PDPsol wrote:

Certainly good to know WHY this candidate wants to cancel the nation's most important infrastructure project. However, the question is WHAT WILL HAPPEN, will this candidate win the election and, if he does, what will happen to the CDMEX project? Both questions are, of course, inherently political, reflecting the deep influence policy makers have on the commercial aviation industry, particularly in Latin America. Have yet to see viable responses to the question, the elections are next Sunday, very soon!

The Mexican Trump is almost certainly going to win the elections. What is going to happen is the same false narrative of "draining the swamp": AMLO is going to turn corruption up to 11:

- First he's going to have to admit what everybody in the aeronautical industry has been saying since AMLO started making noise about the airport in 2015: The Texcoco site is the only one suitable for building an airport for Mexico city due to airspace restrictions set by the many mountains that surround the city.
- He is going to privatize the airport to whomever offers the largest bribes to his party, and those are going to be yuge bribes as the airport is projected to have billion dollar-level yearly earnings by 2030.
- Then he's going to "award" contracts to his crony Rioboo to design elevated highways and a train to the new airport (the only expertise Rioboo's company has is building elevated highways, that's why he lost the tender for designing the new MEX runways).
- Later, he's going to sell the land occupied by the old MEX airport to grupo Danhos, another one of his party's financiers.

TL;DR: if somebody thinks the new MEX airport is plagued by corruption, just wait and see.

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

Venatt wrote:

PDPsol wrote:

The latest presidential election polls place AMLO as Mexico's next president; the elections are a scant 2.5 weeks away. This apparently delusional man will rule the nation, representing Mexico's almost 125 million people, North America's second-largest after the U.S. (!) and attempt to slow-down, derail, or even stop the country's most important, most strategic infrastructure project in development. What risk is there of such an political outcome occurring next month in Mexico? What will happen to this project should that man win the election?

The TRUE REASON behind AMLO's heavy criticizing of the new airport is because one of his close friends José María Rioboó was NOT awarded the 52.6 million contract to build the airport runways, this was exposed by rival candidate Ricardo Anaya in the last presidential debate two weeks ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djVe31CBtOc

Jose Maria Riobooó was directly awarded several contracts in Mexico City's when AMLO was mayor from 2000-2006 without a bid process.

Check post #26, I basically said the same 3 months ago and went into a fight an AMLO fan over the very well know corruption of the "anti-corruption" candidate.

Sorry, it's kind of difficult for me to read every single comments posted here, I only knew about this until I saw the presidential debate but I guess it was known way before. I know a typical peje-zombie will always deny any facts about AMLO.

I am all in favor of the new Airport where it is been built and I think the land is quite big enough, the only question I have is how will it be able to handle twice the number of airplanes the current airport does ? I am referring specifically to the terminal building because by its design I don't understand how will 99 planes be able to park at the gates at the same time ?

The terminal is going to be able to park 96 narrow bodies at the same time, but that number is reduced when wide bodies are used due to the use of Multiple Apron Ramp System (MARS) gates. Every fixed bridge (the "blobs" that protrude from the terminal) has 2 jet bridges which can be used for 2 narrow bodies or 1 wide body.

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

The terminal is going to be able to park 96 narrow bodies at the same time, but that number is reduced when wide bodies are used due to the use of Multiple Apron Ramp System (MARS) gates. Every fixed bridge (the "blobs" that protrude from the terminal) has 2 jet bridges which can be used for 2 narrow bodies or 1 wide body.

This same system is currently installed and working well in YYC. If you don't have too many wide body movements at the same time it's a great setup. However if you have a bunch of widebodys all the same time the narrow bodies will end up in the weeds or waiting to come into a gate. Luckily YYC is mostly narrowbodies, so it works well for us, and allows us to flexibly scale up with wide bodies when needed. Hopefully it will work well for MEX too. The terminal is beautiful.

Anyone can shed any light as of to why the Mexican airport authorities hate windows?

Looks very nice. I'm assuming there's going to be a lot of hardstand space to park aircraft that aren't being used for a few hours.

Flew B6 from MEX to MCO yesterday. Got a nice shot of the new airport right after take off.

