Maya Train is Yet to Deliver Promised Benefits

By Emilio Godoy
VALLADOLID, Mexico, Nov 29 2024 – Indigenous craftsperson Alicia Pech doesn’t know about the Maya Train (TM), the Mexican government’s most emblematic megaproject that runs through five states in the country’s south and southeast

“We don’t travel. We lack the resources to travel on the train here. Who wouldn’t like to get on and ride somewhere? Right now… there are no visitors, no people coming. We think that by December there will be a bit more,” the 44-year-old Mayan woman told IPS.”The Maya do not manage it or operate it… the government is trying to keep the project from being derailed. People feel it is alien to them; it is the culmination of a process of dispossession”: Miguel Anguas.

She was born and lives in Dzitnup, from where she travels every day by bus to Valladolid, a city in the southeastern state of Yucatán, 30 minutes away, to work in the clothing shop she owns with 11 other Mayan women. They weave and embroider blouses, dresses and other textiles, a couple of blocks from the city’s downtown.

The weaver, a married mother of three, complains about low sales. “We can’t afford to pay for the shop, there are no people right now,” she said.

Valladolid, which has a population of about 85,500, is one of 26 stations already in operation on the railway, whose construction began in 2020 and five of the seven planned routes have been operating since December 2023.

The TM was initially in charge of the governmental National Fund for Tourism Development (Fonatur) and since 2023 of the Ministry of National Defence (Sedena). It runs for some 1,500 kilometres through 78 municipalities in the three states of the Yucatán peninsula – Campeche, Quintana Roo and Yucatán – and two other neighbouring states – Chiapas and Tabasco.

Sedena is building the two pending routes, with seven stations, between Quintana Roo and Campeche.

The line has sparked polarised controversy between its supporters and critics over deforestation in Latin America’s second largest jungle massif after the Amazon, in an issue that has become a source of weariness for the region’s communities.

A Maya Train unit waits at Chichén Itzá station, home to the archaeological site of the same name in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatán. Credit: Emilio Godoy / IPS

Pech shares the situation of thousands of people in the Yucatán peninsula, the inaccessibility of the railway and the generation of benefits, despite official promises, as IPS found during a tour of  section 3, from Calkiní (Campeche) to Izamal (Yucatán) and from there to Cancún (Quintana Roo), on  route 4.

This is in addition to the delay of the project and its cost overrun, which exceeds US$15 billion, 70% more than the initial estimate.

The train, intended for tourists, curious users and causing little enthusiasm among the local population, is empty in the larger stations, Mérida or Cancún, and passengers are scarce in the smaller ones, and does not include cargo, for now.

Between December 2023 and August, the TM carried 340,622 passengers, at a rate of 1,425 per day, according to official figures, on the 10 trains that currently run the routes, according to official data.

The tourist sites of Cancun, Merida (the Yucatan capital), Playa del Carmen, Valladolid and Palenque, which has an archaeological site, account for 80% of the passengers on the TM, which has suffered more than 20 accidents since it opened.

Although more international tourists have arrived at Merida airports or tourist destinations such as Cozumel between January and September this year, compared to the same period in 2023, it is difficult to link this to the effect of the new railway. Meanwhile, arrivals in Cancun fell by 1.5%.

Fares range from around three dollars for a one-station ride to a maximum of 156 dollars for a domestic visitor and 208 dollars for a foreign visitor, revenue that goes into the military coffers.

The Yucatán peninsula is home to the majority of the Maya population, one of Mexico’s 71 indigenous groups and one of the most culturally and historically representative in the country.

Mérida-Teya station in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatán. Stops are located outside towns and cities, which makes mobility difficult due to a lack of alternatives and increases travel costs. Credit: Emilio Godoy / IPS

Someday…

In the municipality of Maxcanú – “place of the four monkeys” or “beard of Canul”, an indigenous chieftain, in the Mayan language – and some 65 kilometres from Mérida, Madelin Ortiz, a clothing shop owner, believes the train is beneficial, although she doesn’t use it and her business has not prospered yet.

