Mexico advances 5 northern border projects this year

Authorities and private players are finishing the last details on five Mexican border infrastructure projects while works on four of them will start this year.

Three are highway projects, one is a new port of entry in the western border area, and one is a new railway.

Some projects have been on the agenda for years, but the ratification of the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA) could have sped up progress. 

Railway

US railway operator Kansas City Southern (KCS) is awaiting Mexican approval to begin construction of its second international rail bridge at the Laredo-Nuevo Laredo gateway, in the Texas-Tamaulipas border area.

The US authorized the project in July last year already. 

Mexican approval is expected for next year, after which KCS will have up to 15 years to build the double-track rail line parallel to its existing freight line, according to US approval documents. But the company wants to finish earlier to serve the demand the USMCA will generate.

An investment figure for the 327km line has not been determined yet, but Kansas City Southern de México (KCSM) plans to allocate US$118mn in Mexico capex this year, CEO Oscar del Cueto said during a webinar on Friday.

At a previous event, del Cueto said that the next step involves completing the project layout so communications and transportation ministry SCT could approve it as well. In the latest quarterly report in October, KCS COO Jeffrey Songer said the company had already begun works on the preliminary design, scheduling and cost modeling.

Otay Mesa II

After nearly five years of planning, the government will start construction of the Otay Mesa II port of entry at the end of this year. The facility will be the third crossing facility to be built between Tijuana, in Baja California state, and San Diego, in California. 

Construction was confirmed during the presentation of the first package of projects for the 2020-24 national infrastructure program (PNI) in October, which said the project will require investments of 2.8bn pesos (US$139mn). 

According to development bank Banobras’ projects tracker website Mexico Projects Hub, a public tender for the port of entry is expected to be launched in the third quarter. 

The facility results from US-Mexico negotiations on a plan to build, improve and modernize highways and land ports of entry at the crossings that handle 80% of bilateral trade. Negotiations began shortly after the USMCA was ratified, according to the Mexican foreign relations ministry (SRE).

Otay Mesa II, which was originally estimated to demand US$100mn, has been on both governments’ radar since 2016, and Banobras had approved land worth 800mn pesos for the facility. The US also began related highway works in 2016. 

Other projects

There are three other minor crossing projects at the northern border for which works are expected to start this year. All have been confirmed as part of the first two packages of the national infrastructure program. 

They include the 108mn-peso Brownsville-Matamoros bridge to connect Tamaulipas and Texas, to start works this month; the 411mn-peso complementary works at the Laredo-Texas bridge in Mexico’s Colombia city, scheduled to begin in March; and the 700mn-peso Samalayuca-San Jeronimo border bypass connector in Chihuahua state, for which works will start in December.

Plans for the Brownsville-Matamoros bridge entail transferring the bridge concession from federal highway operator Capufe to Banobras’ infrastructure fund Fonadin. With this change, the fund plans to rehabilitate an abandoned rail bridge that runs parallel to the existing vehicle bridge and modernize the 2.4km Las Americas highway that links Brownsville and Matamoros. 

Meanwhile, plans for the Samalayuca-San Jeronimo border bypass connector and the complementary works for the Laredo-Texas bridge have not been specified yet.

The government also confirmed the construction of two highways near the northern border.

These include the 3.5bn-peso La Gloria-Colombia highway in Nuevo León state, for which works will be split between Promotora Y Operadora de Infraestructura (Pinfra) and engineering firm Ainda in September, and the 1.6bn-peso Altar–Sásabe highway in Baja California state, which was assigned to Pinfra as well.