Looks like they could eventually build a duplicate terminal in the upper part of my photo.

https://imgur.com/a/9kRK230

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

The terminal is going to be able to park 96 narrow bodies at the same time, but that number is reduced when wide bodies are used due to the use of Multiple Apron Ramp System (MARS) gates. Every fixed bridge (the "blobs" that protrude from the terminal) has 2 jet bridges which can be used for 2 narrow bodies or 1 wide body.

That is probably going to become an issue in the future, the design is very nice but at the same time could represent a problem.

av8orwalk wrote:

Flew B6 from MEX to MCO yesterday. Got a nice shot of the new airport right after take off.

Looks like they could eventually build a duplicate terminal in the upper part of my photo.

https://imgur.com/a/9kRK230

That is most likely the solution to a not so far saturation of the terminal currently been built.

Fron New Mex airport FB page.....

https://www.facebook.com/NvoAeropuertoM ... 28437/?t=1

[list=][/list]

paparrucho wrote:

yellowtail wrote:

How many gates will the new MEX have and how does that compare with the current MEX? I would say they would need to increase gate space by at least 50% from current.

it says 95 gates

95?!! should be more i predict

santi319 wrote:

Anyone can shed any light as of to why the Mexican airport authorities hate windows?

Huh? That whole terminal is pretty much a giant greenhouse. It's hard to get more window than that!

aerolimani wrote:

santi319 wrote:

Anyone can shed any light as of to why the Mexican airport authorities hate windows?

Huh? That whole terminal is pretty much a giant greenhouse. It's hard to get more window than that!

Actually only the windows in the international arrivals level seem to be transparent. From the architectural renders it seems that the "windows" at the departures level are going to be obscured by patterned glass and aluminum panels resulting in that only the aircraft parked directly underneath are going to be fully visible.



I guess the reason for this is saving money on air conditioning.

Midway737 wrote:

[list=][/list]

paparrucho wrote:

yellowtail wrote:

How many gates will the new MEX have and how does that compare with the current MEX? I would say they would need to increase gate space by at least 50% from current.

it says 95 gates

95?!! should be more i predict

According to wikipedia the old MEX airport has 56 "contact" gates + 35 remote stands.

The new MEX is going to open with 96 "contact" gates + 68 remote stands. It seems another 2 midfield concourses + another terminal are planned so the whole airport could eventually reach ~200 gates.

AMLO recants his threats, airport will continue.

https://airwaysmag.com/airports/mexico- ... s-forward/

Adelante

LupineChemist wrote:

AMLO recants his threats, airport will continue.

https://airwaysmag.com/airports/mexico- ... s-forward/

Adelante

And, so it goes with demagogues.

I never thought that AMLO's threats to cancel the project had any truth in them. However, I do believe his gov't is likely to cause delays. That being said, while I always wanted to believe that the airport would be open by 2020, that was probably an overly optimistic statement from Nieto.

From the above linked article:

However, what Jimenez Espriu did confirm, is that should the project continue, it will be ready by 2023 and not 2020, as it was originally promised by the Peña Nieto administration.

But sources say that the airport will be ready by 2025 instead.

Overall, the drastic change in Mexico’s political climate will bring delays and further discussions in the development of what will become Latin America’s largest airport.

A 5 year delay is drastic, but not deadly for the project. I suspect the New administration will want LOTS of ‘benefits’ from the commercial aviation and engineering/infrastructure sectors in exchange for the president’s acquiescence. We shall see.

This project is the most important infrastructure initiative in Mexico, if not the entire Western Hemisphere, its strategic importance cannot be underscored. The MEX metropolitan region agglomerates over 22+ million people, a mega-center with a diversified economy requiring global connectivity for continued growth.

How is the construction progressing? Is there any hope of meeting the 2020 opening? I'm a cynic on airport projects opening on time. See: BER

PDPsol wrote:

A 5 year delay is drastic, but not deadly for the project. I suspect the New administration will want LOTS of ‘benefits’ from the commercial aviation and engineering/infrastructure sectors in exchange for the president’s acquiescence. We shall see.

