Beaches for Mexico City?
by Jorge Vargas
Like all of the capital cities in the Western Hemisphere, save perhaps for Canada's, Mexico City has a sharp distinction between its upper classes and its lower classes. We can guess at the figures: 10-20% are rich, wealthy, and powerful, another 20% are middle class, and so many others are poor and 'oppressed.' The poor of Mexico City lack the financial means to take off and go to the beach when the temperatures break 85 and 90 degrees in the Mexican capital – which is a frequent occurrence during the summer months.
So Mexico City's municipal government has decided to bring the beach to the people who can’t get there themselves by building a set of artificial beaches in the city for people to sun-bathe and for the poor children to go and play, building sand castles I presume, and cooling off in the "ocean" waters. The idea sounds great if you present it in the terms of: "Oh, now these people who've never seen a beach and the ocean can see replicas and they can enjoy them!"
But what are the other terms? The Mexican capital is heavily polluted, for a variety of reasons, - the shape of the city, old cars, polluting industries, lax regulation of automobile maintenance, type of oil that these cars consume, poorly planned traffic patterns, corruption, etc. – and these children (because you always need to bring the kids into it) will be building sand castles, surrounded in clouds of smoke and pollution. Furthermore, these 'beaches' will most likely be used to house and store garbage: Who will clean them? Will the city's government honestly commit itself to cleaning these beaches any more than it has cleaned other parts of Mexico City's slums? I have no doubt that Mexico City's cathedrals and plazas are among the most beautiful in the Americas and, most likely, in the world and, to be sure, they're certainly a sight to see but the conditions of Mexico City's slums are most likely not too much different than those of Lima's, or Bogota's, or La Paz's, or even New York's, so we can't start patting ourselves on the back just because no US cities are making this list.
Paris, Amsterdam, and several other major European capitals have built their own 'beaches' and in these countries the same questions arose regarding their economic usefulness. Now, however, the beaches are very popular in most of these cities and they're developing into big tourist attractions as well. Of course, there's a big difference between Paris and Mexico City. The Parisian city officials don't lack the resources to maintain these beaches in pristine conditions. Corruption exists in Paris, it exists everywhere, but it's not anywhere near as prevalent as the corruption to be found in Mexico City, a corruption which will leave any plan for urban planning in a quagmire unless there are other interests at play.
I'm not against giving the poor some form of entertainment and I'm not against giving them the privileges that the rest of us share. But I am against short-sighted propaganda campaigns aimed at winning the 'poor' vote in Third World countries. I am against wasting financial resources and urban space on a project that is, essentially useless and won't yield anything of any real value to Mexico City. I am against the pet projects of men and women who live in the clouds and who dream of a city which doesn't exist, never has, and won't for some time yet, although it's coming.
Perhaps in another thirty years, Mexico City will be able to spend on artificial beaches, but for now the project appears to be a fruitless one. If you want to give the poor the same privileges that we have when we go to the beach, build them a pool and install a large heat light on the ceiling. If you want, you can even throw some sand on the side. Not only will the maintenance be easier and cheaper and the facility be easier to clean, but you won't have to worry about stray animals in your pool and the city's polluted air can be kept out with an air conditioning unit.
If Mexico City's government wants to help its people, they should invest in setting up a better maintenance system for automobiles, they should invest in improving the city's traffic flow, they should invest in finding solutions to the pollution problem, and if they're dead set on taking people to the beach, they should invest in free shuttle busses to transport people from Mexico City's center to the nearest real beach.
Fake beaches will help no one and the Latin governments need to stop feeding their people dreams. We'll only surge forward if we know what the real problems are.
