Maya Train Losses Widen Sharply in First Half of 2026

Mexico City — The Maya Train’s financial losses have deepened sharply in 2026, with the state-run railway bleeding more money in the first six months of the year than in all of 2025, according to figures cited by El Universal.

The train posted losses of 5.013 billion pesos between January and June, compared with 4.81 billion pesos for all of last year. If the current pace holds, annual losses for 2026 would roughly double those of 2025.

The daily toll from the first half of the year works out to about 27.7 million pesos per day over 181 days.

Since the project’s inauguration through June 2026, the Maya Train has accumulated 14.104 billion pesos in expenses and losses, including 11.878 billion pesos in operating costs. Over that period, it generated just 1.060 billion pesos in revenue from sales and services, meaning income covered only 7.5% of its operating costs.

Taking into account construction cost overruns, expenses and losses totaling 558.1 billion pesos, the cost per passenger carried between Dec. 15, 2023, and July 15, 2026, reaches about 209,365 pesos per passenger, based on 2.665 million passengers.

New Contracts for Consulting and Promotion

Against this backdrop, the Defense Department (Sedena), which operates the Maya Train, awarded a direct contract worth 17.347 million pesos to Mextypsa S.A. de C.V. for a comprehensive diagnosis and a strategic plan covering 2026–2030. It is the third no-bid contract for the company from the Maya Train project; it previously received 59 million pesos for technical advisory services in 2019 and 664 million pesos for a project management office in 2020.

Under the contract, Mextypsa will analyze revenue, costs and expenses for each business line — passengers, cargo and complementary services — “to quantify their real profitability and their marginal contribution to consolidated results,” according to the contract documents cited by El Universal.

The railway is also spending heavily on promotion. In 2026, it allocated 40.408 million pesos for marketing, including 14.546 million pesos paid to Creatividad y Espectáculos S.A. de C.V. for designing and installing promotional stands at national and international fairs. Those exhibits have appeared at the Fitur tourism fair in Madrid in January and the Tianguis Turístico in Acapulco in April.

An additional 25.862 million pesos was budgeted for a marketing campaign called “Tren Maya contigo,” running from Aug. 1 to Dec. 15, 2026, with advertising on radio, television, streaming platforms and social media including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Netflix, Amazon, Disney and Warner.

Experts Question Viability

Leonardo Núñez, director of applied research at the watchdog group Mexicanos contra la Corrupción, said the advertising push is “insufficient and incapable of solving problems in the project” because the railway was poorly planned and executed.

“Many stations were left far from the urban centers they should serve,” he said. “The problems are structural, not cosmetic.”

Núñez added that even if the federal government meets its passenger and cargo targets, the Maya Train will not achieve financial balance. He estimated the railway would need to carry at least 10 times the 1.3 million passengers it transported in 2025 before its finances could turn positive.

Eduardo Bohórquez, director of Transparencia Mexicana, said cargo operations could improve the numbers but would not be enough to offset construction and operating costs. “It is difficult to see it becoming sustainable for at least the next five years,” he said.

Bohórquez also criticized the armed forces’ management of the project. “They are used to buying at high prices in non-competitive markets, such as military supplies. They are better at spending than investing, and that is clear in the works they build. Operating trains and tourist services is neither their vocation nor their strength.”