This project is the most important infrastructure initiative in Mexico, if not the entire Western Hemisphere, its strategic importance cannot be underscored. The MEX metropolitan region agglomerates over 22+ million people, a mega-center with a diversified economy requiring global connectivity for continued growth.

It is past due for Mexico City to have enough surplus capacity to be a North America to Central/South America hub.

If Mexico wants to grow its economy, transportation is required.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

How is the construction progressing? Is there any hope of meeting the 2020 opening? I'm a cynic on airport projects opening on time. See: BER

https://airwaysmag.com/airports/mexico- ... s-forward/

AMLO's gov't won't be in power until December. In truth, they aren't saying it won't be canceled, but they've softened their position to acknowledge that they might not cancel it. For now, his press secretary said the following:

…what Jimenez Espriu did confirm, is that should the project continue, it will be ready by 2023 and not 2020, as it was originally promised by the Peña Nieto administration.

But sources say that the airport will be ready by 2025 instead.

Overall, the drastic change in Mexico’s political climate will bring delays and further discussions in the development of what will become Latin America’s largest airport.

LupineChemist wrote:

AMLO recants his threats, airport will continue.

https://airwaysmag.com/airports/mexico- ... s-forward/

Adelante

There are many inaccuracies in that article:

- AMLO is no socialist, he's a run-of-the-mill Latin American demagogue not so different from the presidents Mexico had during the 1970's. His economic philosophy is crony capitalism as he demonstrated during his tenure as Mexico city mayor.

- They are still floating the idea of canceling the airport, and will supposedly take a decision next month on whether to cancel it, keep going as before or privatize it (a very socialist thing to do /s).

- Jimenez Espriu is floating the 2023 date so that their alternative of building different airport at the Santa Lucia AFB appears competitive. But it's a lie as the airport will be ready by 2021 (unless AMLO totally BER-s the airport management).

Jimenez Espriu is going to be AMLO's secretary of transportation, but he has deep conflicts of interest with regards to infrastructure projects as his family's company (IDESA) is involved in the Odebretch corruption scandal and currently has very profitable contracts refinery contracts with the national oil company (Pemex). AMLO and Jimenez Espriu want to re-direct government funds to build refineries that are unlikely to ever be profitable but will greatly enrich IDESA, and even a single refinery is going to cost as much as building the airport. Furthermore, new Mexican refineries are completely unnecessary as the current ones are running at ~40% capacity.

To answer lightsaber's question and demonstrate that the airport will be finished by 2021, two pictures say more than 2,000 words:


The new MEX airport last month.


A comparison of the progress construction at the new IST airport had in 2 years.

Pictures don't lie, construction of the new MEX is closer to completion right now than IST's was 2 years ago. Being that the terminals of both airports are roughly the same size but MEX's runways are going to occupy a larger area 2.5 to 3 years should be plenty of time for the new MEX to start operations.

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

AMLO is no socialist, he's a run-of-the-mill Latin American demagogue not so different from the presidents Mexico had during the 1970's. His economic philosophy is crony capitalism as he demonstrated during his tenure as Mexico city mayor.

I really don't want to believe you, though I fear you are correct.

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

- They are still floating the idea of canceling the airport, and will supposedly take a decision next month on whether to cancel it, keep going as before or privatize it (a very socialist thing to do /s).

KrustyTheKlown wrote:

- Jimenez Espriu is floating the 2023 date so that their alternative of building different airport at the Santa Lucia AFB appears competitive. But it's a lie as the airport will be ready by 2021 (unless AMLO totally BER-s the airport management).

Jimenez Espriu is going to be AMLO's secretary of transportation, but he has deep conflicts of interest with regards to infrastructure projects as his family's company (IDESA) is involved in the Odebretch corruption scandal and currently has very profitable contracts refinery contracts with the national oil company (Pemex). AMLO and Jimenez Espriu want to re-direct government funds to build refineries that are unlikely to ever be profitable but will greatly enrich IDESA, and even a single refinery is going to cost as much as building the airport. Furthermore, new Mexican refineries are completely unnecessary as the current ones are running at ~40% capacity.

And here, I want to believe that you are correct about the timeline.

Thank you for that enlightening info re Espriu.

This is how the terminal looks like at the moment:

caverunner17 wrote:

Mortyman wrote:

When will it open ?

