Estudios nacionales sobre violencia escolar

Two PRD administrations are particularly relevant, López Obrador’s (2000-2005) and Marcelo Ebrard’s (2006-2012). L. Obrador decided to implement an ambitious renovation project in the city centre known as Historic Centre Revitalisation Plan (2002).

In the past, other city mayors had tried to rehabilitate the area for economic and political purposes, but it required political ability as the area was contested by both, popular groups and national and international capital investors. Two factors facilitated the process: one was the increasing decay of the city centre, and the second the political ability of L. Obrador to reconcile interests (Diane Davis 2007).

The revitalisation of the city centre responded to the following objectives. Mexico City was becoming a global city and the city centre was renovated to promote a new city image in the international scene in order to attract foreign investment. It was

174 modernised to attract investment, because the city centre has potential to develop tourism and ‘glamorous’ shops and restaurants, and because investors from the private sector had already shown their interest in the area. In fact, one of the principal capital investors is Carlos Slim, one of the richest persons in the world. In political terms, L.

Obrador was trying to promote his image for the 2006 presidential elections using the renovation of the city centre as his flagship.

The implementation of the Revitalisation Plan started in 2004, and many of the important actions were completed in 2006, just before the elections⁷⁶. The implementation of the plan represented a public investment of 1,800 million MXN pesos (90 million GBP at a rate of 20 MXN for 1 GBP, the costs are not updated).

These are some of the actions of the plan that were implemented before the 2006 elections: The streets in the nearby area of the Zócalo⁷⁷ were renovated and a total of 34 blocks were rehabilitated. The public squares Seminario and Zócalo were rehabilitated in 2005, and the square called Fuente de la Fundación was rehabilitated in 2006. Motolinia Street was transformed into a pedestrian street. The Chinese neighbourhood located on Dolores Street was renovated in 2006. The same year, the High Court of Justice of the Federal District and the Secretariat of Foreign Affairs were constructed as emblematic examples of modern architecture.

In addition, an important number of monuments were restored, such as the Corpus Christi temple in 2005, the Panteón de San Fernando cemetery in 2006, part of the Ajaracas house in 2006, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), the La Merced convent, the Jesús María temple, the building of the Escuela Secundaria No. 1 school, the La Concepción temple, the Loreto temple and the San Lorenzo temple, most of them during 2006. The National Council for Culture and Arts (CONACULTA) carried out some works in the Aztec ruins of the Templo Mayor, the Main Altar of the Cathedral, the Ancient Anglican Church, the Regina Coeli temple, the main hall of the Palace of Fine Arts, the Museum of National Cultures, the José Vasconcelos Library and the Ancient Archiepiscopal Palace, between 2005 and 2006. The Historic Centre Revitalisation Plan was implemented successfully and contributed to the transformation of the area.

76 López Obrador represented the PRD in the 2006 presidential elections. He was voted second place, and his votes count was very close to the winner’s, Calderón Hinojosa from the PAN right-wing party.

77Some of the renovated streets were: 16 de Septiembre, Donceles, Corregidora, Eje Central, Argentina and Palma.

175 The street vendors were removed during the execution of works in the streets, which facilitated their eviction. In 2006, Marcelo Ebrard was elected City Mayor. He had been in the ranks of the PRI and had worked for the Camacho Solís administration during the 1988-1993 negotiations with the street vendors. He had already worked with the unions and this made the negotiations easier.

In October 2007, a total of 87 streets, 192 blocks, in the historic centre monuments’ zone (Perimeter A) were cleared out of street vendors. Approximately 15,000 street traders were removed from the area (Pradilla Cobos 2007). Since then, the area remains relatively ‘clean’, with the exception of some streets to the east and north. In some streets, such as Correo Mayor-El Carmen and Argentina, there are still some groups of hawkers as explained in the presentation of the case.

The priority of the two administrations was to rehabilitate the city centre. The removal of the street vendors was a secondary issue, necessary only to clear the streets of vendors to implement the Revitalisation Plan. The solution proposed to the vendors was, once more, a Relocation Programme, very similar to the one implemented back in 1993 under the C. Solís administration.

The plazas constructed under the 2007-2012 Relocation Programme

A total of 43 plazas were constructed in the city centre; and 4 public spaces were transformed into open markets. Fifty-three percent of the plazas were located in the north area, the 34% to the east and 13% to the south. The North Sector was affected by this programme more than with the previous relocation programmes, as shown in Map 12.

