The incoming secretary of finance yesterday called a new Cancún-Palenque train a proposal but today a newly-elected senator for Quintana Roo announced the 100-billion-peso project (US $5.23 billion) would begin next year.

José Luis Pech Várguez said the passenger train, intended to boost tourism in the south and encourage cultural tourism in the archaeological zones of Campeche and Chiapas, will take six years to build.

Fonatur, the national tourism fund, will be in charge of the project, the Morena senator said.

The project is one that had already been put forward by Morena party leader Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The proposed route would run from Cancún through Tulum, Carrillo Puerto and Bacalar in Quintana Roo and Calakmul in Campeche to Palenque, Chiapas.

The first stage, Pech Várguez said, would be Cancún-Tulum, a two-year project.

Government, the private sector and communal landowners would participate as partners in the rail line, he explained.

The project has been called a bullet train but would travel at an average speed of 130 kilometers an hour, somewhat slower than most such trains.

Source: SIPSE (sp)