to build prototypes of Trump's border wall with Mexico earlier this year have completed their full-scale models on a site near San Diego and will see their creations undergo rigorous testing for nonclimbability, nonunderdiggability, and resistance to tools like sledgehammers and pickaxes (no word on battering rams or poisoned arrows).
While funding for the lofty idea of equipping all 1,954 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border with 30-foot-tall fortifications is still up in the air, the contractors erecting the selected prototypes were awarded between $300,000 and $500,000 for each model.
Here are a few of the prototype designs — some cast in concrete and some built of other materials to allow border patrol agents to peek through the wall into Mexico and prevent passersby on the northern side from being hit on the head by large sacks of drugs that reportedly keep flying over the wall.
All images via U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
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One requirement is for the walls to be “aesthetically pleasing” from the U.S. side. ELTA’s solid metal wall features six light blue squares with white trim on the bottom third, topped by dark blue beams and metal plates.
Texas Sterling’s has a gray surface stamped with patterns of different-sized bricks, like driveways or sidewalks for upscale homes. There is a steel plate on top with prongs that feature three metal spikes, resembling an agave plant.
there is so much wrong with this.
Is it just me or does it seem like almost all of these could be defeated with a $40 grapple hook and some rope...or a decent Lowe's extension ladder
I like the last design best. This will be a beautiful monument for our country and Mexico. Let's hope Mexicans won't have to make the dangerous journey across desert anymore.
Atrocious. Horrific. This is the darkest time for politics in the USA.
Hideous and disturbing, indeed.
Out of context, those last two in the lineup could very well be mock-ups for for a Morphosis building. I do not mean this in a flattering sense, but rather as an observation on what our collective profession deems acceptable when and where.
Lame. Imagine if this was a brick wall. You could get rid of unemployment for the next 100 years.
awful... no creativity what so ever... robin hood cross bow grapple hook and boom you're over... what a fucking waste... glue mirrors to the concrete one and at least it starts getting a little interesting... USA! The worlds largest prison!!!!
this is all you would need plus a 200 ft. of rope
"nonunderdiggability"
Word of the year.
plus a non idea, everything can be dug under, just deeper.
I worked in nonunderdiggable in my lexicon today. Got some weird looks but no questions.
It can't be a Trumpism, too many syllables.
Many European countries have bunkers left over from Germany's 'Atlantik Wall'. This could be adaptive reuse on a really big scale. Sustainable, too!
That isn't a wall.
THIS is a wall.
Where is that?
These are walls:
From the film Monsters.
didn't anybody watch Blow? These lines in the sand are real
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