The programme had the same modality that the one implemented in the 1990s. In many cases, the occupation of public spaces and streets was conceded to the street vendors, without any public consultation. The maps show how the authorities contributed to reinforce the commercial use of the city centre by systematically giving the unions the possibility to build plazas in the available plots.

During the implementation of the programme, some of the unions in the North Sector negotiated with the authorities the construction of fixed structures directly on the streets, which was accepted by the city authorities. This was the case of the Aztecas, Haití, Florida, Caridad and Nicaragua streets, and the Eje 1 Avenue.

176

Map 12 Plazas constructed in 2007

Since the late 1990s, the city government showed interest in renovating the city centre, but it was not until the PRD government that the renovation of the city centre actually took place. The Historic Centre Renovation Plan was launched and several institutions

177 were created to implement it in space. These institutions are the Historic Centre Trust⁷⁸, the Historic Centre Authority⁷⁹, and the Public Space Authority⁸⁰. The primary objective of the plan is the renovation of streets and other public spaces, and the economic revitalisation of the area by developing luxury boutiques, restaurants, and touristic and cultural venues.

In 2011, a Management Plan for ‘Perimeter A’, a master plan, was designed to coordinate projects and actions in the area, as shown in Map 13. This plan considers the interventions that were necessary in the area, such as renovation of squares, renewal of the streets, restoration of buildings, etc. The master plan covers the area within the Perimeter A, except the area corresponding to the market in the North Sector, which is not included in the plan as a ‘marketplace’. The fact that the market area is not represented in the plan might be interpreted as a strategy to allow more ‘flexibility’ to this territory. In fact, the master plan focuses mainly on issues regarding heritage and the renovation of public space. Other relevant aspects, such as the commercial organisation of the territory and its future evolution, are not actually addressed.

The planning approach applied to the city centre focuses exclusively on the Monuments’

Area, while allowing the North Sector a more flexible, unplanned evolution. The master plan does not reflect the organisation of the territory in all its complexity; namely, it does

78The trust was created in 1990 during the Camacho Solís administration. Initially, the Institution’s objective was to manage the projects in the Historic Centre Monuments’ Area, which were financed with public funds. In 2002, it was transformed into a public-private institution in charge of managing the resources from the city government and private investors. Carlos Slim, one of the richest persons in Mexico, is one of the most important investors in the city centre. Actually, the mission of this institution is to implement the Revitalisation Plan approved in 2002 and carry out the design and execution of the projects. In the 2002-2011 period, the Historic Centre Trust invested a total of 560 million MXN pesos (28 million GBP) in the city centre, while the city government invested directly a total of 1,442 million MXN pesos (72 million GBP) to rehabilitate the streets (Rosalba Garza et al. 2011).

The investment corresponded to the rehabilitation of a total of 55 buildings, 1,037 facades, 40 squares and public spaces and 250,000 m² of streets (Rosalba Garza et al. 2011).

79In 2007, the city government created the Historic Centre Authority to prepare and execute a Management Plan for the ‘Perimeter A’, the last version of the plan corresponds to the 2011-2016 period; it is called Management Plan, but it mainly works as a master plan. The main task of this institution is to coordinate actions between institutions to implement the plan. The Management Plan mentions that 19,500 street traders have been relocated to the plazas, but it doesn’t address the functioning of the territory as a commercial area nor the relation between the core area and the North Sector.

80The Public Space Authority was created in 2008 to carry out strategic projects of the Revitalisation Plan. This institution renovates public squares in Perimeter A, especially those spaces that require a qualitative design. In fact, a total of 28 squares have been renovated in the 2002-2011 period, five by the Public Space Authority.

178 not acknowledge the existence of a metropolitan scale market area a few blocks north, and the kind of relations, tensions and interactions that might occur between these two areas.

Map 13 Historic Centre 2011-2016 Master Plan

179 The role of the city authorities in the production of the marketplace concerns the empowerment of the street vendors as political actors, and the spatial consolidation of the North Sector as a commercial area. The city government implemented policies that were insensible to the logics of street vending. In addition, the relocation programmes were poorly designed, and as a consequence the authorities were forced to delegate management tasks to the vendors themselves and to allow them to stay in the streets.

Hence, the negotiations with authorities empowered the vendor unions, especially the leaders. The ambiguous nature of the law that ‘at the same time allows and disallows’ the activity was an efficient way to resolve the contradictions of the policies in the short term. However, in the long term it revealed its inefficiency to tackle the problem in a realistic way. The construction of the closed markets and plazas reinforced the commercial activities in the area.