With Mexico entering into phase three of the coronavirus pandemic, and with Mexico City being a hot spot for contagion, Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum announced new measures to help flatten the curve in a video circulated on social media Tuesday night.

Beginning Thursday, around 20% of Mexico City’s 195 Metro, bus and light rail stations will close.By closing some of the least busy stations, the mayor hopes to ease crowding at busier stations by increasing the frequency of trains and buses.

The city’s Metro system serves around 1.7 billion passengers a year and is the ninth-largest urban transportation system in the world. On a normal day, that translates to around 5 million riders, although stay-at-home measures due to the coronavirus have already reduced that number to around 890,000 per day.

Other new measures in the capital include implementing the “Hoy No Circula” — “no-drive day” — program for all residents, although taxi drivers, truckers, people with disabilities and medical and health care workers will be exempt. 

Metro stations and other public spaces are slated for increased sanitary measures, and nonessential businesses that remain open will be sanctioned, the mayor announced.

Sheinbaum promised that her government would not implement a curfew, nor fine people who venture out of their homes. She instead appealed to citizens’ sense of responsibility and applauded “those who have stayed at home, those who respect social distancing and those who wear masks on public transit. This has been very important, but in phase three we need to redouble our efforts. We are going to beat the pandemic, but we all have to participate,” she said.

Source: Milenio (sp)