Yucatán coast ready for a hotel zone, business leader declares

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An 85-kilometer/50-mile coastal hotel zone stretching from Sisal to Telchac Puerto was suggested Monday by the president of the Mexican Association of Hoteliers of Yucatán.

Héctor Navarrete Medina said a hotel zone in Yucatán would satisfy the growing tourism demand.

While the idea is not new, the hotel group will soon have new administrations to persuade at the state and national levels.

While the idea is vague, it suggests clusters of high-rise resorts such as Cancun’s. Much of the land between the two ports is today fishing villages and residential homes, and one cruise ship port and industrial businesses in Progreso.

“It is definitely viable that Yucatan has a hotel zone, because it is proven that tourist visits start at the beach destination, so this concept is relevant for the entity,” said Navarrete Medina, who had earlier complained that hotel occupancy in Mérida was down in July. For that, he blamed the July 1 election, the World Cup and home rentals competing with hotels on digital platforms such as Airbnb.

Environmental impact studies would determine the effect of transforming such a stretch of beachfront into a more commercialized region. Navarrete Medina told reporters that state environmental and government regulators have already carried out analyses to determine the most viable places on the Yucatán coast.

Navarrete Medina, admitting that the project would be ambitious, said a hotel zone would enhance tourism strategies and increase the number of visitors from across the country and the world to the Yucatecan coast.

Hotel growth in the Yucatan has been steady on the other side of the peninsula, in northern Quintana Roo. Almost 34,000 new rooms were built between 2017 and 2019. Hoteliers on the Gulf coast eye those numbers with envy.

Hotel growth has been hot in Mérida, but business travelers are the main objective in the capital city. Navarrete Medina previously reported that 29 hotels are projected, which together total approximately 2,500 new rooms in Mérida.

Source: Sipse

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