A few key paragraphs:

“The idea behind the Tren Maya is to draw the tourists of Cancún, Playa del Carmen and Tulum to some of the poorest parts of southern Mexico, luring them away from the beach and toward the rest of the Yucatán.”

“The archaeologists face a succession of almost impossible decisions. They’ve been directed to scour Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula for undiscovered ruins and to rank them on a scale of one to four — from negligible importance to profound historical value. Anything judged less than a four will almost certainly be bisected by the rail line or destroyed altogether. The losses so far include millennia-old Maya homes and temples.”

“It’s so rich in archaeology that the only way to preserve everything would be to construct an upper story for the whole population,” said archaeologist Ivan Šprajc, a scholar of Maya civilization.”

AMLO wants to "develop" the Yucatan with a tourism train, forcing it to be built by the military instead of the company that won the contract.

This train runs through archeological sites, which angers the population of the Yucatan which a large chunk is Mayan.

Archeologists are rushing to excavate sites before the government comes and tears them down.

What is not covered:

The Yucatan and Chiapas have a long history of attacking the Mexican government for intruding on its territory and heritage, and peace has only happened when the government does not touch the Yucatan at all.

With racism against indigenous in Mexico increasing with "whitexicans" showing up to disrespect Mayan sites, this can very easily start another caste war or Chiapas rebellion.

This is probably why AMLO brought in the military to build it, he is trying to start an incident with the Mayans in Mexico.

You can only guess the reason why.

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