Los Angeles & Southern California - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [285]
But Tijuana is no longer beholden exclusively to gringo tourists. In the wake of the North American Free Trade Agreement, the city has nearly doubled in population over the last decade as new businesses – particularly maquiladoras (assembly plants) – open every month. Tijuana – now Mexico’s fourth-largest city and one of its richest – boasts an increasingly sophisticated cultural scene, from music to food to academia. Still, alongside this newfound wealth remains desperate poverty, as many of the rural poor arrive in the city daily, their numbers outpacing job creation and city services.
Orientation
Downtown Tijuana (Zona Centro) is a 15-minute walk southwest of the San Ysidro (California) border crossing. It’s on a grid pattern of north–south avenidas (avenues) and east–west calles (streets). Av Revolución (La Revo), the city’s main tourist artery, runs through Zona Centro.
Information
EMERGENCY & MEDICAL SERVICES
Dial 066 for crime, fire and medical emergencies. If you are the victim of a crime, you can call the state government’s tourist assistance number ( 078).
Central police station (Av Constitución 1616) At the corner of Calle 8a (Hidalgo) in Zona Centro.
Hospital General ( 684-0922; Av Centenario 10851)
INTERNET RESOURCES
www.tijuanaonline.org – official website of the Tijuana Convention & Visitors Bureau, with sights, lodging and dining suggestions, and helpful tips.
MONEY
Although the currency here is Mexican pesos (written with a dollar sign locally) everyone accepts – even prefers – US dollars (written ‘dlls’), and many establishments accept credit cards. Carry small US bills or you may end up receiving change in pesos (at a poor exchange rate). Numerous casas de cambio (currency-exchange houses) change money and travelers checks. Banks offer slightly better rates; most also have ATMs, generally the cheapest and most convenient solution.
TOURIST INFORMATION
Visit the following information centers:
Avenida Revolución ( 685-2210; 10am-4pm Mon-Thu, 10am-7pm Fri-Sun) Between Calles 3a and 4a.
San Ysidro Border Crossing ( 607-3097; 9am-6pm Mon-Thu, 9am-7pm Fri & Sat, 9am-3pm Sun) Just within Mexico.
VISAS & IMMIGRATION
US citizens or permanent residents not intending to go past the border zone (ie beyond Ensenada), or to stay in the border zone more than 72 hours, don’t need a visa. All visitors, however, must bring their passport and US visa (if needed) for re-entry to the US.
Dangers & Annoyances
Officials are cracking down on petty crime, but theft, pickpocketing, short-changing, bill-padding and the ‘gringo-tax’ still happen. Bottom line when shopping: that $5 necklace probably isn’t gold.
Driving in Tijuana can be an annoyance, car theft a danger. Don’t leave anything valuable visible in your car, and park in a guarded garage or lot.
The Zona Norte, Tijuana’s seedy red-light district west of Av Revolución and north of Calle 1a (Artículo 123), is not recommended after dark for foreigners lacking street savvy.
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HOT TOPIC: THE POROUS BORDER
In the 2004 satirical film A Day without a Mexican, a mysterious fog whisks away California’s 14 million Latino residents, and chaos ensues.
The equation is simple: economic opportunity drives Mexican laborers north, and vocal opposition in the US is putting pressure on lawmakers to do something about those who have entered illegally. Decades of efforts to curb illegal immigration have led to hundreds of miles of border fence, vigilante ‘Minutemen’ patrolling the borders of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, and measures in municipalities across the nation barring undocumented immigrants from obtaining drivers’ licenses, educational funding and social services. And immigrants keep on coming, despite ever-greater risk to life and limb.
In 2006, attempts in the US Congress to impose tough new measures led to immigrants’ rights marches in dozens of cities – the largest, in Los Angeles, topped out at an estimated 2 million; the bill failed. In 2007, Congress failed again in its attempt to tackle the problem