In airport issues...

The announcement of the new airport in Mexico City as part of the National Infrastructure Program during the Second Presidential Report, leaves us plenty to think about. Everything has been said lately and everyone should already have something to say about it, according to their interests or their purchasing power to select a media that lean in favor or against the project, responding to the interests of the funds to cover the salaries of our "reporters”. In the country we live in today, we must recognize that the news of this great project, and any issue of national interest, arrive to us with a very dark veil that covers all its irregularities and inconsistencies. 

Picture of the New Airport Project. Presidency of the Republic.

Speaking of the problem of the current airport in Mexico City, is not new. Since the late eighties it was a matter of concern: if the urban sprawl absorbed the Airport because of terrible planning mistakes, if the demand exceeds the capacity of the facility, if the runways are inadequate and outdated for the number of flights and model of aircrafts for commercial flights ... all that has been said since last. In 1991 a large project called Metropolitan Airport Plan, which was supplemented in 1995 with the Airports Law, which speaks of not to grow neither to seek new locations but to increase the powers of the near airports to generate a system of Hub and Spokes, as it works in other cities. 

Generate a Hub airport that is powered by a decentralized and smaller airports or Spokes that are connected by efficient and intelligent transport systems, sounds interesting and viable. Develop the project plan can help ahead for what will happen in a few years with the Mexican Megalopolis, which stains Mexico City, Toluca, Cuernavaca, Pachuca, Queretaro, Tlaxcala and Puebla -something every day is closer to being a disturbing reality-, but with the tools not to deal with a distant problem but with relevant and temporally appropriate solutions. The biggest problem: the concession of the airports to private companies; with this project, Airports and Auxiliary Services of Federal Government should lose powers and "give" a little of the great business of commercial aircraft, regardless of the facilities which already exist to do so, remain as large "white elephants" that will hardly develop, even at its current capacity, because a centralist obsession reflected in all decisions and activities of our country. 

The oddest thing about this system is that light rails to communicate at least some of the cities of the next megalopolis are already in process. All the Mexicans will invest a fortune in transportation systems that will reduce travel times to continue generating dormitory towns dependent of the Federal District, with biased and centralist visions that will not allow to have local infrastructure or employment. New networks that communicate the major cities in the Midwest would have to come with proper and strict planning rather than implement them capriciously; ie have a real vision for the future and not only mechanisms to solve problems that in a few years will bring even more problems for the country. 

And with this lack of planning, the airport is the pinnacle of the errors in government whims. Neither Francisco Olvera with his City of Knowledge in Pachuca nor Rafael Moreno Valle with his Amusement Park in Cholula or his new offices for the State Government or the Star of Puebla in Angelopolis or his Baroque Museum by Toyo Ito, will have the terrible impact of placing infrastructure without appropriate planning. The new project -and its investment- will undoubtedly be the most remarkable of this presidential term and ridiculously puts us on par with Hong Kong, Beijing or Dubai, and I think we have yet a long way to go if we want to compete with them even at an airport; is amazing that with the social and economic problems that currently exist in the country, had a hand real trouble only to address "how Mexicans are seen from outside", without worrying about how we look inside ourselves. 

The good out of evil bad: the "winner" project is the work of an airports specialist. No doubt Sir Norman Foster would be the ideal candidate to participate in this project -although I not yet understand the participation of Fernando Romero- and again, the same-transparency of federal prosecutions in this country is challenged with the nepotistic managing of the resources all the Mexicans afford with our taxes. With the little information the government have given us in dribs and drabs and in the interest of the Presidency of the Republic, the project is completely out of scale and its symbolism stands in the different presentations; if it is a letter, if it is an eagle, if it is a contemporary representation of our national emblem... what remains clear is that it will be a landmark work that will not solve the main problems of the country and will cost just over $ 1,000.00 each of the 120 million Mexicans, money that could be used for other purposes less whimsical. 

Finally, the new airport project is underway and apparently little we can do, the decision is taken. We can only wait and go to document, to the extent that we are allowed, the rest of the implementation process is clear and not pay 3 times more for this work as we did with the famous Estela de Luz ... if it happens in this time, surely land auction of the current airport could finance part of the new work, or does anyone knows what for this land will be used in the future?

JPV