Mexico City Plans Green Updates in Tourist Zone Agencia EFE
go to original September 16, 2014

One of the environmentally friendly boats made of recycled material which Mexico City's government plans to gradually substitute for the usual wooden ones in the tourist zone of the Xochimilco canals. (EFE/GDF)

MEXICO CITY - Mexico City's government plans to provide the tourist zone of the Xochimilco canals with environmentally friendly boats and barges and to gradually substitute the usual wooden ones, which have very high maintenance costs, officials said.

Mauricio Leon, director of infrastructure, modernization and innovation for the Federal District, unveiled the plan on Monday.

After presenting the first prototype of the ecologically sound craft last weekend, the plan is that the owners of the traditional gondola-like non-motorized boats form a cooperative to gradually replace them.

The traditional wooden vessels with their colorful arches, formerly used mostly to transport goods but now dedicated almost exclusively to tourism, constitute "an enormous expense" since they must be renovated every year due to "the deterioration in recent years" of the water in the canals and the fungi it contains that degrade the wood, Leon said.

Created by scientists at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, or UNAM, the so-called "technoecological boat" preserves the typical characteristics that have made it a symbol of Mexico worldwide.

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