Mexico City Real Estate Development Project Temporarily Shut Down at Aztecas #215

The following is a short text about a neighborhood blockade that took place yesterday of a gentrifying and environmentally destructive development project in Mexico City. More about the struggle at Aztecas #215 can be found here.

Today, August 8^th, 2018, on the birthday of Mexican revolutionary General Emiliano Zapata, members of the General Assembly of Peoples, Neighborhoods, Communities and Pedregales of Coyoacán blockaded the two entrances to the real estate development project at Aztecas 215 in the south of Mexico City. For around three hours in the afternoon, the entrances were barricaded off, disallowing the movement of traffic and construction materials in and out of the construction site. At least three trucks full of construction material arrived, but were not permitted to enter. Waiting around a couple hours, the trucks eventually left without delivering the material to the construction site.

Today’s blockade marks the ongoing resistance and neighborhood self-organization against the real estate development project being built on top of a fresh-water aquifer in a city and neighborhood starved of water. The encampment in front of the real-estate development project is coming up upon its one-year anniversary on August 31^st, after the prior encampment was evicted on December 5^th, 2016. The encampment and neighborhood assembly are actively organizing against the real estate company, Quiero Casa, in its development project of 377 apartments and 683 parking stalls in the pedregales of Coyoacán in the south of Mexico City. This is both a project of ecocide, but also a project of ruthless gentrification, in a working-class neighborhood with a long history of community organization and resistance.

Stay tuned, as the fight against the real estate project at Aztecas #215 continues!