“The prices are affordable, there are more visitors. There is a lack of trains, because there are few departures. There is not as much fluidity in the timetables. I’ve wanted to go to Cancún, but I haven’t been able to,” the 78-year-old shopkeeper, a married mother of four, told IPS.

But the town is not overflowing with visitors, although there are many locals celebrating the Jicama (Pachyrhizus erosus) Fair, a tuber known as the Mexican turnip.

As in other stations, Maxcanú has eight empty premises with signs such as “Food”, “Community Tourism” and “Handicrafts” waiting for shops. The same happens in Valladolid, and at the Mérida-Teya station on the outskirts of the capital, only two food shops operate, one offering TM souvenirs, another advertising a future bakery, and a car rental place.

A worker cleans the glass doors of community tourism and handicraft sales premises, which remain empty at the station in the municipality of Maxcanú, in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatán. Stops have few shops, despite government offers to operate these spaces. Credit:Emilio Godoy / IPS

There are more idle times than busy ones with passengers at the station in Maxcanú, with just over 24,000 people. Four National Guard soldiers pass the time, along with three stray dogs, seeking the coolness of the station, fugitives from the sun, while five workers clean the place.

To avoid protests and urban disruption, Fonatur and Sedena built the stations on the outskirts of cities and towns, which makes it difficult to access them, due to their disconnection, and increases costs and journey times.

When he promoted the project, then president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who ruled between 2018 and last October, said the TM would support community tourism and that there would be spaces for craftspeople. But people like Alicia Pech are still waiting.

The government claims the train will bring thousands of tourists, create jobs, boost tourism beyond traditional visitor centres, and develop the regional economy, but there is no proof of this, especially since it does not carry cargo.

Permanent

There are wounds that never heal. The TM route has left cuts that mark the Mayan jungle, where there used to be trees, animals and plants. The project has faced accusations of deforestation, pollution, environmental damage and human rights violations.

Aerial view of the planned section 6, which runs from Tulum airport to Chetumal, in the southeastern state of Quintana Roo. Credit: Google Earth

Miguel Anguas, co-founder of the non-governmental organisation Kanan Derechos Humanos, says the TM creates a new territorial order causing harmful impacts, in some cases irreversible.

“The balance is clear.  The Maya do not manage it, nor do they operate it. From what we can see, the government is trying to keep the project from being derailed. People feel it is alien to them; it is the culmination of a process of dispossession,” he told IPS.

The construction cut down at least 11,485 hectares of jungle and emitted 470,750 tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, according to research by the government’s Yucatan Scientific Research Centre, made public in September.

In fact, the government paid itself to compensate for the logging.

The government’s National Forestry Commission paid 4.11 million dollars to 11 private landowners and 18 ejidos (public land assigned for collective use) for the destruction of 2,867 hectares in 2023, and 4.38 million to 40 private individuals and 15 ejidos for 2,827 hectares this year.

Compensation is a legal mechanism that allows for the restoration of one area for damage done to another.

To increase revenues and minimise losses, President Claudia Sheinbaum, in office since 1 October, plans to extend the route to Puerto Progreso, on the Yucatan coast north of Mérida, to move freight.

But the TM will continue to use resources, as the 2025 budget plans an allocation of US$ 2,173 million, both for the two lines under construction and to maintain those already in operation.

The Mexican government knew since 2022 that the mega-project would increase the initial budget.

The updated cost-benefit analysis, prepared that year by the private Mexican consulting firm Transconsult and obtained by IPS through an access to information request, concluded that the cost would be from two to four times more than the initial estimate.

“The stations were defined in terms of serving the greatest number of locations, thus covering the greatest amount of demand in the area,” the document states.

This implies losses for the TM, which would make a profit in the medium term.

While the TM struggles to advance, Pech and Ortiz fantasize that one day they will wait on the platform, see it arrive and board one of its cars.