Probably before Berlin...

LoL!

SQwannabe wrote:

caverunner17 wrote:

Mortyman wrote:

When will it open ?

Probably before Berlin...

LoL!

Odd that Berlin new airport suppose to be open years go and still not open. just think of similiar situation which i do not hope it happen to MEX

Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he'll abide by the will of voters who will decide for themselves whether to proceed with the construction of a $13 billion Mexico City airport or cancel it altogether.
The two options will be put up for public consultation the last week of October, Lopez Obrador said Friday.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -uncertain

Mexico City needs a new airport. Or an alternate one that could operate simultaneously. A National Debate has just begun and input from experts in the subject will be very welcome.
A new airport construction is already at 30% work in progress, but chances are construction could be cancelled if there's a less expensive alternative.
The options are: a) to finish the current airport where it is being built and close MEX or b) expand and adequate the Santa Lucia Air Force Airport (NLU), which is about 20 miles from MEX and keep both operating.
Just out of curiosity I would like to know what you aviation experts of the world think, what are your thoughts about it?
Thank you all!

Mexico City needs a new airport period. More than likely, the vote will be to stick it out and finish the much needed new airport. Splitting operations is only going to hurt the city and country since many international flyers who arrive in MEX are transferring to other domestic flights. The current millennial generation knows the need of an expanded airport, so if they turn out at the polls, the airport is in good standing. Mexican aviation is expected to grow immensely in the next decade, and relying on split ops airports is not in its best interest given that a large chunk of foreign-destined outbound MEX flights are flyers outside of the MEX regional area. My two cents are that they should finish it off and prove itself capable of being a large NA - SA and SA - Asia hub. Aeroméxico desperately needs the new airport to sustain its growth and capture market share its been losing to Copa and Avianca.

I came here wondering if the New Mexico City Airport was in Albuquerque.

Tailwinds13 wrote:

Mexico City needs a new airport period. More than likely, the vote will be to stick it out and finish the much needed new airport. Splitting operations is only going to hurt the city and country since many international flyers who arrive in MEX are transferring to other domestic flights. The current millennial generation knows the need of an expanded airport, so if they turn out at the polls, the airport is in good standing. Mexican aviation is expected to grow immensely in the next decade, and relying on split ops airports is not in its best interest given that a large chunk of foreign-destined outbound MEX flights are flyers outside of the MEX regional area. My two cents are that they should finish it off and prove itself capable of being a large NA - SA and SA - Asia hub. Aeroméxico desperately needs the new airport to sustain its growth and capture market share its been losing to Copa and Avianca.

If the new president insists on splitting operations between two airports in Mexico City, it will mainly benefit airlines based at IAH, DFW, LAX, SFO, MIA, ATL, and PTY.

If the new airport is cancelled, write off Mexico's ability for fast economic growth. Split hubs are always less competitive than a single airport.

This is the first I heard of possibly stopping work. Would Mexico really throw away the design work already completed? 30% to done will happen far quicker than anything else.

I'm betting people with a stake in business near the current airport are pushing this.

Lightsaber

Do any of the new airport proposals resolve the hot and high issue associated with the current airport ?

Now environmentalist again adding their voice and pressure to stop the project

Protesters: New Mexico City airport will hurt environment
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/08/23 ... nment.html

Have the two airports operating is a bad idea. MEX is closer to the city center and will attract most business traffic, staying congested because airlines will want to offer frequency. The new airport would be left for LCCs and passengers that are not time-sensitive. MEX needs to close once the new airport opens.

The idea of draining lakes and the using lakebed environment was always a dubious choice especially when the Mexico City region is already so environmentally fragile from ecological and pollution point of view.

Galwayman wrote:

Do any of the new airport proposals resolve the hot and high issue associated with the current airport ?

That's impossible to fix. I have serious doubts about the new MEX being able to be a major hub for Asian destinations. It's much higher and further away from Asia than DEN. which has just one flight to NRT. IAH, SFO, and LAX are all less than 100 feet above sea level.

incitatus wrote:

Have the two airports operating is a bad idea. MEX is closer to the city center and will attract most business traffic, staying congested because airlines will want to offer frequency. The new airport would be left for LCCs and passengers that are not time-sensitive. MEX needs to close once the new airport opens.

