New Tulum airport scheduled to open in 2023

Credit to : mexicanist.com, linked.

Even in times of epidemics, Mexico remains a popular tourist destination for international tourists. In particular, due to flexible entry rules, many passengers have been handled at Cancun International Airport since last year’s crisis. The existing airport is not sufficient now, so a new airport is planned for Tulum. By 2023, the new Maya airport will be operational and will be able to handle four million tourists.

The Mexican government continues to promote tourism in its home country and apparently relies on the coastal city of Tulum on the Yucatan Peninsula, which has a population of approximately 33,000 and the location of the Mayan ruins will attract and attract more and more tourists. To make the region even more attractive, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador plans to build a 1,500-kilometer railway line called the Tren Maya, which will take travelers through the Mayan sites to a total of five states via the Mayan sites.

But that’s not all: to handle tourist arrivals, the Mexican government is planning a new airport in the new district of Tulum, which will serve another four million passengers in the future. While the tourist stronghold of Cancun already has an international airport, it is no longer adequate in terms of capacities. Therefore, the new airport, 25 kilometers southwest of Tulum, should provide relief from 2023 and receive a large number of tourists after landing.

However, the idea of a new airport is not new. Then-president Philippe Calderon had already proposed a construction plan for a new airport in Tulum in 2010, but the plan was never taken seriously. The current president is keen to make his plans a reality. He had already announced plans for this in October 2020 and presented a tight schedule for February 2021, which will bring both the airport and the Mayan train into operation by 2023.

The new major construction project in Tulum must also be viewed critically. On the one hand, the region is economically dependent on tourism. Therefore, some locals expect the new airport to create new jobs in the tourism sector. Mexico, for its part, plans to build a Maya train in addition to the new airport. The Mayan train already requires some resources and construction time. But the new project is environmentally questionable because, according to critics, construction projects could endanger or destroy Mayan ruins, a world-class historical and cultural heritage site.

Tulum’s future airport will have a city for the military

The future Tulum airport will have a new city for the military, however, this terminal will be civil-military, that is, it will also serve for passenger transportation, meeting the demand for travel in the Riviera Maya. The airport contemplates the construction of a building for the passenger terminal, boarding lounges, control tower, parking and roads, in addition to the urban planning of a military city, main support buildings and buildings for civilian airport services. It is expected to be ready in one year.

The Tulum air terminal will be the second in this modality, as well as the Santa Lucia Airport, “mixed civil-military, with international category”, assigned to Branch 7 of the National Defense and the pre-investment studies, which are in charge of the General Directorate of Engineers. The construction of the airport is aimed at facilitating traffic in the Tulum area. The civil-military airport of Tulum, after executing the first studies, its future will be a cargo logistics center, like the one in Santa Lucia. Likewise, the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP) in its quarterly report reported the execution of 237 million 579 thousand 768 pesos for the elaboration of the first studies.

The proposal is for the airport to become a cargo logistics center, since the Army has proposed that in the future it will seek schemes for the private sector to participate “to reduce the risks and costs of the project, increasing its profitability and potential attractiveness”.