Global Mexico Under Construction The San

9 Global Mexico under Construction
The Santa Fe Megaproject in Mexico City

María Moreno-Carranco
HOW IT ALL STARTED 1

2
“Where can I build my Manhattan?” was the question posed by Mayor 3
Carlos Hank Gonzalez in discussing the creation of a space in Mexico City 4
that would symbolize global corporate power to the world.1 The idiosyn- 5
cratic nature of the question reflected the Mayor’s desire for such a space, 6
as well as the way in which this pet project was shaped by the influence 7
and power of the city’s elite. As long as Santa Fe, the designated space, was 8
considered the Mayor’s “baby” (from the early eighties to the mid-nineties), 9
most aspects of the process ran smoothly; but when priorities changed, cor- 10
ruption became part of the equation and the original plans for the project 11
were undermined. 12
The initial process of considering various sites for this megaproject 13
led to the selection of the Santa Fe district. Part of the area had been 14
a garbage dump since the 1950s and the rest had been sand mines; a 15
minimum of 2,000 people lived there before redevelopment. The govern- 16
ment’s position with regard to the population of Santa Fe can be seen in 17
this striking quote from a high-ranking government official interviewed: 18
“A bunch of fi lthy people are not going to stop modernity.” In order to 19
build Gonzalez’s ”Manhattan,” a number of actions were taken by dif- 20
ferent administrations and individuals. This analysis shows that compet- 21
ing political visions, plans, and realities mediated the creation of Santa 22
Fe, demonstrating that narratives of power—not only state power but 23
also that of economic elites—heavily conditioned the production of the 24
built environment. 25
Large-scale urban projects undertaken throughout history embody par- 26
ticular discourses of modernity and nationhood. In the case of the Santa 27
Fe project, I analyze how Mexico City’s government followed the usual 28
approach of undertaking urban initiatives in an authoritarian manner by 29
means of top-down urban planning. This was the way urban initiatives were 30
implemented throughout most of the twentieth century. Consequently, as 31
the dissociation between plans and realities came into play, the events that 32
ensued were evident and predictable from the beginning—a recurrent story 33
34
Irazabal 1st pages_rev.indd 187

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188 María Moreno-Carranco
1 both in Mexico City’s urban history and in the current sweep of neoliberal-
2 ism. David Harvey explains:
3
4 The very idea that this [increased social inequality] might be—just
5 might be—the fundamental core of what neoliberalism has been about
6 all along appears unthinkable. It has been part of the genius of neolib-
7 eral theory to provide a benevolent mask full of wonderful sounding
8 words like freedom, liberty, choice, and rights, to hide the grim reali-
9 ties of the restoration or reconstitution of naked class power, locally
10 as well as transnationally, but most particularly in the main fi nancial
11 centers of global capitalism (2005, 119)(Harvey, 2005:119).
12
13 But authoritarianism on the part of the government inevitably requires
14 some negotiation and agreement with sectors of civil society, revealing the
15 degree to which the implementation of transnational urbanism is restricted
16 by local circumstances. This chapter illuminates how this process played
17 out in the case of Santa Fe. For the purpose of this analysis, urban mega-
18 projects are defi ned as large-scale undertakings that profoundly transform
19 the landscape in a short span of time using a combination of public and
20 private investment and requiring the coordinated application of both capi-
21 tal and state power geared toward globalization strategies. This study will
22 attempt to partially bridge a gap in the literature about megaprojects in
23 the Latin American context. The discourse on megaprojects runs parallel
24 to that about globalization and the global city, as the planning and imple-
25 mentation of these projects seems generally to be a top-down process in
26 which powerful political or economic elites have their will without effective
27 contestation from any other social actor (Gellert and Lynch 2003; Marshall
28 2003; Olds 1999; Swyngedouw, Moulaert, and Rodriguez 2002).
29 The main purpose of this work is to challenge this kind of approach
30 by investigating megaprojects from a different viewpoint, one that under-
31 stands them as negotiated sites in which people from diverse sectors of
32 society actively appropriate, contest, influence, and determine the outcome
33 of a given undertaking. This study will analyze personal narratives of
34 power, constructed by elites, as well as constraints presented by particu-
35 lar local circumstances. Literature on global cities (Castells 1991a, 1991b,
36 1996; Friedmann 1986, 1995; Sassen 1991, 1994; Taylor 1997) tends to
37 present a deterritorialized perspective. Therefore there is a need to under-
38 stand global processes from a localized and spatialized perspective. The
39 discourse on megaprojects is at the vanguard of academic research and they
40 are also increasingly the targets of public critique. They are currently the
41 chosen urban strategy, particularly in cities where globalization agendas
42 are in place. Physical, social, political, and economic consequences have
43 frequently resulted from ill-advised decisions in localities where they are
44 placed. In this work, I explore by whom and in what context some of these
45 decisions were made.
46

Global Mexico under Construction 189
SOME CONTEXT 1
2
The development process of the Santa Fe megaproject has been far 3
from smooth given the deeply political significance of large-scale urban 4
interventions. Throughout history, such large-scale interventions have 5
depended upon the exercise of considerable power by a sovereign state, 6
powerful elites, or the combination thereof. A state, by defi nition, is terri- 7
torially concentrated and centralized in urban areas; its resources radiate 8
via elite authority from a central location, commonly a city. Therefore a 9
state not only represents power but is also a place (Mann 2003). Con- 10
ceptualization of the state as a place, particularly as shaped by a central 11
city, emphasizes the importance of cities in the creation of power nar- 12
ratives. According to Lefebvre (2003), state and territory are mutually 13
constituted. Thus, in the production of space, a state, via its major cities, 14
becomes more than an agent—it becomes the “guiding hand of produc- 15
tion” (Lefebvre 2003, 382). Hence all large-scale urban projects, although 16
dissimilar in terms of scale, era, and social, political and economic condi- 17
tions, respond to the specific agendas of state power structures. They are 18
shaped by the particular ways in which the state exercises power and by 19
specific manifestations of modernity. Large-scale urban projects seek not 20
only to embrace modernity but also to better position cities in the supra- 21
national arena. Urban changes, while occurring on a regional scale, have 22
a close relationship to larger global processes. Cities are transformed or 23
created in order to reflect a specific image of a nation in the global con- 24
text. Therefore, aesthetically, these large-scale urban projects have his- 25
torically drawn upon internationally acclaimed architectural trends and 26
urban planning approaches. 27
The question of whether or not to provide Mexico City with a fi rst-class 28
global business park was never the issue; rather, it was defi ning where it 29
would be located and how it would be developed. Therefore the ability of 30
the government to develop the place it had fi rst designated and the strate- 31
gies that were put into play in order to achieve implementation are highly 32
relevant. As the case study will show, Santa Fe’s development became 33
entangled in confl icting political visions, economic crises, and overriding 34
issues of corruption; even today, the struggle continues. Although influen- 35
tial elites have attempted to solve many urgent problems, important issues 36
related to urban infrastructure have not been satisfactorily addressed. 37
The multiple narratives about Santa Fe—the efforts made to resist its 38
development, the process of its construction, and daily experiences in Santa 39
Fe today—vary widely, as told by a range of players with differing agendas. 40
Initially, government and local planners imagined it in particular ways; 41
then, planning and urban design experts articulated their own visions for 42
it; real estate developers and architects contributed further input—but each 43
of these groups conceived of it ultimately as a wasteland that could be con- 44
verted into a First World gem. However, the experiences and perspectives 45
46

