Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has announced that construction of the new airport in Mexico City, named ‘General Felipe Ángeles’, will begin at the Santa Lucía Military Air Base on April 29, 2019.
The president stressed that the base would acquire a new dimension by becoming a civil airport, in addition to military, with an extension of 3,000 hectares – five times the size of Benito Juárez Airport.
According to President Obrador, the airport’s new name pays tribute to General Felipe Ángeles, a prominent soldier who served his country in defense of democracy together with President Francisco I Madero. This year marks the centenary of his murder.
In October 2018, Mexicans voted in favor of abandoning a US$13bn project to build a new airport at Lake Texcoco to the east of Mexico City. Designed by British architects Foster and Partners, the project had reached the 30% development phase, including setting the foundations and partially erecting the terminal steelwork.
The referendum was called by the then president-elect López Obrador, who assumed office on December 1, 2018. The president had openly opposed the Texcoco airport project during his election campaign, saying that it had been tainted by corruption and would be a waste of taxpayers’ money.
