Tijuana / Zona Rio

Downtown Tijuana, commonly known as Zona Río or Río Zone, is the Central business district (CBD) of Tijuana. Zona Río is located at a strategic point, in the north of the city, about 1 mile (1.6 km) from the U.S.-Mexico border and 9 miles (14 km) from Centre City in San Diego. The Río Zone is within the Centre borough, a main borough of Tijuana, and close to Tijuana International Airport. The Río Zone, as the CBD of Tijuana, is home to most of the commercial and financial businesses in the city as well as the city's main health services. The majority of Tijuana's banks, hotels, shopping squares, large hospitals, restaurants, and many other businesses are headquartered here, along Zona Río's three main avenues. Although being comparatively small in comparison with other Mexican cities central business districts, such as those of Monterrey and Guadalajara, Zona Río has notable skyscrapers, which due to the relative distance between them, are very prominent. The tallest buildings are the 28-story twin towers that are home for the Plaza Aguacaliente and Grand Hotel Tijuana, commonly known by locals as Las Torres or The Towers. Road of the Heroes Avenue One of the most important avenues in the whole city of Tijuana is the Road of the Heroes (Paseo de los Héroes). Along this avenue are located most of the financial, commercial, and touristic businesses of Zona Río and the entire city. Insurance companies, numerous banks, such as BBVA-Bancomer and Banamex, and shopping squares, such as Plaza Río Tijuana, the largest mall in the city, have their headquarters in this avenue. The cultural heart-point of the city, the Tijuana Cultural Center, is on Paseo de los Héroes. Two recently-built skyscrapers are exclusively occupied by two different hospitals and its corporations. Most of the high-end hotels of the entire city are located in Paseo de los Héroes avenue. Paseo de los Héroes is also noted for its many monuments and sculptures, like the Monumento a la Raza (Spanish for Monument to the Race), the Abraham Lincoln statue, the Ignacio Zaragoza statue, the Cuauhtémoc statue, the Lázaro Cárdenas statue, and others, to which the avenue largely owes its name, Road of the Heroes. Sanchez Taboada Boulevard In contrast to Paseo de los Heroes or Aguacaliente Boulevard, this is not one of the main avenues of the whole city, but rather only of Zona Río. This avenue is the main gastronomical corridor of Zona Río, offering the widest variety of gastronomy in the entire city. There are restaurants offering food from Thailand, Mongolia, Greece, Brazil or Israel, not to mention the typical Italian, Spanish, French, Argentinian, Chinese and American foods, plus the widespread Japanese sushi. As regards of Mexican food, the common tacos, Baja California-seafood, and the antojitos (Spanish term for traditional Mexican food), they are found almost everywhere in the avenue. Aguacaliente Boulevard This is one of the most important and largest avenues in the city, together with Paseo de los Héroes, with both crossing nearly the entire city. Prior to the opening of Tijuana's new airport at Otay district in 1958, the city's former airport was located along present-day Aguacaliente Blvd. Also one of the main gastronomical corridors in the city, and a touristic and commercial avenue, Aguacaliente Boulevard may be a combination of both Paseo de los Heroes and Sanchez Taboada Boulevard, but with a characteristic of being the place where sports auditoriums and stadiums are located. The Aguacaliente Hippodrome and Racetrack is located here. The Municipal Auditorium of Tijuana, home of both of Tijuana's basketball teams, and the Estadio Casas GeoCaliente Stadium, home of the city's newly formed soccer team. The tallest buildings of Tijuana, Las Torres, are located here, along some other buildings and public hospitals. By: Juan Manuel Pacheco