1 of the residents, visitors, students, and workers of Santa Fe were quite dif-
2 ferent; for them, the advantages and shortcomings of the megaproject were
3 clearly evident. Those most impacted by the creation of Santa Fe were the
4 displaced pepenadores (garbage pickers) as well as residents of surround-
5 ing areas, including informal and planned settlements and old agricultural
6 towns—both rich and poor neighborhoods. In fact, Santa Fe represents a
7 vast cross section of formal and informal agents and practices.
8 The Santa Fe business park was conceived as an enclosed, pristine space,
9 but the city’s local practices have leached into it and the megaproject, in
10 turn, spreads into the existing surrounding areas. What has emerged is
11 a diverse urban situation in which the richest people live next to the very
12 poorest, all in a very limited and tight space. It is the only area in the city
13 in which people with the highest income per capita are physically adjacent
14 to some of the poorest areas in the city.
15 In order to contextualize the political situation in which the megaproject
16 was conceived, I present a brief history of urban interventions in Mexico
17 City, followed by a discussion of the origins of the project, an overview of
18 the agency in charge of its development, and an interpretation of the gov-
19 ernment’s aspirations to transform the traditional city into a global one. I
20 detail the master plans that aimed to accomplish this ambitious undertak-
21 ing and also describe the actual space that resulted because of its particular
22 local conditions and influences.
23
24
25 ORIGINS: THE EARLY 1980S
26
27 The site chosen for the Santa Fe megaproject was close to eight square
28 kilometers, part of which, since the 1950s, the city had used as a garbage
29 dump. 2 By the 1980s, most of the sand there had been depleted, leaving
30 deep ravines eroded by years of extractive activity. The small fraction of the
31 site that had not been exploited was the road Tacubaya-Cuajimalpa, which
32 traversed Santa Fe. This section had been left untouched because the roads
33 in Mexico are federal property—precluding miners from extracting sand
34 from beneath them.3 The government’s fi nancial strategy was to permit
35 the owners to quarry the banks of the road, which would provide profits
36 to pay for the expropriation of the entire area intended for the megaproj-
37 ect. There are a number of versions of the story concerning the manner in
38 which the government obtained the land for the Santa Fe development. One
39 source, Martínez Almazán (SERVIMET’s general director for the Santa Fe
40 program from 1980 to 1983), claims that the land was obtained through a
41 process of careful negotiation, in which the owners of the depleted mines
42 “with much generosity and with an attitude of communication, reconcilia-
43 tion, and a construction agreement with the authorities of the Federal Dis-
44 trict, were always willing and committed to cede their land to turn the sand
45 mines into what today is known as Santa Fe” (Martínez Almazán, 2005).4
46

Therefore, according to him, it was not necessary to expropriate the land, 1
and acquisition of the site took a mere eight months. There is a contradic- 2
tion here, however, when he describes the program objectives that were not 3
fully accomplished: “Among the main actions pending are . . . land tenure 4
regularization and the relocation of uses and irregular settlements” (Mar- 5
tínez Almazán, 2005). 6
This account minimizes the complicated and long history of the reloca- 7
tion of the pepenadores as well as the lengthy legal processes initiated by 8
the miners to deal with land tenure irregularities, such as when several 9
parties claimed ownership of the same plot of land. Many of these cases 10
remain unresolved. Nonetheless, most accounts claim that the land was 11
not acquired through expropriation. Whatever the tactic used by the gov- 12
ernment—negotiation, expropriation, or both—it was done with almost 13
no fi nancial investment, which explains why the project is now referred 14
to by government officials as “self-fi nancing.” The profitability of the 15
megaproject’s development has been extraordinary. The government orig- 16
inally paid three Mexican pesos for each square meter of land; the same 17
land was sold during the late 1980s and early 1990s for up to US$200 18
per square meter at a time when investment in urban infrastructure was 19
almost nonexistent. Currently, land values in Santa Fe range from $800 20
to $2,000 per square meter. 5 21
Roque González Escamilla, director of SERVIMET from 1977 to 1982, 22
claims authorship of the original idea for the development of Santa Fe. It 23
is true that the fi rst intervention to facilitate development was executed 24
during his term in office under Hank González’s regime; this was the wid- 25
ening of the existing Vasco de Quiroga Avenue, which linked Mexico City 26
and Santa Fe.6 In addition, during Hank González’s tenure, the land for 27
the megaproject was expropriated and the construction of a new highway 28
connecting Mexico City and Toluca was fi nally begun. González Escamilla 29
and Martínez Almazán claim to have produced a master plan, but no docu- 30
ments exist from that time to back up these assertions. Manuel Camacho, 31
Mayor of Mexico City from 1988 to 1993 under President Salinas, also 32
claims to have been the author of the idea to turn Santa Fe into an “edge 33
city.” He says that in 1988, when he took office, there was no defi ned plan 34
for the development of Santa Fe and argues that he produced the fi rst mas- 35
ter plan for the area. 36
An important step in fostering the development of the area was taken 37
by President López Portillo who, in 1981, donated twenty hectares of land 38
for the construction of a new campus for the Ibero-Americana University, 39
where, as it happens, his daughter later studied. In 1982 construction of the 40
new university began; it was completed in 1987 and the campus became the 41
fi rst fi nished project on the Santa Fe site. The government then promoted 42
the university as a catalyst for the further development of the area. From 43
the very beginning, the project was conceived of as a public private partner- 44
ship (PPP). 45
46

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21 Figure 9.1 The Ibero-Americana University and surrounding areas under construc-
22 tion in 1985. Source: SERVIMET, 1985.
23
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25 THE DEVELOPMENT AGENCY (1982–1988)
26
27 Urban development strategies characteristic of neoliberal states attempt to
28 channel urban redevelopment toward particular locations through the cre-
29 ation of new jurisdictions, area-specific institutional reforms, and develop-
30 ment and planning entities designed to accelerate and strengthen economic
31 growth within those zones. These institutions are often but not always
32 autonomous, without local government control. Rather, they are often
33 under the aegis of political and economic elites who are not accountable
34 to any government agency or to the electorate. To accomplish their ends,
35 these autonomous elites require that certain existing regulations concern-
36 ing planning and building norms be suspended in favor of “exceptional”
37 policy tools and infrastructural configurations, which then become nor-
38 malized (Brenner 2004, 216).
39 The Santa Fe megaproject is an urban development project that exempli-
40 fies the characteristics described above. Santa Fe is one of the few areas in
41 the city where development started with a master plan. It can be considered
42 a real estate development project orchestrated by a government agency and
43 operated as a private entity. This agency was controlled by political elites
44 and was under no pressure for transparency or accountability. The agency
45 in charge of this development was SERVIMET (Servicios Metropolitanos,
46

S.A. de C.V. 1997), which was founded in 1977 to control and expedite 1
the government’s real estate and urban development projects. SERVIMET 2
had the distinction of being a fi nancially self-sufficient institution. Thus, 3
it worked like a private organization, not a public one, and was, in fact, 4
referred to as a company. Between 1978 and 1982, this company estab- 5
lished several other PPP programs for the purpose of managing not only 6
parking lots and various urban centers but also Santa Fe. 7
In the years from 1982 to 1988, when Ramón Aguirre was Mayor of 8
the city, Mexico had severe economic problems, including a foreign debt of 9
around $100 billion (the second highest worldwide after Brazil). In 1985, an 10
earthquake of 8.1 magnitude sent shock waves through Mexico City’s met- 11
ropolitan area. Several neighborhoods collapsed completely, killing at least 12
20,000 people and leaving more than 100,000 homeless. Mexico’s failure 13
to live up to the International Monetary Fund’s preconditions for financial 14
austerity and economic reform had already led international lending agencies 15
to prepare to suspend financial aid. Mexico’s oil industry had been depressed 16
since 1982, so income from oil could not help—most of the industry’s rev- 17
enues were used to finance annual interest on $10 billion in foreign loans. 18
The economic crisis drastically slowed down the development of all 19
urban projects, which, along with the tremendous impact of the 1985 20
earthquakes, explains why the construction of Santa Fe came to a virtual 21
standstill during these years. However, two important steps for the later 22
development of the area were taken by the local government: the closing of 23
the garbage dump and the building of the freeway that connected two of the 24
city’s avenues, Constituyentes and Reforma, with the freeway to Toluca. 25
26
27
THE DISPLACED PEPENADORES (1985–1998) 28
29
At this time the process of displacing the pepenadores had begun. Owing to 30
the complex intertwining of power relations, clientelist practices7, informal 31
activities, urban caciquism 8 , and political interests, this displacement was a 32
complex process that lasted approximately fifteen years. During these years, 33
the pepenadores were relocated twice, first within the megaproject in a plot 34
called Tlayapaca, next to the newly created landfill Prados de la Montaña. 35
The opening of Prados de la Montaña meant that the Santa Fe dump could 36
be closed but the pepenadores could continue their work within the mega- 37
project in this new area. From 1987 until 1994, while the garbage dump of 38
Prados de la Montaña was operating, the pepenadores lived in Tlayapaca. 39
In 1994, when the government announced the closing of the landfill, they 40
also aimed to dismantle Tlayapaca, which they could do because the pep- 41
enadores did not have title to the land. Despite strong opposition to the dis- 42
placement, the approximately 900 families of pepenadores were mandated 43
to relocate to the city’s periphery. Concurrently, their leaders were granted 44
concessions in the separation plants at Bordo Poniente, San Juan de Aragón, 45
46

