The southwestern U.S. region's 800-pound gorilla, to be sure, is The Lone Star State, which can credit its lengthy border with Mexico for extensive NAFTA-related business expansion activity. A Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas (www.dallasfed.org) report issued in June 2001 puts the impact of this activity in perspective. The report, "Maquiladoras: Impact on Texas Border Cities," authored by Lucinda Vargas, senior economist at the El Paso branch of the bank, argues that "border manufacturing is increasingly benefiting from maquiladoras [Mexican companies established by foreign entities to assemble products for export to the U.S. or elsewhere]. Industry suppliers have been expanding or relocating their operations to cities such as El Paso to be close to their customer bases across the border. For instance," the report points out, "in 1999, there were 40 plastic injection molding companies in El Paso employing more than 4,100 workers. These companies mostly serve the maquiladora industry in Ciudad Juarez in sectors that range from automotive and computers to medical and consumer goods. Moreover, employment in plastics manufacturing in El Paso -- up 101 percent since 1990 -- is highly skilled. The success of plastic injection molding in the area is also evidenced by the impressive growth of plastic product exports through El Paso, which equaled $US806 million in 1999, up more that 700 percent from the 1993 level."
      Besides El Paso, the key Texas cities with Mexican counterparts that are home to maquiladora plants are Presidio (Ojinaga), Del Rio (Ciudad Acuna), Eagle Pass (Piedras Negras), Laredo (Nuevo Laredo), McAllen (Reynosa and Rio Bravo) and Brownsville (Matamoros). More than 700 maquiladora plants are on the Mexican side of the Texas border, employing nearly a half million people.
      But there's no shortage of activity north of the border, particularly in the vicinity of McAllen and Mission, Texas. The Anzalduas International Bridge, slated for completion in 2005, will join three other bridges in the area. But the new bridge will have one characteristic the others don't: it will link the largest international joint development of its kind -- the Business Park at Sharyland Plantation in McAllen and its cross-border counterpart in Reynosa, Mexico. Combined, the development will consist of about 20,000 acres (8,100 ha.). The Sharyland Plantation site already features 1.7 million sq. ft. (158,000 sq. m.) of Class A industrial space; an additional 250,000 sq. ft. (23,200 sq. m.) will be completed by year-end 2001.
      "On the U.S. side, what's driving activity in our area is NAFTA," says Patrick Brewer, vice president of marketing and development for the Business Park at Sharyland Plantation. "The companies here are servicing sister companies over in Mexico with logistics and distribution services or warehousing of raw products or finished goods."
      An exception is Symbol Technologies, a manufacturer of bar code scanners, wireless communications networks and other products, which does some assembly on the U.S. side of the border. Symbol has built a 340,000-sq.-ft (31,600-sq.-m.) facility in the Sharyland Business Park, which it uses primarily for distribution of goods made in Reynosa, Mexico.
      El Paso-based Five Star Development is constructing a 276,000-sq.-ft. (25,600-sq.-m.) facility in the park -- the first of two planned facilities designed to provide manufacturing, distribution and in-warehouse storage space for logistics groups to offer their clients. Global Logistics and Panasonic are also tenants at Sharyland Plantation.