Mexico City back to normal after earthquake
MEXICO CITY — Six months after this capital’s last major earthquake, its most popular tourist attractions are busy again.
If you’re headed here, remember that the metropolitan area is built on an ancient lake bed. For generations, as the growing city has drawn down the aquifer beneath the lake bed, the ground has been sinking unevenly, leaving the city vulnerable to quakes.
The magnitude 8 quake of 1985 killed at least 5,000 people. The magnitude 7.1 quake of Sept. 19 killed more than 225 in the city and many more outside it. Many buildings remain shut or under reconstruction, especially in the Roma and La Condesa neighborhoods.
But it was a return to business as usual at every major stop I checked in mid-February along the tourist trail. Tour operators say the same is true at the pyramids of Teotihuacan, about 30 miles northeast of the city center.
In September’s quake, the Metropolitan Cathedral that looms over the zocalo at the center of the city escaped major damage, but authorities said a statue of Hope (the theological virtue) was toppled from its spot on the clock tower. Though Hope-less for the foreseeable future, the cathedral remains open daily.
Xochimilco’s canals are about 15 miles south of the zocalo — typically an hour’s drive. But the canal system’s Embarcadero Nuevo Nativitas area, which bore no signs of quake damage, was well worth my trouble.
Rent a brightly painted boat (and pilot) for about $28 an hour. Buy snacks; listen to musicians. The canals, which date to preHispanic times, go on for miles, and they’re threatened by pollution and dwindling water supply. But I saw more smiles there than any other place in the city.