An impact that is never factored in to Costa Rica’s success is the carbon emissions of the foreign tourists paying for it all. Almost all of those conscientious US and European eco-tourists arrive in Costa Rica by plane. The inconvenient truth is that air travel is an entirely unscalable mode of transport, i.e. people who do it are tacitly relying on others not to do it.

To be genuinely sustainable, Costa Rica’s patrons would need to visit more slowly, and perhaps even spend more time there. A rail corridor through Central America would be one way to do it, with high-speed services but not only.

When I visited I learned that it can take a year for them to approve permits for a new paved road -even in the middle of a town. The highways are all gravel, not paved. They view paved roads as permanent ecological harm that must be mitigated.

So mindset.

I’ve been wondering if the sharp rightward turn of the government in recent years will threaten their past success. Has there been any sign of this?