The new Tulum Airport (TUY), in Mexico’s Mayan Riviera, is expected to be inaugurated by the end of the year. The confirmation came directly from government sources the day after the visit to the construction site of the new structure carried out by the country’s president López Obrador with the governor of the state of Quintana Roo where the famous seaside resort of Cancún is also located.
In principle, it will initially have the capacity to carry out 32 thousand annual operations with a capacity of 5 million passengers. Once open, authorities expect to welcome around five million travelers a year. The airport will also be connected to the “Tulum” station of the future Tren Maya, which will connect Cancún, Palenque, Tulum, Uxmal, Mérida and other archaeological sites, cities and seaside resorts.
A project to say the least controversial for several reasons: it is the Mexican army which is in charge of the construction of the civil airport and the military base and, it is a project described as “devastating”, no only because of the damage caused to the environment with the felling of 1.3 million trees once its construction is completed, but also because it will only be used for 30 years.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s major flagship project has been plagued by inconsistencies and risks since the start of its construction, a situation that has been highlighted in multiple investigations carried out by the civil organization Mexicanos Contra la Corrupción y la Impunidad (MCCI – Mexicans against corruption and impunity).
In turn, Toni Chaves, president of the Riviera Maya Hotel Association, surprised by considering that the Tulum airport will not affect that of Cancun, but on the contrary, since he predicts that there will be an increase in flights and will energize already mature destinations in the southern part of the state.
Likewise, the head of the hotel industry said that five thousand additional rooms are planned until 2025 and predicts that the new hotel developments with the Tulum airport will take place in 4 or 5 years.
The airport is already 60% built, as well as the future Tren Maya station. The following video tells what its installations will look like:
The populist López Obrador is also personally overseeing the work of the highly controversial Mayan Train in the region. The above-mentioned civil organization MCCI pointed out that the companies supplying the rails of the new line received advances higher than those authorized by the procurement rules of the National Fund for the Promotion of Tourism (Fonatur), in addition to multiple irregularities in the purchased equipment.
Another political affair affecting tourism to follow…
