“Both projects – the development of Santa Fe and the regeneration of the Historic Centre – have created important economic poles for Mexico City that enhance the city’s productive capacity. They also present similarities in their planning and implementation: they show a convergence between public and private actors in how problems are solved, from the financing of infrastructure to the provision of services and the resolution of conflicts over land uses. They both brought about local and citywide benefits, triggering the real estate market and creating employment. During the construction phase alone, 40,000 jobs were generated in the Historic Centre and the figure for Santa Fe reaches the figure of 50,000 jobs. There is also the multiplier impact that this employment has on other industrial sectors. The new operations and services provided in both sites have also increased employment in the city.”
“Urban centralities are usually understood in terms of the shift from a manufacturing to a service economy, and the increasing integration of the Mexican economy to globalisation processes. What I think also needs to be understood is that the new economic centrality of cities is not merely driven by exporters. Cities are the centre of contemporary knowledge and cultural production, and these economic activities have a completely different way of integrating the spheres of work and private life. Therefore, city nodes need to be integrated into thick and diverse social networks and built urban tissues. With the high concentration of national research institutions in Mexico City, I think, the placing of Mexico in a competitive position in the global economy should be reconnected to the concept of urban centralities and their capacities of knowledge, learning and research should be integrated into the planning process.”
“The separation, exclusion, and other precise 20th century qualities of Santa Fe fall behind the open-endedness, the richness of public spaces, the historical associations, in a word the culture of the Historic Centre. However, there is an important point here: charm is not enough. Buildings do not do anything on their own. There has to be an idea of what that charm is for in this highly competitive 21st century world and that needs to connect to economic survival and development through the generation of powerful world-beating ideas, which could happen here as well as anywhere else. Therefore, the question for the Urban Age and for Mexico City is not just to copy outmoded 20th century models, nor to rely upon the lovely historical fabric of the old city, but to reinvent the idea of what a city is for.”
“The centralities of Mexico City are part of the processes of polarisation and socio-spatial segregation of this metropolis. On one hand, we find the rise of the real estate sector that is highly articulated to transnational corporations, developers and property managers. This segment is tied up to the construction and commercialisation of new urbanisations of an elitist character for the social minorities that are integrated into world markets. Exhibit Number One: Santa Fe. These new urbanisations generate, as I see it, false centralities characterised by their self-segregation and the privatisation of public spaces. On the other hand, excluded majorities who do not have access to the benefits of the global economy – particularly access to secure and well paid employment – resort to the city’s multiple historical centralities– paradigmatically the Historic Centre – to find spaces for their economic, cultural and political exchanges.”
“I am optimistic about the possibility of implementing policies for the Mexico Valley Metropolitan Zone as a whole because I believe we have at our command very valid precedents in the matter. Since the 1993 Human Settlements Law, the federal government has delegated to the Mexican states the responsibility of defining the extent of metropolitan zones. At that point an important process of metropolitan coordination began, particularly in the Mexico Valley where some actions have already been taken (the joint control on air pollution for example) that will allow the future development of programmes with a holistic and long-term vision. We have been building the institutional framework so as to concretely define metropolitan problems, mechanisms and policy instruments: 11 joint metropolitan commissions address issues of environmental contamination, human settlements, civil protection, public security, transport and circulation. I think that the next step for us to take is to advance into more specific executive actions in the process of metropolitan coordination.”
“The State of Mexico and the Federal District are heading towards a new political relationship that favours the development of agreements. This incipient cooperation, I believe, will consolidate. Significant steps will need to be taken towards far reaching reforms that will enable this relationship, that currently depends on the political will of both governments, to be required by law. The government of the State of Mexico has the best will to build a new legal framework that will improve our metropolitan zones, facilitating civic coexistence and a better quality of life for their residents.”
“My view is that the Executive Commission for Metropolitan Coordination is a very promising beginning towards regional governance in Mexico City. This body was created by the State of Mexico and the Federal District to enable them to coordinate and plan joint programmes and projects. It is presided over by the Governor of the State of Mexico and Mayor of the Federal District and works closely with the Federal Government. Given the fact that the metropolitan population is roughly equally divided between the federal district and the state, having the Governor and the Mayor, co-equal partners is a good form of organisation. It is also very important given the power of the national government over state and local matters. Historically and currently to have a mechanism that involves these three parties, implemented by their own governments is the best way to address a range of metropolitan problems. No other city that I know of has such an institution capable of working on metropolitan issues.”
