A partially constructed rock wall on the property of a Franklin Self Storage facility in El Paso, Texas, is to blame for flooding and home damage, according to three homeowners whose residences were impacted by heavy rains last week. All three damaged homes are on Swede Johnson Drive, which borders the storage site at 6950 Helen of Troy Drive. During the storms, the wall diverted the water into nearby backyards, residents told the source.
Construction of the wall was started within the past year but never finished, according to residents, who also said they hadn’t experienced flooding prior to the wall’s presence. "It had never happened in all the seven years that I've lived here, and we've had some pretty bad rainstorms,” said Cindy Garibay, who told the source her house sustained thousands of dollars in damage. “We've never had any kind of flooding like this."
The water was two feet deep in Garibay’s backyard, causing furniture and large potted plants to float about her yard, she told the source.
"It was so terrible that I thought we were going to lose the house," added neighbor Margarita Mora. "I think it was bad planning. I don't know about the engineers or architects or who did it, but everybody went wrong who had something to do with this."
The self-storage facility manager didn’t comment when approached by the source.
"It's a monstrosity," Garibay said. "I call it the great wall of El Paso. If it was inspected, why was it approved if it’s incomplete? If you look at it, it’s not complete. This wall was built to keep the storage units from getting flooded, but now it’s our problem, I guess."
Building permits were issued to the storage business, according to an unidentified city official, who said the municipality is investigating the cause of the flooding.
Franklin Self Storage operates three facilities in El Paso.
