In a Time of Drought

Last weekend Alejandro came over to the apartment that I rent.  He had never been along the "Ecoducto", a pedestrian path and green space that runs along the median strip of the expressway "Viaducto Miguel Alemán".  It begins a short distance from the apartment. So, in the midday heat, we decided to walk the path that runs for nearly one mile.

This is the dry season, and April and May are the hottest times of the year in Mexico City, a place where the high altitude generally mitigates the city's tropical latitude.

Some of the plants such as lavender, seem to be doing just fine in this period without rain.

The bamboo plants have grown enormously in the few years since the "Ecoducto" was created.

However there were also large areas in which the plants have all shriveled up, and appear to be dead.   Alejandro blames the city government for not maintaining the gardens and keeping the plants watered.  I think that the current drought is to blame.  Eight-five percent of Mexico is currently suffering extreme drought, the worst in thirty years.  The reservoirs which supply the city with water are starting to dry up.  

The route which the freeway follows was once the course of a river, the Río de la Piedad.  When the highway was built, the river was channeled into a conduit along the median strip.  City waste water also flows into the pipe.  The "Ecoducto" was built with the intention that the plants would be irrigated by the enclosed river, and that the vegetation would actually filter the waste water.  On other occasions when I have walked the along the path, there have actually been areas of water on either side.  I guess you could call them miniature wetlands.  This time there was no water to be seen.  I am wondering if in this drought, the underground Rio de la Piedad has dried up to the point where it is no longer irrigating the green space.  That is just my speculation. 

After days of heat and no rain, on Wednesday evening we had a heavy thunderstorm here.  In Alejandro's neighborhood there was hail, and here the electricity briefly went out a couple times.  In the center of the city there was minor damage to the "Templo Mayor", the remains of the Aztec temple.  Portions of the corrugated, metal roofs which protect some of the archaeological site collapsed under the weight of the hail.

However, I very much doubt that one thunderstorm is going to relieve Mexico's drought.