Machu Picchu train line reopens after protesters strike deal to readmit tourists
Peruvian authorities have reopened the train route to Machu Picchu, after an agreement was struck to end more than a week of protests that had blocked access to the famed Incan site and stranded tourists.
PeruRail said in a statement a partial service had restarted on Wednesday and that a regular service would return on Thursday from the city of Cusco to Aguas Calientes, a town near the archaeological site.
The protests began late last week over a new centralized ticketing system, leaving hundreds of tourists unable to reach the ancient ruins high up in the Andes.
Protesters said they feared the new electronic ticket sales platform would hurt local businesses by shifting the administration of ticket sales to one private company authorized by the ministry of culture.
The blockade had left streets, hotels and restaurants around Peru’s most famous tourist attraction almost deserted.
“This seems like the time of the Covid-19 pandemic – you hardly see any people,” said Roger Monzón, an employee at the Inkas Land hotel in the Machu Picchu district, an 18-room building currently housing only two tourists from Portugal.
The two sides signed an agreement on Wednesday that will see a transition period to the new platform.
“We have to move forward to reactivate our economy,” Peru’s minister of culture, Leslie Urteaga, told a local radio station.
Agencies responsible for the preservation of the Unesco world heritage site have warned about overcrowding and tickets being oversold, leading authorities to find new ways to control visitor numbers as travel rebounds in the wake of the Covid pandemic.