Border Patrol Calls Off Plan for Bottleneck : Immigration: Increased enforcement by Mexican authorities dramatically cuts the number of illegal entrants running north onto I-5. U.S. officials then drop proposal to shut freeway lanes.

The day before U.S. authorities were to start cracking down on illegal immigrants who run across the border by dodging freeway traffic, Mexican federal officials began a crackdown of their own Wednesday, curtailing the harrowing practice dramatically and prompting the U.S. Border Patrol to drop its enforcement plans.

The Border Patrol said Wednesday it was suspending a program, announced one day earlier, to station 25 agents at the border crossing and shut down four of six freeway lanes there, beginning today.

But in the 24 hours since Mexican enforcement was stepped up, “we have only had four reported sightings of people coming up through the southbound lanes,” Border Patrol spokesman Steve Kean said. “The plan has been suspended. We are confident that the Mexican authorities will control the situation.”

The new measures had raised fears of new U.S.-Mexico tensions and of heightened congestion at the already chaotic San Ysidro port of entry.

The Border Patrol announced the plan at a news conference Tuesday. At a meeting with Border Patrol commanders late that evening, Mexican immigration officials reiterated that they would put a stop to the freeway crossings, which hundreds of illegal immigrants a day have been using to elude capture, said Border Patrol spokesman Steve Kean.

Wednesday’s decision came amid mounting concern about the desperate images that have proved an embarrassment to both U.S. and Mexican officials in recent weeks: northbound groups of men, women and children sprinting headlong past Mexican customs officers and U.S. immigration officers into waves of speeding southbound cars.

No one has been reported injured in the dangerous dashes, made by as many as 50 people at a time.

Humanitarian concerns and the potential economic damage of the freeway lane closure apparently produced tougher Mexican action, observers said, on a matter that is always politically delicate there--using law enforcement agencies to stop illegal immigration to the U.S.

Martin Torres, a spokesman for the Mexican Consulate in Los Angeles, said Wednesday that his government’s hands-off policy toward illegal immigration has not changed. The Mexican constitution guarantees citizens freedom of movement and prohibits the government from interfering with that right, he said.

“The Mexican government is not committing itself to stopping the migratory flow into the United States,” he said. “It is committing itself for reasons of security, to protect pedestrians and drivers.” Roberto Martinez of the American Friends Service Committee, a San Diego immigrant rights activist, said, “It’s going to work out better that the situation is controlled on the Mexican side, rather than in the U.S. They need to do more of this. I don’t think there has been enough communication on both sides.”

Last weekend, an elite Mexican border police unit had already begun cracking down on smugglers of illegal immigrants who were orchestrating the freeway dashes from a busy gathering place just south of the border, according to Mexican officials and smugglers.

But until Wednesday, the Border Patrol called the Mexican response inadequate. And Kean said agents will monitor the port of entry in case more immigrants begin using the Interstate 5 crossing again. It was considered an effective route because U.S. immigration officers have a policy against pursuing illegal immigrants on the freeway.

A spokesman for Baja California Gov. Ernesto Ruffo said that state political and business leaders were worried that the Border Patrol’s proposed lane closure would hurt tourism and other sectors of the already depressed trans-border economy.

“There is a climate of concern,” said Raul Reynoso Nuno.