Tijuana

Tijuana (/tiːˈwɑːnə/ tee-WHAH-nə; Spanish: [tiˈxwana]) is the largest city in Baja California and on the Baja California Peninsula and center of the Tijuana metropolitan area, part of the international San Diego–Tijuana metropolitan area. As an industrial and financial center of Mexico, Tijuana exerts a strong influence on economics, education, culture, art, and politics. As the city has become a leading center in the country, so has the surrounding metropolitan area, a major industrial and paramount metropolis in northwestern Mexico. Currently one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in Mexico, Tijuana maintains global city status. As of 2015, the city of Tijuana had a population of 1,696,923.

On the Gold Coast of Baja California, Tijuana is the municipal seat, cultural, and commercial center of Tijuana Municipality, covering 70% of the municipality but with over 80% of its population. A dominant manufacturing center of the North American continent, the city maintains facilities of numerous multinational conglomerate companies. The 2000s (decade) saw Tijuana become the medical device manufacturing capital of North America. Also a growing cultural center, Tijuana has been recognized as a most important new cultural mecca. The city is the most visited border city in the globe; sharing an approximate 24-kilometre-long border (15 mi) with its sister city San Diego, over fifty million people annually cross the border between these two cities. This metropolitan crossing makes the San Ysidro Port of Entry the busiest land-border crossing in the world. It is estimated that the two border crossing stations between the cities proper of San Diego and Tijuana account for 300,000 daily border crossings alone.

Tijuana River

The Tijuana River (Spanish: Río Tijuana) is an intermittent river, 120 mi (195 km) long, near the Pacific coast of northern Baja California state in northwestern Mexico and Southern California in the western United States.

Location

The Tijuana River drains an arid area along the U.S.—Mexico border, flowing through Mexico for most its course then crossing the border into Southern California for its lower 5 mi (8 km) to empty into the ocean in an estuary on the southern edge of San Diego.

The Tijuana River has two main tributaries. One the Arroyo de Alamar or Rio Alamar, runs in its upper reaches in the United States as Cottonwood Creek. It runs from its source in the Laguna Mountains southwestward where it is impounded in by two dams, Barrett and Morena, to supply water to the city of San Diego. Cottonwood Creek is joined by the Tecate Creek before it enters Mexico where it is known as the Arroyo de Alamar from the point where it enters Mexico to its confluence with the larger tributary, the Arroyo de las Palmas, that forms the headwaters of the Tijuana River within the city.

Tijuana Municipality

Tijuana Municipality is a municipality in the Mexican state of Baja California. Its municipal seat is located in the city of Tijuana. According to the 2010 census, the municipality had a population of 1,559,683 inhabitants, of whom 1,300,983, or 83.4%, lived in the city of Tijuana. The municipality maintained its position as 3rd most populated nationally as of 2015 census, only behind Ecatepec de Morelos and Itzapalapa (DF). Carlos Bustamante Anchondo of the PRI is the current municipal president. Most notably, residents from Tijuana city, which barely budged in population, moved to the municipality in the 5 years preceding the 2010 Census, indeed the non-city portion has gained over 140,000 residents. Much of this historic movement could be explained by the drug violence, as residents seek isolated suburban communities outside city limits to escape it. The municipality comprises the largest part of the Tijuana metropolitan area.

Tijuana is bordered to the south by the municipalities of Rosarito Beach and Ensenada; to the east, by the municipality of Tecate; to the west, by the Pacific Ocean; and to the north, by the international border with the United States, specifically the County of San Diego, California. The area of the municipality of Tijuana is 879.2 km² (339.46 sq mi); the municipality includes part of the Coronado Islands, located off the coast of the municipality in the Pacific Ocean.