Sonora, Mexico Border Towns

View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Bowling Green State University: ScholarWorks@BGSU Visions in Leisure and Business Volume 17 Number 4 Article 3 1999 Variability of Tourist Attraction on an International Boundary: Sonora, Mexico Border Towns Daniel D. Arreola Arizona State University Kenneth Madsen Arizona State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/visions Recommended Citation Arreola, Daniel D. and Madsen, Kenneth (1999) "Variability of Tourist Attraction on an International Boundary: Sonora, Mexico Border Towns," Visions in Leisure and Business: Vol. 17 : No. 4 , Article 3. Available at: https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/visions/vol17/iss4/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at ScholarWorks@BGSU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Visions in Leisure and Business by an authorized editor of ScholarWorks@BGSU. VARIABILITYOF TOURIST ATTRACTIONON AN INTERNATIONAL BOUNDARY: SONORA, MEXICO BORDER TOWNS BY DR. DANIELD. ARREOLA, PROFESSOR AND MR. KENNETH MADSEN, MASTER'S STUDENT DEPARTMENT OF GEOGRAPHY ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY TEMPE, ARIZONA 85287-0104 ABSTRACT activity. Tourism is an activity especially common to political boundaries (38, 39). This paper explores how and why tourism Along the nearly 2000-mile long border that and tourist districts in border towns vary separates Mexico from the United States, along a single international boundary. A tourism has existed in some formfor nearly a. perception about Mexican border tourism century. In a recent study ofMexican border holds that the boundary itself is the primary towns, tourist functions were found. in all 1 & stimulus to development. While almost communities examined, primarily on the everyMexican border town has some tourist Mexican side of the boundary (6). Although, function, the nature and extent of that activ Mexican shopping is an important activity on ity will vary with a host of exogenous fac the American side of these border towns, it is tors. We argue that Mexican border city not considered here. Unlike American tour tourism is largely a function of these diverse ist shopping in Mexican border towns, which external factors more than simply a presence is characterized by curios and souvenirs, and on the international boundary. Successful similar to Canadian-American cross-border tourism in the Mexican border cities is linked shopping, Mexican border town residents to historic advantage and age of settlement, chieflyshop forretail goods on the American as well as access, degree of promotional ef side (18, 40, 43). fort, and media exposure: To illustrate this assertion, we compare tourist development Tourism is Mexico's second major source of and the creation and absence of tourist dis foreign exchange and a primary employment tricts at two separate locations along the So sector. In 1991, tourism generated circa nora-Arizona border: Nogales and San Luis USD $4 billion and employed nearly 2 mil RioColorado. lion people (14). Historically, the Mexican border towns have been major day-trip tour ist destinations and revenue accumulators. INTRODUCTION As early as 1968, the border accounted for 70 percent of tourist spending in Mexico (8). An axiom of political geographic under standing is that borders both repel and attract 19 While every border town has some tourist boundary is varied. A large part of this trade function, it is highly variable by location on function at the Arizona border relates to the the international boundary. The presence of Mexican winter fresh produce grown in the border is a necessary precondition for southern Sonora and Sinaloa and exported day tourism, but boundary location alone through Nogales, Sonora, to cold storage does not predict successful tourism. Rather, warehouses on the Nogales, Arizona, side of tourism success is linked to a suite of exoge the boundary. Nogales, Sonora, (population nous factors including historic advantage of 108, 000 in 1990 according to the latest cen location, access and connection to the other sus ( 13) but local officials claim a population side of the border, and promotional cam of 300,000 (22)) has been affected by con paigns and media exposure that create a siderable industrial activity where some 79 tourist destination identity. maquiladora assembly plants employ 31,23 2, which also contributes to border trade (41 ). This paper compares tourist activity at two Mexican locations along the Sonora-Arizona The Sonoran Economic Development Cor boundary to demonstrate how factors other poration reported that some 560,000 tourists than proximity to a boundary shape tourism visited Sonora from Arizona in 1990 gener on the Mexico-U.S. border. Six Mexican ating more than USD $36 million (25); most towns are located along the Sonora-Arizona of these visitors to Sonora (some 58 percent) boundary (Figure 1 ), and four of these figure entered via Nogales (33). To most North as tourist gateways/destinations (Naco and American