The Maya Train is just what you would expect from Mexico's president: a massive building project that's been railroaded through any questions of feasibility or environmental impact by being declared a matter of "national security". Costs balloon, service sucks, and customers never show up.

The idea was to build a 1500km rail network around the Yucatan peninsula to serve tourists. It would connect coastal resorts like Cancun to inland Mayan archaeological sites like Chichen Itza. Locals might even benefit if they're lucky At $8 billion, why not?

Planning

The disaster began long before the first rail was laid. Mexican President resident Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) loves big infrastructure products that get lots of media attention and give him a chance to take personal credit, much like Turkey's President Erdogan. His signature campaign promise was to scrap the half completed new airport for Mexico City and build on another site. The Maya Train was to be an even grander project and work had to be done fast to complete it during AMLO's 2018-2024 term.

The genius who thinks the cartels aren't a problem because Mexicans don't use cocaine.

Ordinarily it would take years of careful research and planning just to decide on the route, but much of the Maya Train was to use existing rail lines. More importantly, nobody gave a shit about the environmental and safety reviews that would be done in other countries. AMLO just declared his tourist train a "national security" project so it doesn't have to follow any rules. The Yucatan is geologically complex with cenotes, flooded limestone caves, underlying much of the route. Hopefully they won't collapse or be polluted. Habitat for rare wildlife like jaguars will be destroyed and divided. Remember how the train is going to archaeological sites? Let's just hope it doesn't obliterate too many undiscovered ruins along the way.

In a normal project, these concerns would never have even come up. First it would need to be demonstrated that the railroad could actually make money. But the Maya Train wasn't a business venture, it was simply a means of aggrandizement for AMLO and an opportunity for his cronies to cash in. There was a vague concept that tourists would take it from coastal resorts to inland destinations instead of using existing bus lines, but how many?

At least the stewardesses wear miniskirts.

There were also vague ideas about the Maya Train serving local passengers and freight, but these were at odds with the primary goal of serving tourists. Ordinary people don't want to take a detour to the outskirts of the cities where the airports, hotels, and Maya Train stations are. They can't afford it anyway, so they are sold tickets for a fraction of the price of the tourists'. The amount of freight moving around the Yucatan that is easy to ship by rail (coal, ore, grain) is unlikely to be worth setting up trains for and slow freight trains would have to work around the schedule of fast passenger trains.

Execution

Construction began in 2020 with , the first stretch built by Mota-Engil, a Portugese company that has done similar work in honest and transparent parts of the world like Angola. Costs quickly ballooned from $7.5 billion to $30 billion. Proceeding at breakneck speed the first part of the line became partially operational in December 2023. At least enough for AMLO to take a triumphant photo op.

It looks about as high tech as a 30 year old commuter train.

It's virtually worthless for other purposes as there aren't train stations to stop at yet, vital infrastructure isn't finished, the train makes 55mph on average, departures are delayed for hours, and even the plumbing onboard the train is breaking down. Within a few weeks it was temporarily shut down, and just a few days ago tourists were butthurt at missing their trains and being stuck.

Normally you might expect customers and the government to be outraged at whatever company is operating the rail line. But the Maya Train isn't operated by a company. It's operated by Mexico's notoriously corrupt and inefficient army. Why are they involved in the tourism industry? That's just how AMLO rolls. Like many left-wing populists in Latin America he loves giving control over random parts of the economy and administration of the country to the military for no good reason.

Train to nowhere. Imagine how boring the scenery is.

AMLO's term is running out. Will Mexicans make a choice any less stupid in the next election? Probably not, if they're like everyone else on Earth these days.

If you want to see how empty it is, someone did go down and manage to catch a ride: