The Maya Train, the new airport and El Jaguar park will increase the population of the municipalities of Tulum and Felipe Carrillo Puerto by around 450 percent over the next three decades, according to the Territorial Operational Program of the Southern Zone of the Riviera Maya.
According to the analysis, in which the Secretariat of Agrarian, Urban and Territorial Development (Sedatu) also participated, population growth and tourist influx will require 116 percent more drinking water per year, which will impact the aquifers in the area.
The projected scenario estimates that, by 2050, 41.6 hectometres of water will be needed to supply the demand of both municipalities, in addition to the production of wastewater of 20.8 hectometres. For that same year, the production of garbage and urban solid waste will be 748 tons per day.
Projections estimate that between 2024 and 2050 the population in both municipalities will increase from 130,000 reported in the 2020 census to 716,161 inhabitants, meaning that both municipal capitals would have a population concentration similar to that of Playa del Carmen, that is, the density would triple. The ideal scenario is an optimistic view of development, since it is estimated that the projects will have a greater influx than estimated and will be consolidated in less than a decade.
For his part, Elías Sienenborn, an environmentalist who has documented the contamination of cenotes in Section 5 South of the Mayan Train, warns that the damage is already happening: real estate speculation has skyrocketed with the railroad, there is no land management plan and, instead, land dispossession has begun.
“Population growth in the ideal scenario will lead to the expansion of urban areas in a region where 86 percent is forest, 7.2 percent is aquatic vegetation and 6 percent is mangroves,” said Sienenborn.
As reported by REPORTUR.mxthe two works promoted by the administration of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), the Tulum airport and the Maya Train, are complementing and promoting each other. Andrés Martínez Reynoso, director of the Quintana Roo Tourism Promotion Council (CPTQ), pointed out that this new era of tourism in the Mexican Caribbean is focused on coordinating the 12 destinations in Quintana Roo. (Tulum Airport and Maya Train vary tourist behavior in Qroo).
