The Tulum tourism slowdown has reached the taxi stands, where drivers say this summer has brought the worst stretch of work they can remember, with hundreds of concessions parked during the year's normally busiest season.
Their account arrives as President Claudia Sheinbaum prepares a three-day tour of Quintana Roo that puts her morning press conference in Tulum on Friday and, according to regional outlets, private meetings with tourism representatives about the state of the local economy. Whatever the federal government decides about beach access, sargassum, and the Parque del Jaguar will land directly on the people who move visitors around this town for a living.
A driver with 32 years on the road says the streets have gone quiet
Graciliano Camal Chek, known in Tulum as Sixto, has worked the taxi trade here for 32 years. In remarks published this week by regional outlets, he said he had never faced a situation like the current one. Summer used to be a stretch of steady demand. Now, he said, drivers spend long shifts without a single fare.
The emptiness is not confined to the taxi lines. Camal Chek described a municipality where closed businesses and for rent or for sale signs have become ordinary features of the commercial streets, a visual record of how far the drop in visitors has spread beyond the hotels.
Hundreds of concessions parked because fares no longer cover fuel and plate rent
According to Camal Chek, the shortage of work has pushed hundreds of concessions out of circulation. Owners are choosing to stop operating rather than absorb the daily cost of staying on the road, among them gasoline, the settlement owed at the end of a shift, and the rent paid for plates by drivers who do not hold their own concession.
That figure comes from him. Neither the local taxi union nor municipal transit authorities have confirmed how many concessions are currently idle.
Occupancy figures put numbers behind the Tulum tourism slowdown
Official data supports the drivers' description of the season. The Sistema de Información Turística de Quintana Roo reported average hotel occupancy of 59.6 percent across the state's main destinations during the week of July 4 to 10, a weak result for one of the most important stretches of the calendar. Tulum registered the lowest level in the state at 41.5 percent. Costa Maya came in at 31.9 percent.
The pattern predates the summer. Tulum received 522,705 visitors between January and April, 21,718 fewer than in the same period of 2025, according to Sistema de Información Turística figures cited by Reforma. Traffic at Felipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport fell from 530,783 passengers to 365,851 over the same months. The archaeological zone dropped from 500,029 visitors to 361,600.
Neighboring destinations are absorbing the same shock. Small hotels in Playa del Carmen report occupancy near 32 percent, roughly 15 points below the same period of 2025, according to the Asociación de Pequeños Hoteles. Its president, Offner Arjona, estimated that around 15 percent of small hotels in the area have suspended operations temporarily or closed permanently.
Sargassum and Jaguar Park restrictions top the list of causes drivers name
Camal Chek pointed to several factors he believes are behind the decline, among them the arrival of sargassum, the restrictions tied to the Parque del Jaguar, and other conditions affecting the destination. He did not claim to know which weighs most. What he said was clear to him was the result, visible in the reduced flow of visitors and in the earnings of workers and shopkeepers.
Hotel operators elsewhere in the state have named a broader set of causes. Rodrigo de la Peña, president of the Cancún, Puerto Morelos, and Isla Mujeres hotel association, said the sector had expected the FIFA World Cup to turn Quintana Roo into a connection point for traveling fans. Those expectations faded, he said, as tourists prioritized domestic trips inside the United States and airfares climbed alongside the price of jet fuel.
The trade's own reputation is part of the same argument. Coverage of the Riviera Maya over the past several years has documented tourist complaints about excessive taxi fares and drivers' refusal to work with ride-hailing platforms, disputes that have at times escalated into confrontation. Those accounts and the ones drivers are giving now about empty stands describe the same destination.
Sheinbaum arrives with beach access and sargassum on the agenda
Sheinbaum's tour of Quintana Roo runs from July 17 to 19. The morning press conference is scheduled for Friday at 8:30 a.m. at Air Force Base 12, beside the Tulum airport. On Sunday she is set to close the tour at the Tren Maya Cancún Aeropuerto station with a press conference focused on the sargassum response along the state's coast.
Reports differ on when she reaches Tulum. Quintana Roo Hoy reported she would arrive Thursday for a two-day working visit including private meetings with tourism representatives at the Air Force hangar and a tour of the Parque del Jaguar, while presidential sources cited by other outlets placed the start of the tour on Friday. No official detail on the Jaguar Park portion has been released.
Expectations in town center on what she announces rather than where she stands. Regional outlets have reported the agenda may include progress on the Tulum Renace program, along with measures covering Jaguar Park entrance fees and free passage along the beaches inside it.
Camal Chek's request is narrower than any of that. He asked for strategies that bring visitors back. "We need actions that encourage visitors to arrive," he said, describing parts of the city where economic movement has thinned enough that the difficulty facing service providers is visible from the street.
The answer, if one comes, will be delivered from a hangar beside an airport whose passenger traffic has fallen by roughly a third. The drivers waiting outside it will hear it Friday morning.
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