Bacalar, Quintana Roo – The new navigation rules for Bacalar Lagoon are being positioned as a technical and socially grounded effort to steer tourism and local economic activity toward sustainability while protecting the lake’s fragile ecosystem. The updated regulations, soon to be published in the Official Gazette of the Federation, assign legal responsibility for implementation, supervision, and oversight to the Port Authority, now operating under the jurisdiction of the Harbor Master’s Office after a recent administrative transfer to the Secretariat of the Navy. The announcement came during a multi-stakeholder meeting held at the Bacalar Naval Club, where federal, civic, business, and scientific interests convened to align around the future of the lagoon. The lagoon’s unique ecology and the need to preserve features like its famed stromatolites have made managing human impact a recurring theme for years; activists and informed travelers alike have warned that unchecked growth could damage what residents and visitors call the “Lake of Seven Colors.”
Port Captain Román Bustos Gómez, speaking on behalf of the Chetumal Port Captain’s Office and representing the Mexican Navy’s presence in the region, said the forthcoming new navigation rules for Bacalar Lagoon reflect proposals and feedback submitted since 2020 by business associations, civil society groups, ejidos, and other local stakeholders. The rules are crafted “without excesses,” he said, seeking balance between use and conservation, and are built on both technical studies and local social input. The delay in formal publication, Bustos explained, stemmed from a shift in administrative authority: the General Coordination of Ports and Merchant Marine moved from the Ministry of Communications to the Navy, making the Harbor Master’s Office the legal administrator of the lagoon’s water body.
The updated framework restructures how vessels and recreational users move through and interact with the lagoon. Measures include the deconcentration of boat traffic away from the central town perimeter by opening navigation to broader, “more usable areas” across the lagoon’s more than 60 kilometers of length. Specific protective subzones will prohibit all forms of navigation, swimming, or contact in areas adjacent to the coasts of Bacalar and Xul Há lagoons, where stromatolites—living sedimentary structures critical to the lagoon’s scientific and ecological value—could be disturbed.
Other targeted restrictions include “cenote precautionary subzones,” where motorized craft must not exceed four knots (7.4 km/h) and in which swimming, snorkeling, and diving are banned unless authorized for research purposes by the Captain’s Office. A cautionary zone around Bird Island will limit loudspeaker and horn use within 300 meters of its shore, aiming to reduce noise disturbance to avian life. A designated swimming caution zone—a 50-meter-wide strip beside the shore—will organize bathing activity while keeping it separate from boat docking areas through the placement of authorized buoys. Speed limit zones for boats, pontoons, and personal watercraft are also part of the new regime.
Business and community representatives at the meeting urged authorities to avoid overregulation and instead focus on compliance and broader watershed health. They emphasized that threats to the lagoon extend beyond vessel traffic. Maintaining boat cleanliness to prevent pollution, enhancing reforestation efforts, regulating agrochemical usage, and upgrading stormwater and drainage infrastructure were flagged as necessary, deeper interventions. The group also agreed to explore restoring historical natural drainage channels through targeted dredging—measures intended to reduce sediment, agrochemical, and sewage runoff that threaten water quality and the systems that support local livelihoods.
“This isn’t just about where boats go,” said a representative of the hotel and nautical associations. “The lagoon’s health depends on what happens on land as much as on water. If we don’t act on runoff, agrochemicals and the loss of natural filtration, navigation rules alone won’t keep Bacalar alive.” The framing of the rules, Bustos reiterated, will remain rooted in local knowledge and aimed at sustainable economic development, not merely restriction for its own sake.
The meeting drew a wide cross-section of regional leadership: Captain Napoleón Ibarra, representing Vice Admiral Marco Antonio Muñoz Hernández of the Eleventh Naval Zone; Raúl Andrade Angulo of the Hotel Association of Central and Southern Quintana Roo; representatives from Canaco Servytur; Roberto Salgado of the Bacalar Lagoon Basin Community Council; advocates from the Friends of Bacalar Lagoon and Xul-Há Association; engineers from the regional college; local civic leaders including Nicanor Piña of the Magical Town of Bacalar; public works officials; and the delegate of Conagua in Quintana Roo, among others. Their presence underscored the layered governance approach being touted for the lagoon’s future.
Environmental advocates and responsible tourism proponents have long highlighted the need to protect Bacalar’s delicate balance between human use and natural preservation. The lagoon’s coloration, its freshwater mix, and its ancient stromatolites—some of the few living examples of microbial formations in the region—draw researchers and travelers alike, fueling both economic opportunity and ecological vulnerability.
With the formal publication imminent, the Port Authority now faces the test of turning the new navigation rules for Bacalar Lagoon into enforceable behavior while shepherding complementary land-based measures. If the technical-social model promoted in the meeting holds, the lagoon could become a case study in collaborative conservation: a popular destination managed in step with the people who depend on it and the natural systems that define it.
