Mexico’s Maya train wins award despite environmental concerns

Mexico’s Maya train, the 1,452km passenger and freight rail line planned to connect five states in the southeast, received an international award on Tuesday amidst criticism over possible negative environmental impacts.

The US$7bn plan was named Oracle Project of the Year during the 11th North American Infrastructure Forum, an annual event in Washington D.C. that recognizes innovative infrastructure projects in North America.

According to Mexico’s national tourism board (Fonatur), which is the train’s main promoter, the project was recognized in the value creation and benefits category for its "positive impact on the communities and the economy of the area" and for "contributing to mobility, access to education and the benefits that will be obtained in the region in the long term."

Attendees and online voters picked the Maya train over Canada’s Port of Quebec Laurentia terminal and the US Gateway Program Projects and Appalachia Storage Hub in a contest with 50 entrants. 

This is the second international recognition the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) has earned for the train since its announcement last year. 

Earlier this month, the UN said it supported the leftist president’s infrastructure proposals, especially the Maya train, but asked for "a comprehensive plan" to ensure sustainable development and respect for communities. 

Some experts and indigenous groups in Mexico, however, are still opposed to the train, despite the president’s pledge to protect the environment.

ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS

Environmental concerns over the trans-peninsular train arose when the president called for a public consultation last year.

Before the process, hundreds of scientists sent a letter to the president asking him not to move forward with the plan. 

“High biodiversity sites must be preserved according to the most stringent international standards,” they wrote, “taking into account the indigenous peoples who have been the guarantors of their territories and custodians of the natural and cultural wealth of our country.” 

One year later, one of the authors of that letter told BNamericas that the project still poses threats to the environment.

“Us, biologists and conservationists, are still worried because we don't want another Cancún,” senior biology researcher Patricia Escalante Pliego said. “We want something friendly to the environment, ecotourism. So that the communities have their cabins and have ecotechnolgy so as not to continue contaminating the water with our drainage.”

Although the AMLO administration said that it is using rail infrastructure that was built before, Escalante said a difference exists between an established rail and expanding a rail line for a specific train.

“That is infrastructure that already caused a lot of damage and that, with the train, can be accentuated. I told the proponents once: ‘[rails] and trains are not the same.’ The impact doubles,” she said. 

The last train update included 28 stops on three stretches: the Jungle stretch, the Gulf stretch and the Caribbean stretch. Environmentalists fear the train could cause the most damage on the Jungle stretch, since it reaches the Calakmul biosphere, Mexico’s largest tropical forest reserve.

The government said the train's "main objective is the social welfare of the inhabitants of the Mayan Zone."

STATUS

On Thursday, AMLO said his administration was “waiting for the basic engineering studies to be completed to tender the Maya train, which will mean thousands of jobs.”

These studies are included in the contracts the government tendered a few weeks ago.

The contracts to carry out the basic engineering design for the train were granted to a group headed by Key Capital and includes Senermex Ingeniería y Sistemas, Daniferro Tools, and Geotecnica y Supervisión Técnica, beating offers from seven other consortiums. 

The group's 299mn-peso (US$15.3mn) bid was one of only two offers seen as technically feasible and which were considered for economic evaluation.

Contracts for four of the seven sub-sections into which the railway will be divided are to be tendered in December, according to the government.

Each sub-section is estimated to demand a US$1bn investment. 

Pictured: Oracle Awards (CREDIT: Fonatur)