Mexico.- Despite various questions and after an analysis of just 36 days, the project of the Section 5 South of the Mayan Train was declared “environmentally viable” and obtained a “conditional” guarantee.
The Environmental Impact Statement (MIA) in regional modality, which was presented on May 17 by the National Fund for the Promotion of Tourism (Fonatur) and published a day later in the Ecological Gazette, received authorization last Monday.
The General Directorate of Environmental Impact and Risk (DGIRA) of Semarnat granted its approval in official letter SGPA/DGIRA/DG03703-22.
It determined there that the project for Section 5 South is environmentally viable and, therefore, decided to authorize it, although in a conditional manner.
Nevertheless, the terms of the authorization are still unknown and specific conditions.
The MIA of Section 5 South of the Mayan Train, which runs from Playa del Carmen to Tulum and has a length of 67.6 kilometers, recognizes that 485 hectares of forest will be affected medium subperennifolia and secondary vegetation for works that include right of way, stations, access roads and others. And it classifies said impact as “critical”.
It also foresees as “severe adverse” impacts the fragmentation of habitat due to changes in land use and the installation of infrastructure, the affectation of species of flora and fauna in some risk category of the NOM059-SEMARNAT-2010, the alteration of the scenic quality of the landscape and the modification of natural sites or monuments.
However, it ensures that the negative impacts identified are “remediable.”
In a document presented to Semarnat after the publication of the MIA, the Center for Biological Diversity and Greenpeace Mexico warned that it was presented after the start of the works, which invalidated it by itself, they also pointed out various omissions and inaccuracies.
In fact, the absence of the MIA was the basis for various injunctions filed by environmental groups against the works on Section 5 South.
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And its approval was in turn the argument used this week by Fonatur to ask Judge Adrián Novelo to lift all current suspensions.
The Merida federal judge opened an incident yesterday to decide whether to revoke the definitive suspension that prevents the progress of the works on Section 5, but refused to immediately cancel four other provisional suspensions that keep the project stopped.
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