England is building a wall to keep immigrants out

The U.K. is erecting a wall on the other side of the Channel, in France, in an attempt to keep refugees and migrants out, The Guardian reports. The "big, new wall" in the port city of Calais will be completed by the end of the year, and stand 13 feet high and stretch just over half a mile long, running along the main road where migrants often block the motorway with debris as they try to climb aboard trucks heading to the U.K. Plants and flowers will be used to make what residents are calling "the great wall of Calais" less of an eyesore.

"People are still getting through," immigration minister Robert Goodwill said. "We have done the fences. Now we are doing the wall."

Others are skeptical. "When you put walls up anywhere in the world, people find ways to go around them. It's a waste of money. It could make it more dangerous for people, it will push up tariffs for people-smugglers and people will end up taking more risks," François Guennoc, who works with a French aid group in Calais, told The Guardian.

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The wall is part of an approximately $22.8 million package between the French and the British meant to tighten security in the port city, which is near the major French refugee camp known as "the Jungle."