1 and Santa Catarina so that some of pepenadores could be hired at these
2 sites, as Prados de la Montaña was to be shut down. The pepenadores were
3 offered monetary compensation and the possibility of relocation; 220 fami-
4 lies would be relocated to Tlahuac and the remaining 668 families would
5 be relocated to Iztapalapa. However, 107 families decided not to be moved.
6 These people, who were no longer pepenadores and worked nearby, were
7 no longer unconditionally aligned with their leaders and resisted eviction. In
8 1998, after a series of intended evictions, sometimes violent and sometimes
9 achieved through negotiation, the process was finalized; however, protests
10 in the area continued up until 2004.
11 Since the pepenadores are caught up in the web of power relations, clien-
12 telist practices, informal activities, urban caciquism, and political interests,
13 they have little opportunity to achieve real improvement in their living con-
14 ditions and remain key pawns for powerful interest groups. This explains
15 why their contestation, in the matter of Santa Fe’s transformation, had such
16 long-lasting effects and great economic costs. As Roy (2004) has argued
17 in relation to Calcutta, although urban remaking seems to be a way to
18 eliminate the informal sector, in reality a complex undercover process of
19 resettlement and rehabilitation is instituted. Given the uncertainty of the
20 resettlement, power structures secure the loyalty of the urban poor regard-
21 less of the evictions. Thus, Roy concludes, urban populism exists under
22 cover as a result of urban developmentalism.
23
24
25 MEXICO’S FICTITIOUS ENTRY INTO
26 THE FIRST WORLD (1988–1994)
27
28 By 1987 SERVIMET had started the promotion of the Santa Fe site through
29 the Master Plan of Land Use and Regeneration of Santa Fe, which, in 1988,
30 laid the groundwork of the sale of 180,000 square meters of land to the
31 Televisa Corporation.9 This was the fi rst major transaction with a private
32 company in the area. In the same year, Carlos Salinas de Gortari took over
33 as president of Mexico and appointed Manuel Camacho Solís to be Mayor
34 of Mexico City.
35 The presidential promise made by Salinas de Gortari was that he would
36 transform Mexico into a First-World nation. At the beginning of his admin-
37 istration, Salinas launched an economic project that managed to lower
38 inflation rates from 160 to 30 percent annually. He decided to further liber-
39 alize the country’s economy by negotiating the North American Free Trade
40 Agreement (NAFTA). The only previous international free trade agreement
41 that Mexico had signed was the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
42 (GATT) in 1986. However, GATT did not provide for Mexico’s full inte-
43 gration into the global economy, as NAFTA did.
44 Mexico City needed a transformation that would reflect a move toward
45 highly sought after First-World status. Liberal reforms in government
46

triggered real estate investment, which, in turn, created favorable conditions 1
for the continued development of Santa Fe. The project as envisioned was 2
to follow the global trend set by urban megaprojects such as La Defence in 3
Paris and Docklands in London.10 Santa Fe was regarded as Mexico City’s 4
equivalent. The desire to better position Mexico City on a global scale 5
heavily conditioned local place making. 6
Mexico has a long-established tradition of using megaprojects to attract 7
global capital and recognition. During Porfirio Díaz’s government (1876– 8
1910), for example, the Belle Époque movement transformed many Mexi- 9
can cities by creating new urban spaces, which adopted French and Italian 10
trends in architectural motifs, boulevards, parks, opera houses, and arcades 11
(Tenenbaum 1994). Large-scale projects started by Mayor Manuel Camacho 12
demonstrated his capacity to better position Mexico City in the international 13
arena, thus contributing to the platform he was building for his presidential 14
aspirations. During his tenure, the face of the city was profoundly trans- 15
formed; in some areas, the groundwork was laid for its present urban char- 16
acter. Although Santa Fe was Camacho’s core project, he launched four 17
other urban megaprojects in the late 1980s, all of which aimed to propel 18
Mexico into the global economy. These megaprojects were Centro Histórico, 19
intended at restoring the downtown area; the Alameda project which was 20
aimed to create a touristic and commercial development, restoring one of the 21
areas most heavily damaged during the 1985 earthquakes; The Polanco proj- 22
ect, intended to turn the avenue Presidente Mazaryk into the local “Rodeo 23
Drive”; the regeneration of Lake Xochimilco, which was accompanied by an 24
ambitious plan to turn the area into an important entertainment center; and 25
Santa Fe. Later, the Alameda project, which included Paseo de la Reforma 26
Avenue, was renamed Corredor Reforma. After more than twenty years, 27
these projects continue to be considered significant contributions to Mexico 28
City’s entry into the global arena. 29
By 1989, the fi rst documented master plan for Santa Fe had been devel- 30
oped and the area was declared a Controlled Development Special Zone 31
(Zona Especial de Desarrollo Controlado, or ZEDEC). SERVIMET, as 32
the developer of the area, was in charge of providing Santa Fe with the 33
necessary urban services and infrastructure. In the five years following, 34
SERVIMET commercialized 1.5 million square meters, with national and 35
international investors generating a profit of 280 million pesos, approxi- 36
mately US$85 million (based on an exchange rate averaging 3.3 pesos to 37
the dollar). SERVIMET’s promotional material emphasized that for each 38
square meter sold, thirty-three square meters would be developed and ser- 39
viced, resulting in a high-quality urban environment. SERVIMET also 40
obtained important savings for various local government agencies when 41
it contracted out to build 720,000 square meters of infrastructure. When 42
the plans started to materialize, however, unexpected factors modified the 43
original intent. As Holston (1999) argues, master plans, by imposing their 44
own order, assume a rational domination of the future that would result 45
46

