Periférico Light Rail

The Periférico light rail station is just north of the famous ring highway that surrounds Mexico City. It shouldn’t be confused with the Line 12 Metro station Periférico Oriente. The Metro station is just about 19-minutes drive east along the same highway. While that Metro station is the highest in Mexico City, this little light rail station has its own distinction. A full transit stop, it only somehow fit into a leafy section of the Mexico-Xochimilco Causeway.

The station is also named “Participación Ciudadana.” This is in recognition of the transit system, and Mexico City’s general commitment to broader democracy when it comes to public works and facilities. The station is especially important for its nearness to the administrative center of the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana and the La Salle del Pedregal High School. The giant Xochimilco Campus of the Instituto Tecnológico de Monterrey (Tec de Monterrey) is visible from the station.

The station logo depicts a cloverleaf interchange, ubiquitous in 20th-century highway design. The Periférico highway rings much of Mexico City and remains one of the principle vehicular thoroughfares. The total length spans some 120.83 kilometers. The highway was begun in the 1950s and opened in several phases over the course of the 1960s.

At the time, most of this area was still surrounded by vast expanses of farmland. The Periférico station is also on the very limits of the old Coapa Hacienda to the east. Little by little, urban development, industrial buildings and neighborhoods have grown up on what was once farmland.