Two years after its December 2023 inauguration, the Tren Maya lawsuits that surround Mexico’s flagship rail project have hardly slowed down. An internal legal report from the army-run operating company, obtained by El Universal, shows 51 active cases tied to the train.
The breakdown reveals how wide the conflict runs. There are 12 amparo cases, many challenging land expropriations along the 1,525-kilometer route or warning of long-term environmental harm to cenotes, caves and jungle ecosystems across Chiapas, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán and Quintana Roo.
Three nullity suits contest the early termination of public works contracts and alleged refusals to pay what companies say they are owed. One more case disputes how authorities valued land seized for the railway. In parallel, a civil environmental lawsuit was filed this August, arguing that construction damaged fragile underground water systems and forest cover.
Beyond those headline cases, there are four agrarian disputes brought by campesino groups seeking restitution or fair compensation for communal lands taken for the tracks and stations. And the largest block, with 31 labor suits, comes from workers who say they were fired without cause or left in limbo by a tangle of subcontractors.
Environmental organizations have been warning about this legal threat for years. Groups such as CEMDA and local collectives documented dozens of injunctions and complaints as the project cut through jungle and karst terrain. An international “tribunal for the rights of nature” even urged an immediate halt to the project, citing what it called ecocide risks for the region’s forests and aquifers.
At the same time, courts have sent mixed signals. Federal judges have ordered partial suspensions on several occasions, especially on Section 5 between Cancún, Playa del Carmen, and Tulum, citing the risk of irreparable damage to cenotes and caves. Other injunctions were later lifted, allowing work to continue even as scientists and divers documented collapsed caves and fractured underground rivers.
In 2025, the government publicly acknowledged that the train’s construction damaged cenotes, rainforests, and wildlife corridors, and promised restoration measures such as reforestation and new wildlife crossings. Those pledges now sit alongside the 51 open cases, raising a fundamental question for residents along the line: who will actually fix the damage, and who will pay.
Tren Maya lawsuits reveal a long legal tail
Money is at the center of many of these disputes. The legal report cited by El Universal notes at least one case in which the army-run company has already lost, forcing the state to pay more than 86 million pesos after cancelling a contract. The rest of the litigation bill is a mystery. Authorities have classified detailed spending on lawsuits, lawyers, and expert reports as reserved information, arguing that the train is a matter of national security.
Outside the courtroom, the unpaid-bills story is already public. In December 2024, truck drivers who hauled rock and gravel for the project blocked highways near Mexico City and in the Yucatán Peninsula, saying they had gone months without being paid by subcontractors. The government later admitted it had fallen behind on transfers to those firms, contributing to the delays. That protest did not immediately turn into a lawsuit, but it exposed the same pattern of financial strain that appears in the current docket.
The 31 labor cases show another side of that strain. Many workers were hired through layers of intermediaries on fast-moving construction schedules. When sections finished or contracts changed hands, people reported being dismissed with little paperwork and no clear employer to claim benefits from. Those disputes now pit individual welders, machine operators, and drivers against a state-controlled company backed by the Defense Ministry.
For communities along the line, the consequences are not just monetary. The four agrarian suits stem from ejidos and communal lands where residents say they signed under pressure, did not receive promised compensation, or saw more forest cleared than initially agreed. For many, the lawsuit is as much about dignity and control over territory as about the check.
Environmental collectives have had to finance their legal fights case by case. Groups such as SOS Cenotes turned to online crowdfunding to pay for lawyers, expert studies, and trips to hearings, arguing that the project advanced “without public studies and without obeying court orders,” even after injunctions were granted. Some plaintiffs describe spending years tied up in court while bulldozers moved ahead only a few kilometers away.
That frustration is visible in recent reporting by outlets such as El País, which documented stalled amparo cases, missing records, and delays that plaintiffs see as deliberate tactics to wear down opposition. Judges issued suspensions, yet construction often continued, shifting the legal battle from prevention to compensation and environmental remediation.
The result is a legal map that mirrors the tracks themselves: scattered cases across multiple states, courts, and legal areas, all tied to one mega-project that is already up and running but far from settled.
What the new amparo rules mean on the ground
One detail in the Tren Maya’s litigation file may have implications far beyond this train. The civil environmental lawsuit filed in August risks being thrown out because of a recent reform to Mexico’s Amparo Law, approved this October.
Under the new rules, people who bring amparo challenges must show a direct and individual harm, not just a collective environmental impact. Legal analysts warn that this narrows the door that allowed communities and organizations to stop or slow mega-projects when jungles, rivers, or aquifers were at stake. Environmental law experts at universities and NGOs argue that the reform could make it much harder to defend shared resources, from cenotes in the Yucatán to rivers threatened by dams or mining.
Critics also worry that some changes could apply retroactively, potentially affecting ongoing cases. That concern reached the national stage when President Claudia Sheinbaum herself rejected a last-minute retroactivity clause added by senators, saying it clashed with the Constitution and asking deputies to correct it. Plaintiffs in environmental and human-rights cases are now watching closely to see how judges interpret the reform in practice.
For those involved in Tren Maya lawsuits, the timing feels personal. Years after they first went to court over deforestation, collapsing caves, or cultural impacts, many plaintiffs have not received a final ruling. Now they face new legal barriers just as the government starts to talk about restoration rather than prevention.
On the federal side, the project has moved into a new phase. The administration that built the train under Andrés Manuel López Obrador is gone; his successor is trying to position the line as a tool for regional development and freight transport while promising to “correct” environmental harm. Yet with dozens of unresolved cases, the risk is that compensation, remediation, and transparency remain fragmented and slow.
What happens next will shape more than a single train. If courts close the door on collective environmental claims, other mega-projects may advance with fewer judicial brakes and more conflicts pushed into private negotiations or social protest. If judges find ways to protect affected communities despite the reform, the Tren Maya docket could become a test case for how Mexico balances rapid public works with the right to a healthy environment and access to justice.
For now, the train continues to run through the jungle. Along the route, farmers, workers, divers, and activists keep watching the court calendars, waiting to see whether their names on those 51 files translate into real repairs, fair payments, and stronger protections, or stay as one more line of unresolved history attached to a steel ribbon of track.