1 in the dissolution of any confl ict between the imagined and the existing
2 society. This assumption fails to consider conflict, ambiguity, and indeter-
3 minacy as constituent elements of social and urban life.
4
5
6 SKETCHES VERSUS REALITIES
7
8 During Camacho’s administration, Juan Enríquez-Cabot, the director of
9 SERVIMET, was charged with overseeing the development of Santa Fe.
10 He was to be the development agent; his background in real estate devel-
11 opment influenced his vision for the area. At the time Enríquez-Cabot
12 was working in SERVIMET, the agency grew by 4,000 percent (because
13 of money generated by the sale of Santa Fe plots), becoming the city’s
14 largest revenue source after taxes. Enríquez-Cabot managed to realize the
15 dream of Camacho and Hank González. Although the Santa Fe project
16 was initiated according to Hank González’s concept, its development up
17 to the time of Camacho was not a government priority, so that progress
18 was sluggish. Political justifications were made for reasserting the mega-
19 project’s priority, including the environmental recovery of the area and
20 the necessity of generating areas to alleviate intense real estate pressures
21 in the city. According to Luis Sánchez Gómez, Enríquez-Cabot’s right-
22 hand man, real estate investment needed to coalesce around a particular
23 place or the money would be diverted somewhere else. Thus, Enríquez-
24 Cabot undertook the revitalization of the endeavor and opted to expand
25 the project area from 800 to 946 hectares; he also furthered the develop-
26 ment of a single master plan. Although Enríquez-Cabot’s plan was very
27 schematic and lacked in detail, its general organizational principles still
28 guide the project today.
29 The well-known architects Ricardo Legorreta and Teodoro González
30 de León, along with González de León’s then-partner Abraham Zablu-
31 dovsky, were commissioned to develop the master plan. It is relevant to
32 note that while they were not experts in urban planning, they were the
33 most highly regarded architects of the time in Mexico. They had been
34 commissioned to design several major public works projects, including
35 many city landmarks—such as the Children’s Museum, the remodeled
36 National Zoo, and the National Auditorium—built or remodeled during
37 Salinas’s presidential term with the significant involvement of SERVI-
38 MET and resources generated by the sale of land in Santa Fe.11 Since the
39 idea behind Santa Fe was to create an American-style suburban develop-
40 ment, the architects went to Century City, California, seeking a clearer
41 vision of the kind of urban model they were being asked to develop.
42 Century City is a 250-hectare commercial and residential district on the
43 west side of Los Angeles and one of the original edge cities developed in
44 the United States during the 1960s. Welton Becket Associates had been
45 commissioned to develop Century City’s master plan by 20th Century
46 Fox in 1957.

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Figure 9.2 Early master plan showing the first areas developed, Peña Blanca and 22
Centro de Ciudad. Source: SERVIMET, early 1980s. 23
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While SERVIMET’s sales brochure described the master plan in some detail 26
and highlighted a rigid zoning policy oriented to optimal land usage, in real- 27
ity the architects delivered a highly schematic plan that was neither totally 28
detailed nor finished. The master plan has been severely criticized since it did 29
not adhere to Mexican customs regarding the utilization of urban space and 30
failed take into account integration with the preexisting urban fabric. From 31
the first drawings, the megaproject area was strictly demarcated; an attempt 32
was made to create a distinct urban environment totally separated from the 33
rest of the city. Zoning for the area was very specific, with little mixed use, 34
which resulted in an automobile-dependent urban plan. In fact, Santa Fe’s 35
concept is that of an urban enclave. Long wide avenues run longitudinally, 36
characteristic of an urban grid; the Mexico-Toluca Freeway—which almost 37
divides the project in two—crosses over the megaproject at a higher level; 38
with no access to or from the area it is impossible to access the megaproject 39
from transverse streets. All the other longitudinal streets are dead ends or cul- 40
de-sacs. Transverse streets are few, and many of them are private, resulting in 41
a disarticulated urban grid that promotes gated communities with dedicated 42
streets. As a result, the only people who use Santa Fe’s streets are the people 43
who actually have to go there, not those passing through. The streets are 44
clearly intended for internal traffic, making it difficult to travel across the 45
megaproject, which further reinforces the idea of an urban enclave. 46

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22 Figure 9.3 Street grid for the residential area of La Loma. Source: Carpeta básica
23 de información Santa Fe by SERVIMET, early 1980s
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41 Figure 9.4 First master plan for Santa Fe. It is possible to see the megaproject
42 as “floating” in the middle of the green areas and splintered horizontally by the
43 Mexico-Toluca Freeway. It is also possible to appreciate how most of the vertical
streets are dead ends or cul-de-sacs. The regular and irregular settlements sur-
44
rounding the megaproject were considered irrelevant to the goals of the project
45
and were therefore erased. Source: Carpeta básica de información Santa Fe by
46 SERVIMET, early 1980s.

There is ample evidence that no consideration was given to the surround- 1
ing areas in the design of the master plan. There was, in fact, a deliberate 2
attempt to isolate the area from its context. Santa Fe is integrated neither 3
with the residential neighborhood of Bosques de Las Lomas nor with the 4
poorer formal or informal settlements that surround it. Further, it is sur- 5
prising that project architect Abraham Zabludovsky describes Santa Fe’s 6
land zoning as responding directly to the immediate urban context. In ref- 7
erence to Santa Fe‘s residential area, La Loma, he says “in the west area of 8
La Loma, where the urban image is least pleasant, single family housing 9
complexes, in clusters, are suggested with the aim of creating interior views 10
and spaces. In the southern area, single-family housing is proposed within 11
a less unpleasant context” (Servicios Metropolitanos, 1997, 98).12 12
It may be reasoned from this that “direct response to the immediate urban 13
context” actually refers to working against context instead of the project’s 14
incorporation into existing surroundings. Zabludovsky further argues that 15
16
It is required to continue with the marketing plan and the stimulus in 17
order for future projects to consolidate the urban configuration, creat- 18
ing spaces for transition and pedestrian encounter, those spaces associ- 19
ated with the plazas, esplanades, avenues, and streets of any city that 20
are the essence of the urban place where people live and coexist in. 21
(Servicios Metropolitanos 1997, 98). 22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
Figure 9.5 The streets are rarely used by pedestrians, as there is nowhere to
45
walk to; in some areas the sidewalks are narrow and not designed for easy pedes-
trian access and use. Source: María Moreno-Carranco, 2008. 46

1 The hoped-for mixed-use urban environment, suitable for pedestrian
2 interaction, never materialized. Today Santa Fe’s streets are devoid of the
3 vibrancy fi rst envisioned in some of the early models, which had included
4 plazas, in keeping with the original desire for pedestrian access and human
5 interaction. The model for the fi rst shopping center featured a big plaza with
6 a fountain and palm trees, seemingly placed there to invite pedestrians into
7 the mall. The actual shopping mall is instead surrounded by parking lots,
8 permitting no pedestrian access at all. It appears that the original vision of
9 easy access for pedestrians gave way to a desire to maximize the number
10 of parking spaces. Given the likelihood that the shopping mall would be
11 patronized exclusively by those who owned vehicles, it was decided that
12 it was unnecessary to provide access for those who could come only via
13 public transportation.
14 Reading the master plan, it appears that the megaproject was to be a
15 comprehensive development. Space and land were distributed as follows:
16 25 percent of the area was to be used for residential space; 12 percent for
17 corporate offices, services, and tourism services; 3.5 percent for a shopping
18 mall; 3.3 percent for administration, health, education, and culture; 2.6
19 percent for urban services; 1.5 percent for urban infrastructure; 1.5 percent
20 for an urban subcenter created to provide basic urban services; and 0.77
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
Figure 9.6 Original plan for the Santa Fe shopping mall, showing a plaza for
45 pedestrian access. Source: SERVIMET Santa Fe Carpeta Básica de Información,
46 early 1980s.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
Figure 9.7 Original plan for the Santa Fe shopping mall, showing a gardened plaza
20
and a large open area next to the mall. Source: SERVIMET Santa Fe Carpeta Básica
21
de Información, early 1980s.
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
Figure 9.8 The completed Santa Fe shopping mall, lacking pedestrian access, all
the space designed for the plaza was converted into parking area. Source: SERVI- 45
MET, 1997. 46

