Mexico’s Yucatan Tourism Train Project Gets New Backer

A consortium that includes a subsidiary of mining and transport firm Grupo Mexico was awarded the tender to build a section of the “Mayan Train,” one of the Mexico’s flagship infrastructure projects, the country’s national tourism fund said on Friday.

Mexico Compania Constructora, a unit of Grupo Mexico , one of the world’s largest copper producers and a major Mexican rail operator, led the consortium with a winning proposal of 17.8 billion pesos ($864.69 million) to construct a portion of the railway which stretches from Playa del Carmen to Tulum, Mexico’s National Fund for Tourism Promotion (Fonatur) said in a statement.

The 1,470-km (910-mile) project is designed to connect Mexico’s tourism hot spots and promote development on the Yucatan Peninsula. The cost of the project, championed by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, is estimated at about $7 billion.

Companies Acciona Infraestructuras Mexico, Acciona Construction and Mexico Proyectos y Desarrollos, were also part of the consortium.

The new tender replaced an earlier tender declared void by Mexico after a consortium that included U.S. investment group BlackRock Inc was the sole bidder.

It was one of two new tenders which would replace the original, local newspaper El Financiero previously reported.

(Reporting by Cassandra Garrison, Sharay Angulo and Daina Beth Soloman)

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