Donald J Trump hopes to be President, much of that hope is pinned on the idea of securing our southern border with a massive wall, a massive wall that he intends to force another country to pay for. For what t's worth, some of Mexico's most prominent political figures have all but laughed at the notion that their country will foot the bill of such a massive undertaking. "I will say it emphatically: There is no scenario in which Mexico will pay for this wall that is being proposed by the United States presidential hopeful," Mexican Treasury Secretary Luis Videgaray. Videgaray isn't alone, former Mexican President Vicente Fox took it a step further and perhaps put it in to terms that Trump supporters could better understand "I have to say that we are not, I am not going to pay for that f***ing wall,". It's fairly obvious that Mexico has absolutely zero intentions of forking over even a single peso in the effort to close the border between the two countries. And with good reason. A Structural engineer using the pen name Ali F. Rhuzkhan gives a quick snapshot of just how difficult it would be to build this proposed wall, "The challenge of Trump’s border wall is not technical, but logistical. The leap in complexity between “building a wall” and “building a 2,000-mile-long continuous border wall in the desert” is about equal to the gap between “killing a guy” and “waging a protracted land war.” Trump’s border wall, if built as he has described it, would be one of the largest civil works projects in the history of the country." he continues "If we assume a border wall length of 1,954 miles (there are 600 or so miles of existing border barrier, but much of this would not qualify for Trump’s wall), then we can make some estimates as to the volume of concrete needed for the project: Foundation: 6 feet deep, 18 inch radius = 42.4 cubic feet Column: 4 square feet area by 30 feet tall = 120 cubic feet Wall panels: 25 feet tall by 10 feet long by 8 inches thick = 166.7 cubic feet Total concrete per 10-foot segment = 329.1 cubic feet 1,954 miles = 10,300,00 feet = 1,030,000 segments (10-feet long each) 1,030,000 segments * 329.1 cubic feet per segment = 339,000,000 cubic feet = 12,555,000 cubic yards. (The cubic yard is the standard unit of measure of concrete volume in the United States.) Twelve million, six hundred thousand cubic yards. In other words, this wall would contain over three times the amount of concrete used to build the Hoover Dam and that quantity of concrete could pave a one-lane road from New York to Los Angeles, going the long way around the Earth. "But the challenge is far greater than simply collecting the necessary raw materials. All of these hundreds of miles of wall would need to be cast in concrete facilities, probably project-specific ones that have been custom built near the border. Then, the pre-cast wall pieces would need to be shipped by truck through the inhospitable, often roadless desert." "The men and women doing the work of actually installing the wall would have to be provided with food, water, shelter, lavatory facilities, safety equipment, transportation, and medical care. This analysis also ignores the less sexy aspects of large-scale engineering projects: surveying, land acquisition, environmental review, geological studies, maintenance, excavating for foundations, and so on. Theoretical President Trump may be able to executive-order his way through the laser grid of lawsuits that normally impede this kind of work, but he can’t ignore the physical realities of construction." Trump has been quoted as saying the cost of the wall would be anywhere from 4 billion to 12 billion, others have estimated it would cost upwards of 25 billion and that the overall cost to maintain the wall would exceed that number in less than a decade. Much of Trump's campaign has hinged on immigration reform and securing the borders, much of that, if not all of it, is hinged on building this wall, a wall that he intends to force another country to pay for and build. If his campaign hinges on building this wall, does he have a legit candidacy? What percentage of Trump supporters would vote for him if he came out today and said that the wall, in its entirety, is nearly impossible to build and or maintain and unless we assault Mexico we would have to foot the bill?
I think it's a little unfair to compare it to a campaign slogan, we're talking about one of the largest civil projects in American history and something he's built his campaign on. That wall isn't happening on Mexico's dime, nor ours, so how he can he continue to push it during the campaign? It's because his supporters (what percentage, I don't know) believe he will actually be able to facilitate the building of the wall. It's ridiculous.
Make America Great Again is his slogan, building a massive wall to keep Mexicans out of America is one of, if not his biggest propositions. It goes beyond selling hope and change or whatever Obama did.
Depends on whether the statement is supposed to be taken literally or not, and that's the way it's presented. There are ways to get Mexico involved in the border problem, but that's not what's being described at all. So, no, the wall as described so far is a slogan targeted toward the low info voter.
Hard not to take it literally when Trump is literally talking cost and dimensions and funding. I think he thinks he could pull it off. Which just adds to the utter crazy that is Trump.
Exactly. He doesn't care about the wall. He wants to have a dialogue again about enforcing our laws and limiting immigration to manageable. I hope he's for shutting down any money or support to immigrants. That's he logical next step.
"Art of the deal" isn't considered one of the greatest business books of all time because what he did wasn't impressive or difficult.
Going to cost more than all the programs ever. That doesn't include the massive hike everyone got in premiums.
Well, it's been done once in history and again, it took centuries. Sure modern technology expedites the process greatly but it's still a completely ridiculous proposal.