1 percent set aside for sports and recreation (Gaceta Oficial del Distrito Fed-
2 eral, September 12, 2000). According to this zoning plan, the largest area
3 is dedicated to residential projects, most of which are single-family units
4 with low density, comprising twenty to fi fty housing units per hectare.13
5 Areas designated for corporate offices have different densities and provide
6 almost 14 percent of the total corporate space available in Mexico City.
7 Both office and residential areas are isolated from basic service areas.
8 Further analysis of the zoning plans shows open-space plans with the
9 following percentages: protected ecological areas 23.42 percent, green
10 areas 10.85 percent; and circulation roads 14.89 percent (Gaceta Ofi-
11 cial del Distrito Federal, September 12, 2000). These percentages give
12 the impression that the development has ample open space. However, the
13 largest green areas are two inaccessible ravines, a private golf course, and
14 the former landfi ll and garbage dump, both closed to the public. The lack
15 of real public space is dismaying. The only actual park is a small aban-
16 doned lot, which is in danger from a neighborhood association’s efforts
17 to turn it into a parking lot, because, they say, of a lack of public parking
18 in the area.
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42 Figure 9.9 The only park in Santa Fe, located in the Centro de Ciudad area, the
43 portion of the project with mixed-land zoning. The park was rarely utilized. In 2012
44 work began to turn it into a parking garage with a shopping area. Source: María
45 Moreno-Carranco, 2008.
46

Table 9.1 Santa Fe: Timetables Showing the Relationship between Mexico's Economic Situation, People in Power, and Actions related to Santa Fe
Presidential SERVIMET 1

Terms President Local Government Director Economy Actions
1976–1982 José López Carlos Hank Roque González Between 1978 and 1981 the Land expropriation. Donation of land to
Portillo (PRI) González (PRI) Escamilla GDP grew 7% UIA and laying of foundation stone by the
President
1982–1988 Miguel de la Ramón Aguirre V. Manuel Arce Between 1982 and 1988 the Closing of garbage dump, relocation of
Madrid (PRI) GDP grew 0.13% garbage pickers, construction of freeway
(PRI) from Mexico City to Toluca.
1988–1994 Carlos Salinas Manuel Juan Enríquez Between 1988 and 1994 the Urban Planning/ Zedec proposed land
(PRI) Camacho & Cabot GDP grew 3% use, densities, development parameters.
Manuel Promotion and marketing of site.
Aguilera (PRI)
1994–2000 Ernesto Oscar Espinosa Ignacio Gómez 1995: severe economic crisis Stagnation
Zedillo Villareal (PRI) Roch causes GDP to drop to –6%,
(PRI) similar to 1970–1976 level.
Average growth 1996–2000
over 5%
1997 First Local Elections
Cuauhtemoc Alfonso Vaca Real Estate boom
T&F Proofs: Not For Distribution

Cárdenas (PRD)
& Rosario Robles
(PRD)
2000–2006 Vicente Fox Andrés Manuel López Carlos Heredia, Between 2000 and 2006 the Real Estate Boom continues. Investment in
(PAN) Obrador (PRD) & Tomás Freiman, GDP grew an average of over additional vial infrastructure for the area
Alejandro Encinas Uriel Tufiño 2% (PPP)
(PRD) The “Puentes de los Poetas” linking Santa
Global Mexico under Construction
Fe to the southern part of the city are

built.
203
(continued)
8/2/2013 12:19:18 PM
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
17
14
18
16
11
41
31
10
45
43
21
39
37
27
33
42
35
32
13
15
19
38
24
36
28
12
30
29
26
20
23
46
34
40
25
22
44
17
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
14
18
16
11
41
31
10
21
45
43
39
37
27
33
42
35
32
13
15
19
38
24
36
28
12
20
30
29
26
23
46
34
25
40
22
44
204
Table 9.1 (continued)

Presidential SERVIMET 1
Terms President Local Government Director Economy Actions
2006–2012 Felipe Marcelo Ebrard Javier Gutierrez, In 2008 a global The real estate sector is hit by the economic
Calderon Casaubón(PRD) Muro Pliego economic crisis begins and crisis.
(PAN) the average growth drops Construction rates slowed down in 2008
(In 2012 from 4.8% in 2007 to 1.3 in and 2009.From 2010 to 2012, over 7,500
the PRI 2009, going up again in 2010 housing units were built in the area.
returns to to 5.4%, and maintaining a Office space rent prices per square meter
María Moreno-Carranco
power with grouth rate of 3.9% in 2011 have virtually no increment since 2000,
President and 2012 ranging between US$22 and $24. Housing
Enrique Peña prices range between US$1900 to $3300
Nieto being per squere meter, remaining with virtually
elected). no increment.
The “Supervía Poniente” continuing the
freeway initiated with the “Puentes de los
Poetas” linking Santa Fe with the south-
ern part of the city opens in 2012.
T&F Proofs: Not For Distribution

1. In the years of Enríquez Cabot (1990-91) SERVIMET had approximately 800 employees and in 2009 the number was down to 15 employees.
PRI = Partido Revolucionario Institucional (The party in power for almost 70 years. It shifted political positions frequently depending on the president’s will
but ideologically claimed to be politically centrist. PRI leaders De la Madrid, Salinas, and Zedillo were advocates of economic neoliberalism.)
PRD = Partido de la Revolución Democrática, the left-wing party.
PAN = Partido Acción Nacional, the right-wing party.
Source: María Moreno Carranco, 2012.
8/2/2013 12:19:19 PM
By looking at Table 9.1, we can clearly see how the development of Santa Fe 1
runs parallel to the country’s economy. Concurrent with the economic 2
crisis, the project came to a virtual standstill. 3
4
5
TRANSNATIONAL COMMERCIALIZATION OF THE SITE 6
7
In his work on urban megaprojects in the Pacific Rim, Kris Olds (2001, 8
6) identifies six central characteristics that are common to these devel- 9
opments: megaprojects are developed with revolving capital sources; 10
they are modeled upon each other; they are developed and planned by 11
architects, fi nanciers, engineers, and planners with experience mostly in 12
designing and building urban megaprojects; their agents have both explicit 13
and implicit globalization strategies in mind; they are marketed to over- 14
seas fi rms and to the rich for lease or purchase; and they are designed to 15
symbolize a global urban utopia for the twenty-fi rst century. In Mexico, 16
the presence of an urban megaproject suggested a shift to a high level of 17
modernity; the Santa Fe urban megaproject was attempting to follow the 18
trend of megaprojects elsewhere. 19
In 1989, with the fi rst master plan fi nished, SERVIMET began commer- 20
cializing the land; thereafter, attracting investment to the area became the 21
imperative. Hence models of the site were constructed to encourage devel- 22
opers to invest in Santa Fe. Government officials embarked upon a mission 23
to contract with transnational corporations such as Hewlett Packard and 24
General Electric and to cultivate relationships with important international 25
real estate developers. 26
The government successfully persuaded several investors to come on 27
board, and construction of the fi rst office buildings in the zone, known as 28
Peña Blanca, began. José Rión, a pioneering investor in the area, recalls 29
that when he initiated construction of his building, designed by Ricardo 30
Legorreta, there was no infrastructure available, not even streets. In fact, 31
several architectural features had to be modified in order to structurally 32
situate the building at the ultimate street level. The construction of Rión’s 33
office building began despite a lack of building permits and licenses; work 34
proceeded under the aegis of the authorities because Camacho, Mayor at 35
the time, wanted to expedite development of the zone. In fact, it was not 36
until the day before the dedication of the building, in 1993 by President 37
Salinas, that the building permit and a certificate attesting to the comple- 38
tion of the construction were issued.14 Owing to the lack of infrastructure 39
and public services during the fi rst year, the building relied on a generator 40
to supply electricity; mobile telephones were used in place of landlines and 41
tanker trucks supplied water. Rión remembered, “We operated as if liv- 42
ing in the middle of the desert.” He recalled the early years of the project, 43
when he and Juan Enríquez, director of SERVIMET from 1988 to 1993, 44
controlled everything—including to whom they would sell plots. 45
46

