New highway section opens from Guadalajara to Puerto Vallarta

March 6, 2023

Another section of the Guadalajara–Puerto Vallarta highway has opened, getting drivers another step closer to a world in which driving time between the two cities will drop by two hours.

The road opening comes about two months after the 23.6-kilometer Capomo-La Florida route began operations in December 2022, connecting Las Varas with Junction 692, an important road for tourism.

Once the entire road is finished, driving time between the two cities will be reduced from hours 4 hours 30 minutes to 2 hours 30 minutes.

In a statement, the Secretary of Infrastructure, Communications and Transportation (SICT) announced the opening of a 30.8-kilometer stretch of highway between the La Florida and the La Cruz de Huanacaxtle junctions in the new Las Varas-Puerto Vallarta highway. Construction of the road took an investment of 4.9 billion pesos (US $272.2 million) that benefited nine communities.

A total of 54.4 km of the highway is now open to vehicles, once the third section is complete, the finished road will total 86.5 km in length and will include 45 bridges, seven junctions, three tunnels and three viaducts.

An estimated 6,000 vehicles will circulate on the roadway daily, according to SICT.

Tunnel on Guadalajara-Puerto Vallarta highway — The just-opened stretch of highway is the second of the highway’s three phases. The total 85 km length of road will feature three new tunnels.

The highway will grant access to different points of the Riviera Nayarit’s tourist corridor (named one of the world’s greatest places by Time Magazine). It will also give the cities of Guadalajara and Tepic direct access to the tourist corridor. The highway will also connect two international airports in the region: the Puerto Vallarta airport and the Tepic airport in Nayarit.