Spotlight: 4 highway tenders in Mexico’s Quintana Roo state

The Mexican government is set to launch tenders this year to construct four highway projects between tourism hub Cancún in Quintana Roo state and the international airport serving the city. 

The projects involve a total of around 6bn pesos (US$288mn) and were presented over the weekend along with the 3.8mn-peso Jaguar national park project in Tulum, which seeks to preserve the environment by halting the spread of urbanization in a 250,000ha area of Quintana Roo. 

All the projects are designed to complement the ongoing construction of the Maya train in southeast Mexico, on which work on the fifth stretch in Quintana Roo has not begun yet and recent obstacles forced the government to make new modifications. 

The main project concerns the long-awaited Nichupté bridge, which is planned as a public-private partnership, while the other three involve minor highway works. 

The tenders will be launched this half, according to infrastructure undersecretary Jorge Nuño Lara (pictured), who accompanied President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) and other officials during supervision of Maya train works over the weekend.

Nuño said financing for all four projects will come, in part, from development bank Banobras and its infrastructure fund Fonadin. 

Nichupté bridge

Construction for the bridge will start in May, Nuño said, and the project should be completed by December 2023. A date for launching the tender was not announced, but everything signals it should happen in the next couple of weeks. 

The works require estimated capex of 4.8bn pesos, some 400mn pesos more than originally estimated, and part of the financing will come from the private sector as it was approved by Quintana Roo’s congress as the state’s first PPP in December 2020. 

In October, BNamericas reported that the tender would be launched in the fourth quarter of 2021, based on updates on Banobras’ project tracker website Mexico Projects Hub. 

The federal government appears to be attempting to speed up construction as the bridge’s projected opening date has been brought forward from the third quarter of 2024. 

The bridge will be 13.5km long, of which 8.4km will cross the Nichupté lagoon in front of the main thoroughfare in Cancún's hotel district. According to the official, it will be built using hydraulic concrete. 

Besides having been included in the 2020-24 national infrastructure program from December, the bridge was added to the Oaxaca Pact infrastructure program in August.

 

Luis Donaldo Colosio boulevard

Originally announced by AMLO in December, Nuño said the infrastructure, communications and transportation ministry (SICT) is currently completing the executive plan to modernize the boulevard, and as soon as it is finished the tender will be launched. 

“We will start building it in May this year and finish it in November 2023,” he said, adding that the estimated cost is 900mn pesos. 

The 11.1km boulevard will connect the Nichupté bridge with a highway junction near Cancún airport. 

The boulevard is one of the busiest roads in Cancún and planning for its upgrade has been underway since early 2020.

Airport junction

The junction near Cancún airport will connect with federal highway 307, which runs all the way down the Yucatán Peninsula to Chetumal in Quintana Roo. 

The works involve widening to four lanes from two an existing clover-type junction.

The estimated 200mn-peso project is the most advanced of the four in terms of planning and its tender is set to be launched next week, according to Nuño, who added construction will start in April and conclude in November 2023. 

Chac Mool avenue

To alleviate congestion during construction, the federal government will construct a 6.2km access road known as Chac Mool between the junction and Cancún. 

Estimated investment is 150mn pesos and works are set to start in July. 

More details about this project are expected to be unveiled later in the year.