1 In 1992, the economic boom generated by neoliberal reforms imple-
2 mented by President Salinas, initiated a state of high enthusiasm and
3 optimism—a time when the presidential promise of turning Mexico into a
4 First-World country seemed to be coming true; Mexican businessmen were
5 eager to invest in the city. Nearly a quarter of the projects in Santa Fe today
6 were initiated during this time, when there was much promise surround-
7 ing the undertaking. Taking advantage of this propitious environment, the
8 Mexican government also encouraged international developers to visit the
9 city, offering them the opportunity to invest in Santa Fe. Foreign fi rms’ lack
10 of local expertise was deemed irrelevant by government officials because
11 they believed that those foreign fi rms would be able to offer solutions for
12 whatever problems arose, as if all modern cities were the same.
13
14
15 HINDERED INITIATIVES
16
17 In 1993, Camacho resigned his position as Mayor in order to express to
18 President Salinas his discontent with not being appointed presidential can-
19 didate by the PRI party in the 1994 elections. Since the creation of Santa Fe
20 was Camacho’s project for the city, the ambitious plans for its development
21 were hindered by this political development. And for succeeding adminis-
22 trations the project was too strongly identified with Camacho to be deemed
23 a relevant urban intervention. Today, Camacho’s contribution to the Santa
24 Fe project has been largely forgotten. However, the early developers of
25 the area acknowledge that during his administration as Mayor, things ran
26 smoothly and promises and commitments were kept. Camacho intended
27 to capture a significant amount of private investment for the city, which, if
28 not attracted to Santa Fe, would not be otherwise channeled to Mexico. He
29 also aimed to create short-term employment in order to expand the city’s
30 economy. He claims that the Santa Fe project presented the chance to chan-
31 nel resources to the poorest areas of the city; in fact, though, the money was
32 used to fund Salinas’s landmark projects.
33 When Camacho left office, Manuel Aguilera Gómez took his place for
34 the remaining year of Salinas’ administration. According to various devel-
35 opers, while investment in Santa Fe continued—with more than twenty
36 office buildings built during that time—the government ceased allocating
37 resources to needed infrastructure and what was already in existence began
38 to deteriorate. When new infrastructure was built, it was of low quality, and
39 several aspects of the project were not completed. The dreams and desires
40 for a global city started to collide with local realities. The master plan,
41 models, sketches, and descriptions of the megaproject were disconnected
42 from the reality of what actually happened on the ground, illustrating that
43 inserting a foreign urban model was not enough to produce a First-World
44 enclave in Mexico City. Even if the master plan imitated an America edge
45 city at the time of its initial implementation, local conditions transformed
46

the intended outcome. Local politics and deeply embedded corruption in 1
the government influenced the eventual shape of the built environment. 2
According to interviews with early investors and a former government 3
official, the money raised by the Santa Fe project served as President Sali- 4
nas’s petty cash, used for the execution of his pet projects, instead of being 5
reinvested in Santa Fe’s infrastructure or in poor urban areas, as was ini- 6
tially stated as a political justification of the project. The difference between 7
the government’s promises and its capacities were not evident until Santa 8
Fe ceased to be the mayor’s priority and deep levels of corruption were 9
revealed. One of the fi rst investors in the area named corrupt government 10
officials as the main beneficiaries of the funds. Apparently some politicians 11
kept the money while others diverted resources to political campaigns or 12
some other projects they found interesting. According to the manager of the 13
neighborhood association, René Muñoz: 14
15
Santa Fe was a super business for SERVIMET. For a long time, SER- 16
VIMET was considered one of the most profitable companies in the 17
world, since the government made expropriations in Mexican pesos 18
and handed the land to SERVIMET to be sold in dollars. . . . SERVI- 19
MET was such a good business that it was the only government com- 20
pany in which its employees received profit distribution from the sale of 21
the lands. They sold a government plot and at the end of the day, profit 22
distribution was available for all. They expropriated the land from gar- 23
bage pickers or people who had no way to defend themselves . . . what 24
is awesome and absolutely illegal is that a public servant received profit 25
distribution from the sale of a public asset. 26
27
The fact is that to date, despite the large amount of money generated from 28
sales and the property taxes collected from tenants, Santa Fe’s urban ser- 29
vices and the access roads connecting the area with the rest of the city are 30
in an extremely precarious state.15 31
The Chrysler building, a twenty-story building with approximately 32
10,000 square-meters of space, was a $30 million investment. It was com- 33
pleted in 1998 but not hooked up to the city water system until 2005. Before 34
then, twelve water tankers supplied the 120,000 liters of water per day 35
needed to sustain the businesses in the building (according to the tanker 36
drivers). In a statement that circumscribes his own responsibility, Muñoz 37
describes the water problems this way: 38
39
1,200 houses are discharging unsanitary drainage in the open air. It 40
runs down the sides of the houses of our neighbors down the hill. Obvi- 41
ously, even though they [the neighbors] try to have a favorable opin- 42
ion of us, it is not easy. . . . We have showed them the payments we 43
have made for the water treatment plant. If I add up all the payments, 44
we have paid the equivalent to three water treatment plants. We have 45
46

1 shown them the plant we have and told them that we cannot make it
2 function since the water company is very territorial and they do not let
3 us operate it. . . . Everything is there, if the government doesn’t put it to
4 work I can’t do anything about it, I can’t oblige them to work.
5
6 Water connection is not the only problem. According to Héctor Reyes,
7 director of the water company in Mexico City at the time Santa Fe was
8 planned in 1990, the estimated amount of water required for the area was
9 agreed on at 550 cubic meters (550 m3) per second. According to the Santa
10 Fe Neighborhood Association (Asociación de Colonos Santa Fe, A.C.,
11 SFNA), the water they receive measures only 150 cubic meters (150 m3) per
12 second (Reforma 2004).
13 Muñoz narrates the following anecdote referring to the case of an Office
14 Depot store that was going to commence operations one week after this
15 interview took place:
16
17 He [the person representing Office Depot] came to ask me ‘Where
18 should I hook up my drainage?’ and I had to answer, “Well if you don’t
19 build a 5 km pipeline, I have no clue where you can hook it up! If you
20 go to SERVIMET they will tell you there is no drainage line. But that
21 is not all; you will fi nd a problem with all services.” We are lacking 50
22 million dollars in order for the electric power to be properly installed.
23 We lack an electric substation. . . . We are missing a water treatment
24 plant; we discharge in the open air. Regarding potable water, the net-
25 work is wrong since we have water shortages. We have a very accurate
26 estimate, in one week of lack of water, only for La Loma, there are
27 $70,000 dollars needed to pay for water truck tanks. Security, for all
28 Santa Fe—900 hectares—we have only four police cars. We do not
29 have garbage collection. We don’t have street cleaning or gardening. . . .
30 We have to self-supply these services. . . . We had to repave the streets,
31 fi x potholes, paint and restore 90 percent of street lightning, the rest
32 [10 percent] we didn’t fi x because they had no light bulb or cable.
33
34 Another significant problem in the area is the lack of proper access routes.
35 The main avenues of access to the site do not have enough capacity, resulting
36 in serious traffic congestion. Until 2004, there was only one main entrance
37 into the area. Even now, anyone coming from any point in the metropolitan
38 area must take one of two roads to access Santa Fe, either Reforma or Consti-
39 tuyentes. Traffic jams make it difficult to get in or out of the megaproject for
40 periods of several hours a day. One of the residents of the area commented,
41 “Santa Fe is the only neighborhood in the city that has six different rush hours
42 a day. Before, it was impossible to come here in the mornings and go out in the
43 afternoons. But now, it is congested at all times in both directions.”
44 These are only some examples of the deficiencies and disconnec-
45 tions between what the government attempted to achieve and the actual
46

