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A 100-year-old railway Mexico hopes will rival the Panama Canal (2023)

The route will run across Mexico's narrowest point, connecting the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean

The project "seeks to capitalise on multinationals' desire to be closer to the US" as well as the periods of low water levels in the Panama Canal as the region suffers "increasingly frequent droughts", said the paper. Originally part of the Tehuantepec line, the railway was first built for the government of dictator Porfirio Diaz and was inaugurated in 1907, before the Mexican Revolution and the opening of the Panama Canal "devastated business", said the FT. In a news conference the canal's director, Ricaurte Vásquez Morales, said: "Definitely the Mexican solution could be a potential threat to the Panamanian operation," but he added a replacement route would only be needed "if we were in a situation where there is no water at all, and we do not anticipate that".

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