Mérida, Yucatán — Another Walmart, the city’s sixth, will be part of a huge shopping and hotel complex in the shadow of the Altabrisa Mall.
For several weeks bulldozers have been leveling land where, according to workers, foreign investors will build a Walmart Supercenter, a hotel of at least six stories, a Starbucks and a Cinemex cinema, all part of a complex called Uptown Mérida.
The land is in front of the Monumento a las Haciendas traffic roundabout, where the Altabrisa Sears and the Star Medica Hospital is in view. No mention has been made of how the traffic will be rerouted to accommodate a large complex.
According to Diario de Yucatán, the new shopping complex is funded by investors in Cancun, Guadalajara and Mexico City.
So far, four backhoes and other machines have built a foundation for work to start possibly this year.
Walmart is already a huge presence in Merida, operating nine Mi Bodega Aurrerás, seven Bodega Aurrerás, five Walmarts, three Vips, three Sam’s Clubs, two Suburbias, one Superama and one El Portón restaurant. A fourth Vips, on the Paseo de Montejo, changed owners in 2013 after 20 years.
Walmarts already exist at City Center, on the Paseo de Montejo by the hotel zone, Pensiones, Itzimná/Brisas Del Bosque, and the Poniente Branch on the Carr. Merida-Caucel. A fifth of the world’s Walmarts are in Mexico.