realities of the resulting place. Even with all these setbacks, by 2006, the 1
plots of the megaproject were almost fully sold out. By 2008, an estimate 2
of 800,000 square meters of office space existed; by 2011, almost an 3
additional 400,000 square meters were available.16 By 2012, Santa Fe was 4
the home of national and transnational companies, 4 shopping malls, 12 5
hotels, 230 restaurants, 40 movie theaters, private schools and universi- 6
ties, hospitals, high-end gated communities, and apartment buildings17 in 7
which some 10,000 families (31,932 people) live in 7,983 housing units. 8
To date there are over 5,000 housing units already fi nish and ready to be 9
occupied An estimated 205,000 people commute to the area every day 10
(Vazquez 2012). 11
Approximately two thousand corporations have offices in Santa Fe; these 12
include Chrysler, Hewlett Packard, Erickson, Citibank-Banamex, General 13
Electric, IBM, ABN Amro, Philip Morris, Kraft, Sony, and Telefonica, 14
along with Mexican transnationals like Televisa, José Cuervo, and Bimbo. 15
Since the objective of this development was to promote global invest- 16
ment through the creation of a wide-ranging project, it was planned 17
to house not only transnational companies but also an American-style 18
shopping mall with services such as cafes and restaurants along with 19
private schools and universities, hospitals, high-end gated communities, 20
and apartment buildings. Today many of the corporate office buildings, 21
housing projects, and shopping centers are no longer being designed and 22
constructed by Mexican architects but rather by transnational fi rms. The 23
latest architecture is largely generic, with a strong emphasis on function- 24
ality over aesthetics. 25
None of the local authorities have solved the problems of Santa Fe. 26
Politically, the area is divided into two delegaciones (similar political 27
demarcations to those of a county)—75 percent of its area is part of the 28
Delegación Alvaro Obregón, and the remaining 25 percent belongs to the 29
Delegación Cuajimalpa. The delegados (representatives) from both entities 30
claim that they are not responsible for infrastructure and service provi- 31
sion in Santa Fe, arguing that since SERVIMET is the agency in charge 32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
Figure 9.10 Santa Fe’s Skyline in the Cruz Manca Area (These buildings were 42
constructed between 2001 and 2006). The buildings on the left are mainly office 43
towers and the ones on the right are apartment houses. 44
Source: María Moreno-Carranco, 2008. 45
46

1 of this area, they would be breaking the law if they took any action with
2 regard to urban services. Furthermore, the delegados claim that they have
3 no resources to allocate to Santa Fe, so they want SERVIMET to fi nish pro-
4 viding urban infrastructure before they accept any responsibility over the
5 management of the area. SERVIMET, on the other hand, argues that they
6 were in charge of providing infrastructure but were not accountable for its
7 maintenance. They claim that they will have legal and accounting problems
8 if they assume this responsibility, since their budget cannot be allocated
9 for maintenance purposes. They do not talk about the deficiencies, caused
10 by rampant corruption, in the quality of the infrastructure they provided.
11 Instead, the neighborhood association is taking over the responsibility of
12 solving infrastructure deficiencies that were supposed to have been dealt
13 with by the government, which raises questions regarding accountability
14 and civic responsibility. From 2004 to 2011 the Santa Fe neighborhood
15 association made agreements with the city government to manage part
16 of the income generated from land tenure taxation. With these resources
17 the association provided urban services and the urban condition partially
18 improved. In 2012 the city´s Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera, stopped allo-
19 cating resources to the neighborhood association and the precarious service
20 provision recommenced, with the increasing discontent of the locals.
21
22
23 CLOSURE ON STATE URBAN INITIATIVES
24
25 Santa Fe must be viewed as part of a longer history of the deep involvement
26 of political figures and bureaucrats in urban development and landmark
27 projects in Mexico City. Thirteen of the most recent Mexico City may-
28 ors, including Uruchurtu, Sentíes, González, Aguirre-Velázquez, Cama-
29 cho, Cardenas, and López-Obrador, have declared their intention to run
30 for the national presidency. The city projects launched by each of them
31 were intended not only to benefit the city but also to serve as evidence of
32 the kind of work these politicians were capable of bringing to fruition for
33 the entire nation. Being Mayor of Mexico City was a platform to show
34 they knew how to govern. Even when only Cuauhtémoc Cardenas and
35 López-Obrador actually got to be presidential candidates—and although
36 neither of them succeeded in becoming president—this tradition of using
37 the city government as a launching platform to the presidency seems to
38 continue. As a consequence of the practice of every new city governor
39 favoring a specific city project, changes in priorities of personal politi-
40 cal agendas vis-à-vis the city’s needs have led to a number of unfi nished
41 initiatives. Several politicians claim to be the authors of the idea for the
42 development of Santa Fe, blaming previous or subsequent administra-
43 tions for Santa Fe’s shortcomings and thus, ironically, illustrating the
44 lack of accountability typical of the Mexican political system. Given the
45 extent to which Santa Fe is publicly regarded as an urban failure, none
46

of the architects involved in the design of the master plan want to be 1
associated with it. 2
The use of large-scale urban projects to tell the story of a nation to 3
the global community is by no means new, nor is it exclusive to Mexico 4
City. What has changed throughout history is the conception of moderni- 5
ty—and of methods for achieving it. At the end of the nineteenth century, 6
the remaking of Paris and Vienna was the result of particular aesthetic 7
conceptions of the city, expressions of state power, and attempts to make 8
these cities capitals of modernity (Olsen, 1986). In the mid-twentieth cen- 9
tury, cities like Brasilia in Brazil, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar in Bangladesh, and 10
Chandigarh in India were designed with the idea of creating modern and 11
industrial societies. Megaprojects are only the most recent phenomenon in 12
a longer history of urban redevelopment, in which politicians build large 13
and visible projects in order to show their commitment to nation building 14
and to narrate not only the nation’s past but also its future by reordering 15
the cityscape. 16
The history of the Santa Fe megaproject demonstrates the inevitable pit- 17
falls in attempting to apply a hegemonic defi nition of globalization—but 18
also even in determining what constitutes a global city or a megaproject—in 19
places where such global perspectives may conflict with local conditions and 20
outcomes. On the contrary, a particular form of globalization is produced, 21
one that is unique because it integrates local circumstances with broad 22
global aspirations. Even if Santa Fe was created with the intention of being 23
a First-World enclave in Mexico City, this goal was unattained because 24
the preexisting conditions of development seriously influenced the ways in 25
which blueprints materialized and resulting outcomes were shaped. 26
Mexico City’s governments throughout most of the twentieth century 27
have instituted urban initiatives in an authoritarian fashion by means of 28
top-down urban planning.18 This can be seen in the case of Santa Fe, where 29
the city government followed the same approach, both in the development 30
of the master plan and in its implementation. The resulting story is entirely 31
predictable, since the disconnections between plans and realities are part of 32
an ongoing narrative of Mexico City’s urban history. It is also important to 33
remember that the PRI government operated along clientelist bases. Hence 34
authoritarianism inevitably required some negotiation and agreement with 35
various sectors of civil society. It is relevant to highlight that negotiation 36
with an apparently powerless group of people—the pepenadores—was 37
necessary, illustrating the degree to which the implementation of transna- 38
tional urbanism is bounded by local situations. This chapter has illustrated 39
the need to conceptualize megaprojects as negotiated sites in continuous 40
conversation not only with various actors and institutions but also across 41
various levels (local, national, transnational). 42
As we have seen, political and economic elites are not necessary aligned. 43
Even a neoliberal state may have interests divergent from those of the capi- 44
talist class. At times when the megaproject was a priority for the Mayor 45
46

