FOR 2016

MRIDA CITY HAS ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT.

Jorge Alberto Fuentes Zapata

TUDelftX: The Next Generation of Infrastructures

12/30/2015

Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata

For 2016: Mrida City has room for improvement.

TO MAURICIO VILA DOSAL, MAYOR OF MRIDA CITY (YUCATN, MEXICO)

Greetings Mayor Vila Dosal, I wish to extend my congratulations to you for becoming the new
Mayor of our wonderful city after the June 2015 elections. A well-deserved and outstanding 44.5%
win over all your opposition1 ensured the future of this beautiful city in your hands. As it is a wellrecognized fact, Mrida is the engine of the state of Yucatn. As it can be seen from the following
2014 study on competitiveness by the Instituto Mexicano para la Competitividad (which translates
as the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness) the state of Yucatn where we reside as a city ranks
1st in most competitive Derecho (Law and Order), 2nd most competitive in the Poltico index
(Political system) and 3rd most competitive in Economa (Economic system)2. Im proud that
our city, Mrida, being the engine of the state, gets the privilege of leading these improvements.
We should rejoice. However, in the aggregate
(the General Ranking) our state is not even in
the Top 10, were number 11. It is not that we
should be, but we can be and were not, in the
top 10. Thats a concern. Please proceed to
observe the following chart:

Although the responsibility may fall more or less on

Governor Rolando Zapata, Mrida is the most
important city in the state of Yucatn, and it is clear
that we lag in progress not because our political, law & order, and economic systems dont
function. It is other areas such as Community, Environment, and Innovation which have kept us
from achieving a top spot. Our problem has to do with infrastructure. And this is what I wish to
emphasize:
If we are to achieve the 11th Sustainable Development Goal3 of the United Nations, regarding
Sustainable development of communities and cities, then we need to reform our transportation
system. It should be expected that our population will keep increasing and we need a proper
transportation system to cope with this future growth. In 2005 we were a total of 422,711 people,

Source: http://yucatan.com.mx/merida/elecciones-merida-2/mauricio-vila-alcalde-electo-de-merida
Source: http://imco.org.mx/indices/indice-de-competitividad-estatal-2014-las-reformas-y-los-estados/
3
Source: http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/cities/
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Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata

For 2016: Mrida City has room for improvement.

by 2010 we grew to 777,6154 and since 2014 we have been a population of 886,6775. Were
growing.
ISSUES WITH THE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM
There is no passenger train service in the city yet, only freight trains operate. As we become a
more interconnected metropolitan area with the surrounding sub-urban and rural areas of Kanasn
Umn, Conkal and Uc, we can foresee the need of a train service infrastructure sooner than we
expect. The public bus tariff is around 7 pesos, and in Mexico City, the largest populated city in
the country with above 8 million people, this tariff is sufficiently less as it stands between 4 and
5.50 pesos depending on the distance traveled6. Due to the fact that theres more people in Mexico
City, they achieve economies of scale and hence transit reduces the price of its bus tariffs.
We, on the other hand, are only equivalent in size to about 12.5% of Mexico Citys population,
but we pollute significantly, as 60% of the population uses public transportation7 but nearly all
buses are gasoline-fueled. In addition, only 10% of bus routes are direct routes, almost every busrider uses at least two buses to get to their respective destinations.
Public opinion stands very firmly on an improvement in transportation for the city of Mrida. As
the citizens have pointed out through a research conducted by the Diario de Yucatn (The
Yucatan Journal), the list of our more urgent problems in the city is topped by ineffective
transportation.
People complain of inefficient public transit, badly trained bus drivers, corruption, leakage of
funds gone unreported from the citys transportation budget, and overall increased insecurity.8 The
previous mayor Renan Barrera, stated that nearly 50% of Yucatns population lives in Mrida as
of 2013. If we are to make progress in developing a sustainable city that is growing, we need to
improve our transportation system.