visitors,' Nogales, Sonora, is a Sasabe are functionally non-tourist towns). shopping destination located three hours This paper examines Nogales, Sonora, a suc from Phoenix by interstate highway and less cessful tourist node, and contrasts it to San than one hour from Tucson (Figure· 1). A Luis Rio Colorado, Sonora, a city of compa recent guidebook called the town one of the rable population size, yet one without a sig cleanest and safest on the Mexican border nificant tourist presence. This assessment (10). draws on data collected from U.S. and Mexican censuses, archival materials in local Before Nogales, Sonora, was a tourist desti repositories, published guidebooks, and in nation, it was a railroad junction, a gateway terviews and observations made in the field. condition that ultimately influenced its trade An examination of the variability of tourist appeal and tourism potential. Founded as a attractiveness along a single international railroad crossing on the international frontier boundary reveals how historical and geo in 1880, Nogales became a node on the trade graphical factors create the potential for route that linked the Mexican port of Guay tourism growth. mas on the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California) with Tucson, Arizona (Figure I). In effect, Nogales became a pivot point along the stem NOGALES of a giant T that linked Tucson to Los An geles, El Paso, and Guaymas. Imagine Tuc In 1997, tiny Nogales, Arizona, (population son at the intersection of the cross-bar cre circa 19,500) ranked fourth in combined ating the T with Los Angeles to the west and . trade (import and export) among all U.S.- El Paso to the east like antipodes of the T Mexico ports of entry behind Laredo, El top. Nogales was a hinge point on the stem Paso, and San Ysidro (37). While each of of the T which was, in reality, a Southern these locations lies adjacent to a Mexican Pacific railroad extension that connected border town, the nature of trade across the Tucson to Guaymas. 20 Although Mexican Nogales and American bution from Mexico to the United States. Nogales were platted as two separate politi Nogales, therefore, became one of a select cal entities, the towns developed as a single, few border locales with paved highway ac bi-cultural community (35). Nevertheless, cess to the interior· of Mexico, making the Mexican Nogales had always maintained a Sonoran border town a major international 50 ft. setback from the boundary. The U.S. transit point, in the same league with Ciudad side, at one time called Line City, was built Juarez and Nuevo Laredo on the· Texas bor right up to the border. In 1897, the U.S. der. Traffic through Nogales to Mexico•s · attorney general, by presidential proclama interior nearly doubled· between 1954 and tion, ordered the clearing of all buildings 1959, climbing from 38,000 to 73,000 per within 60 ft. of the international boundary, sons (35). resulting in a 110 ft. aisle between the two towns (32). In 1917, as a result of hostilities Ten years later in 1969, Interstate 19 linked associated with the Mexican Revolution, a Nogales, Arizona to Tucson. The border fence was erected by the U.S. government was now easily accessible to Tucson and by on its side of the boundary, physically divid- extension to Interstate 10, to Phoenix. To · ing Ambos Nogales, or the two Nogaleses, day, Mexican Nogales is a tourist destination as the border community came to be known serving a hinterland of more than 3 million (34). people. Only Tijuana across fromSan Diego and Southern California is proximate to a BeforeProhibition in 1918, Nogales; Sonora, larger tourist market. This accessibility of evidenced no tourist functions except the Nogales to large urban, areas with potential public market, which was run by Chinese tourists should not be underestimated .. immigrants and reportedly an outlet for fresh Pearce notes that " [ t]or developments which vegetables and provisions. By the early do not constitute a tourist ensemble in them 1920s, however, Nogales, like other Mexi-· selves, proximity to . the market becomes can border toWDS, was a popular destination particularly critical" (J.l, p. 33). If not for for Americans who sought entertainment in the foundational access of this twin-town· Mexico's "wet palaces." The_ Sonoran border junction along the· border to markets in both town became locally and regionally known countries (particularly tourists from Ari for its cafes and restaurants, many with zona), Nogales could not have developed dance floors and orchesfras during lunch and into the tourist destination that it has become dinner hours and where patrons could order even with the presence of other facto�s. booze with legal disregard for the Volstead Relative to other tourist destinations, No Act-the U.S. law that created Prohibition. gales is much closer to. Tucsol) than Tucson is to· other major Arizona attractions, in The town's tourist reputation was boosted in cluding Phoenix and the Grand Canyon.

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