Sounds like a Narita solution at best, and a Mirabel solution at worst.

PDPsol wrote:

This project is the most important infrastructure initiative in Mexico, if not the entire Western Hemisphere, its strategic importance cannot be underscored.

Another huge infrastructure initiative in Mexico is the I-15 corridor through the state of Sonora. 4 lanes, with shoulders, of hydraulic concrete. There are bypasses around Guaymas, Obregon and Nogales with another under construction around Hermosillo. I've heard rumors of a bypass around Navojoa as well. That is one continuous modern highway from Sinaloa to the US border, meeting up with I-19 at the border (I-19 is fascinating because from Tucson to the border everything is marked in Kilometers). The military inspection site installed about 1/2 hour north of Hermosillo (state capital) is impressive. Guaymas is the last and northernmost deep sea port in the Sea of Cortez and has received many improvements and railroad expansion. All of this taken together, Mexico is poised to have Guaymas receive lots of goods from the EAST (china, korea, etc..) and transport them NOB (north of the border) to Nogales, where an impressive expansion to the border crossing is now complete. Nogales Arizona, with no waterfront, will become a port of entry that may rival Long Beach. The pieces are coming together.

I was impressed to see that this work continued, unabated, through the elections.... which usually doesn't happen. (e.g. the new Dam project in San Bernardo on the Mayo River has been at a stand still for 6 months, with even the concrete plant being dis-asembled). Of course, the use of this highway is highly dependent on a healthy NAFTA agreement. Nevertheless it's a big deal. I drive it all of the time and it's just getting better and better.


Back to the new Mexico City airport.... Will the Texcoco site be subject to as much fog as the existing airport? Does it have better geography/topology to maintain better visibility? I know it's very close to the existing airport, but the whole area is a collection of distinct micro-climates.... (For instance, I find Mexico City to be cold, even in the summer.) Is this new site better for visibility?

legend500 wrote:

incitatus wrote:

Have the two airports operating is a bad idea. MEX is closer to the city center and will attract most business traffic, staying congested because airlines will want to offer frequency. The new airport would be left for LCCs and passengers that are not time-sensitive. MEX needs to close once the new airport opens.

Sounds like a Narita solution at best, and a Mirabel solution at worst.

Perfect analogy.

Mirabel split connections and killed a hub.

MEX needs a new airport.
A little late to vote...



Lightsaber

Wasn't Toluca (TLC) already supposed to be serving as a reliever airport for Mexico City? There was an LCC buildup about 10 years ago but service didn't stick so I don't see how building up the air force base would really have a different result.

In October are a number of town hall meetings that will take place all over the nation regarding the fate of the new airport plus a popular consultation...details are still lacking. AMLO has always been a fan of building two new runways at the Santa Lucia military base for international departures. While he is the austerity and anti-corruption candidate, he was surrounded himself with some very questionable people. Hopefully, he will continue to dialog with the business community and hear many points of view before making important decisions...like the future of the new airport. I was in Mexico City a few weeks ago, and the nations needs a new better capacity airport. I think they do a great job managing the current facility but with increased national and international demand, a new facility is a must.

There's much noise about the new MEX being built on a old lake bed, but AMLO's alternative is just as bad as Santa Lucia AFB is located on land that was part of the same lake.

The real issue here is that Jose Maria Rioboo wants money to recover what he spent financing AMLO's movement since the early 2000's, so if he has his way all planning and construction already undertaken for the new MEX will be scrapped so he can get very profitable contracts to build an useless airport.

Rioboo actually tried to get contracts for designing the runways and terminal of the new MEX but lost all tenders given that he has no airport experience. Rioboo's Terminal proposal was made with the same team that build a mall that collapsed last month

lightsaber wrote:

legend500 wrote:

incitatus wrote:

Have the two airports operating is a bad idea. MEX is closer to the city center and will attract most business traffic, staying congested because airlines will want to offer frequency. The new airport would be left for LCCs and passengers that are not time-sensitive. MEX needs to close once the new airport opens.

Sounds like a Narita solution at best, and a Mirabel solution at worst.