1 (particularly during the administrations of Hank González and Camacho),
2 this entity had enough power to guarantee the smooth development of
3 Santa Fe. However, as soon as priorities were directed elsewhere, corrup-
4 tion became the primary power driving the engine of development. The
5 poor infrastructure resulting from fraudulent maneuvers became the main
6 concern of investors, who anticipated a drop in their assets’ value. Given
7 the lack of accountability and the power vacuum left by agencies of the
8 various governments, the investors, developers, and residents of Santa Fe
9 took the situation into their own hands. These economic elites’ desire for
10 return on investment is leading to the further privatization and segregation
11 of Santa Fe, but not without contestation from excluded social groups. This
12 analysis sheds light on the dynamics that shaped “the entrepreneurial city”
13 (Hall and Hubbard 1998). As mentioned above, megaprojects have often
14 proven to be the result of a series of erroneous decisions (Gellert and Lynch
15 2003). Rather than seeing the outcomes as “accidental” or “unintended,”
16 we must, in order to learn from the process, understand what is missing in
17 the blueprints and in their implementation.
18
19
20 NOTES
21
22 1. Carlos Hank González was Mayor of Mexico City from 1976 to 1982. The
23 Mayor, appointed by the president, was a local authority figure in charge of
the Federal District.
24 2. Later on, the project was expanded to more than nine square kilometers.
25 3. The expression the miners refers to the owners of the land, who performed
26 the sand extraction for profit.
27 4. SERVIMET stands for Servicios Metropolitanos, a state agency that acts as
28 the real estate developer for the city’s government.
5. This figure was provided by Roque González Escamilla, director of the city
29 government’s development agency, Servicios Metropolitanos, S.A. de C.V.
30 (SERVIMET) during Hank González’s administration. In the numbers
31 reported by SERVIMET, the price per square meter was close to US$60.
32 However, according to one of the developers, the prices were closer to
33 $200.
6. In my interviews to the residents of the old town, they said that in 1981 they
34 were served with notices informing them of the road-widening scheme. They
35 were very surprised when, on a Sunday morning just a few days later, bull-
36 dozers arrived and partially demolished houses alongside the road.
37 7. Clientelist practices refer to the exchange of goods and/or services for polit-
38 ical support. Clientelisim as been defi ned by Richard Graham as a set of
actions based on the principle take there, give here, with the practice allow-
39 ing both clients and patrons to gain advantage from the other’s support.
40 8. Caciquism refers to areas dominated by local political bosses particularly in
41 Latin America, which are refered to as “caciques”
42 9. At the time, Televisa was the only Mexican television network.
43 10. As reference, the Santa Fe megaproject comprises 940 hectares; by contrast,
Docklands in London is 28.75 hectares and La Defence in Paris is 31.36
44 hectares.
45 11. Gaceta Oficial del D.F. 5 de junio de 2009.
46

12. When Zabludovsky refers to an “unpleasant context,” he is referring to the 1
poor areas that are visible from the megaproject. 2
13. Denser areas consist of multifamily housing, with densities ranging from 100 3
to 160 housing units per hectare.
14. Santa Fe is a clear example of the interface between formality and informal-
4
ity in the workings of this project. The casualness about the lack of permits 5
during the construction of Jose Rion’s building is illustrative. 6
15. A new freeway called Super Via Poniente connecting Santa Fe with the south 7
of the city will start operating early 2013. 8
16. Source: Reporte de mercado Ciudad de México 2008, oficinas. Available at:
www.colliers.com.mx
9
17. Numbers according to the Santa Fe Neighborhood Association. 10
18. This was the case at least until 1997, while the PRI was in power. 11
12
13
REFERENCES 14
15
Brenner, N. (2004). New State Spaces: Urban Governance and the Rescaling of 16
Statehood. Oxford, UK, and New York: Oxford University Press. 17
Castells, M. (1991a). The Informational City: A New Framework for Social 18
Change. Toronto: Centre for Urban and Community Studies, University of
Toronto.
19
Castells, M. (1991b). The Informational City; Information Technology, Economic 20
Restructuring, and the Urban Regional Process. Oxford, UK: Blackwell. 21
Castells, M. (1996). The Rise of the Network Society. Oxford, UK, and Malden, 22
MA: Blackwell. 23
Friedmann, J. (1986). The World City Hypothesis. Development and Change 17,
69–84.
24
Friedmann, J. (1995). Where We Stand: A Decade of World City Research. In P. L. 25
Knox and P. J. Taylor (eds.). World Cities in a World System. Cambridge, UK: 26
Cambridge University Press. 27
Gaceta Oficial del Distrito Federal. (September 12, 2000). Decreto por el que se 28
aprueba el programa parcial de desarrollo urbano de la zona de Santa Fe. Mex-
ico City: Organo del Gobierno del Distrito Federal.
29
Hall, Tim, and Phil Hubbard. 1998. The Entrepreneurial City: Geographies of 30
Politics, Regime, and Representation. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. 31
Harvey, D. (2005). A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford, UK, and New York: 32
Oxford University Press. 33
Holston, J. (1999). Spaces of Insurgent Citizenship. In J. Holston (ed.). Cities and
Citizenship. Durham, NC, and London: Duke University Press.
34
Lefebvre, H. (2003). Space and the State. In N. J. Brenner, B, Jones, M. Macleod, 35
G. (eds.). State/Space: A Reader. Malden, MA: Blackwell. 36
Mann, M. (2003). The Autonomous Power of the State. In N. J. Brenner, B, Jones, 37
and M. Macleod, (eds.). State/Space: A Reader. Malden, MA: Blackwell. 38
Marshall, R. (2003). Emerging Urbanity: Global Urban Projects in the Asia Pacific
Rim. London and New York: Spon Press.
39
Martínez Almazán, R. (2005). Santa Fe: ¿Por qué el Megaproyecto? Paper pre- 40
sented at the symposium Santa Fe pasado, presente, futuro, Universidad 41
Iberoamericana. 42
Olds, K. (ed.). (1999). Globalization and the Asia Pacific: Contested Territories. 43
London and New York: Routledge.
Olds, K. (2001). Globalization and Urban Change: Capital, Culture, and Pacific 44
Rim Mega-Projects. Oxford, UK, and New York: Oxford University Press. 45
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1 Olsen, D. J. (1986). The City as a Work of Art: London, Paris, Vienna. New
2 Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
3 Reforma. (December 5, 2004). Luchan en Santa Fe contra el déficit de agua.
Reforma.com.
4 Roy, A. (2004). Transnational trespassings: The geopolitics of urban informality.
5 Urban informality: Transnational perspectives from the Middle East, Latin
6 America, and South Asia, 289–317.
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8 Sassen, S. (1994). Cities in a World Economy. Newbury Park, CA: Pine Forge Press.
Servicios Metropolitanos, S. A. d. C. V. (1997). SERVIMET XX Aniversario
9 1977–1997. Mexico City: Editorial Nuevo Espacios.
10 Swyngedouw, E., F. Moulaert, and A. Rodriguez. (2002). Neoliberal Urbanization
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12 In N. Brenner and N. Theodore (eds.). Spaces of Neoliberalism (pp. 195–229).
13 Oxford, UK, and Boston: Blackwell.
Taylor, P. J. (1997). Hierarchical Tendencies amongst World Cities: A Global
14 Research Proposal. Cities 14, 323–332.
15 Tenenbaum, B. A. (1994). Streetwise History: The Paseo de la Reforma and the
16 Porfi rian State, 1876–1910. In C. E. M. and W. E. F. W. Beezley et al.(eds.).
17 Rituals of Rule, Rituals of Resistance. Public Celebrations and Popular Culture
18 in Mexico, Wilmington, Del.
Vazquez, R. (2012). Oferta Residencial en Santa Fe, de mucha altura Real Estate
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Global Mexico Under Construction The San

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9 Global Mexico under Construction

The Santa Fe Megaproject in Mexico City

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T&F Proofs: Not For Distribution

Fe to the southern part of the city are

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