Source: http://data.un.org/Data.aspx?d=POP&f=tableCode%3A240
Source: http://www.unionyucatan.mx/articulo/2014/03/28/ciudadanos/merida/zm-merida-aumenta-657-supoblacion-en-2014
6
Source: http://www.capital21.df.gob.mx/microbuses-taxis-y-autobuses-mantendran-tarifa-en-2015/
7
Source: http://yucatan.com.mx/merida/serio-problema-urbano
8
Source: http://yucatan.com.mx/merida/transporte-urbano/problemas-mas-urgentes
5

Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata

For 2016: Mrida City has room for improvement.

THE PLAN
We must turn Mrida and the overall Metropolitan area into an Eco-city as a long-term strategy.
For this we will need to have a well-planned city layout and public transportation system, operate
on a self-contained economy so that resources needed are found locally in this Metropolitan area
and make the transportation system interconnect the entire landscape in a way that increases
overall productivity and local GDP.
The Metropolitan area comprised of economic activity integrated into Mrida city from Uc,
Conkal, Kanasn, and Umn can be seen in the following figure:

Figure 1: Google Earth Image: Metropolitan Area

What we need is to build a Rapid Transport system around the city of Mrida that connects these
critical points around the city and that will allow the rapid transit to also go through the city.
Outside/ Surrounding the city and Through the city:
OUTSIDE/SURROUNDING

THROUGH THE CITY

The energy which will

administer these rapid
transit systems should be
renewable and it must be
established in the suburban and rural areas which
make up the metropolitan
area and that are within the
red abstract rectangle
shown in Figure 1. As it is
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Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata

For 2016: Mrida City has room for improvement.

shown in the same figure above, there is clearly a huge amount of green space that remains without
use and where considerable renewable energy infrastructure can be built to power the entire city
of Mrida and the Metropolitan Area. It is enough area to build an infrastructure for public Rapid
Transit, and also a renewable energy system to power the region. Solar power systems, and Wind
power systems must be built and interconnect through the green areas available in the Metropolitan
Area:

Figure 2: THE ACHIEVABLE RENEWABLE ENERGY GOAL FOR OUR METROPOLITAN AREA

A Domestic Resource Mobilization that is properly applied to invest in the development of this
renewable energy infrastructure in the rural areas close to the city will certainly come with
cooperation from the municipalities which will benefit from this structure. But, it is nonetheless
crucial for this to happen, as it will mean that economic activity and productivity will rise in the
long-term once we have an interconnected Metropolitan Area and, at the same time, when this
infrastructure is built, it is sustained by renewable energy infrastructure for which there is space.
Building a rapid transit system through the city and integrating this with a rapid transit system in
the surroundings will be an ambitious project, and it will require the city to run a deficit in the
near-term to finance it. It will also require the state of Yucatn to aid financially, and we may also
seek the federal government, as they can ask for funds from the World Banks International
Finance Corporation (IFC) and International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD)
of which Mexico is a member. The federal government can provide additional support through
SEDESOL, as this development infrastructure project will benefit rural inhabitants in the
surroundings as well. In the long-term this will be a solid investment, which will take the entire
state of Yucatn from number 11 on the ranking for competitiveness, all the way to number 1 in
less than 5 years after this project is finished. The better part is that we will stay on that top spot
for a long time, as long-term strategies work this way. Long-term strategies create improvement
that becomes impossible to reverse, and this is what we should seek to apply within Mrida and
the Metropolitan Area. An infrastructure that is accessible, available, adaptable, and affordable.
Sincerely yours, Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata.
4

Jorge A. Fuentes Zapata

For 2016: Mrida City has room for improvement.

A special thanks to edX Inc. and the Delft University of Technology for making this analysis
possible, and more specifically to the staff from the department in charge of Next Generation
Infrastructures. Furthermore, thank you Mayor Vila Dosal and City of Mrida for your attention.