Perfect analogy.

Mirabel split connections and killed a hub.
...

A better analogy for AMLO's proposal would be Berlin Brandenburg: contracts awarded due to political connections to people lacking the skills to build a modern airport.

ODwyerPW wrote:

...
Back to the new Mexico City airport.... Will the Texcoco site be subject to as much fog as the existing airport? Does it have better geography/topology to maintain better visibility? I know it's very close to the existing airport, but the whole area is a collection of distinct micro-climates.... (For instance, I find Mexico City to be cold, even in the summer.) Is this new site better for visibility?

The issue with the old MEX and fog is that the airport lacks a complete ILS system for approaches from the southwest given that there's no space for building an appropriate approach lighting system.

Visibility at both sites should be around the same, but a complete ILS cat III system will assure that the new airport remains open under most weather conditions.

The new airport should help and boost the country’s economy. Have read a few airlines have hinted flying their own metal once the new airport is built. The current airport is is saturated many airlines find it difficult to acquire slots. EK and TK for example are trying to find a creative way to fly because not only the altitude but getting profitable slot times. CX has already said that once the new airport is built they would love to fly there. QR is another airline that could possibly fly to the new airport. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a few more European airlines fly to the new airport also. Again, Mexico needs this new airport.

The new airport is the right solution, and is the way forward for the upward progress of Mexico.

AMLO is a populist, and his voters seem to have an almost religious reverence for him. I feel that a plebiscite will simply result in his supporters coming out and voting the way he tells them too. He's not even the president yet, so he hasn't had time to screw anything up. Essentially, at this moment, he's probably at the height of his popularity.

As to the environmental arguments against the current site… hasn't the damage already been done? If construction were cancelled, would they pay to remove all the new construction already completed? Would they pay for a complete environmental restoration to the land? If not, then the environmental argument is bunk.

Like it or not, the original tender for the airport was questionable at best. Some of the worlds largest companies were not able to participate nor even find local partners. In other words, the selection of prime contractors and teaming arrangements were likely sweetheart deals behind closed doors.

While killing the entire project might be extreme, there certainly should be a good review of the events that took place with how the project came about and the awarding of contacts.

LAXintl wrote:

Like it or not, the original tender for the airport was questionable at best. Some of the worlds largest companies were not able to participate nor even find local partners. In other words, the selection of prime contractors and teaming arrangements were likely sweetheart deals behind closed doors.

While killing the entire project might be extreme, there certainly should be a good review of the events that took place with how the project came about and the awarding of contacts.

Might be extreme?

Mexico is well-known for its corruption. Currently, it ranks at 135 out of 180 in the corruption index, tied with such nations at the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and Russia. It would be more surprising if there were no corruption issues with the new airport. But, is cancelling the whole project an appropriate reaction? Forget “might be.” Cancellation would absolutely be an extreme reaction; inappropriate to say the least. The only reasonable explanation is that AMLO has his own corrupt motivations.

LAXintl wrote:

Like it or not, the original tender for the airport was questionable at best. Some of the worlds largest companies were not able to participate nor even find local partners. In other words, the selection of prime contractors and teaming arrangements were likely sweetheart deals behind closed doors.

While killing the entire project might be extreme, there certainly should be a good review of the events that took place with how the project came about and the awarding of contacts.

Finding local partners is hard as there's a finite number of local companies to partner with. But the fact is that plenty of American and European companies won tenders for designing and building the airport.

An additional factor for a secretive original tender was to avoid a repeat of the protests that derailed the 2000 MEX airport project before leaving its planning stage.

This is not an extensive list, but some of worlds largest airport engineering companies are building the new MEX airport:

Arup: Original master plan, structural design for the terminal and ATC tower.
Parsons: Planning and management.
Foster and Partners: Architecture.
Netherlands Airport Consultants: soil engineering and runway design.
MITRE: Airspace design and feasibility studies.
Landrum & Brown: new master plan.

On the other hand, Chinese companies have lost every tender they entered.

---------------------------------------------

Anyhow, AMLO does not want to review any irregularities with tenders as he wants the exact same companies building his airport to try to avoid paying termination fees for their existing contracts.