Founded in 1576 and the largest city in the central state of Guanajuato in Mexico, León de los Aldamas has a population of just over 1 million. Its well-known for its leather and shoe industries and is the industrial and commercial center for the region in Mexico known as The Bajío.

León is an overindustrialized city which lacks a public transportation system capable of handling the increase in traffic it has experienced during the boom in growth over the past half century (it had a population of 100,000 in the 1940s). The main plaza of the city and its downtown has slowly decayed, and its one-way streets are filled with traffic every morning and evening by many people who work and live there. Several large markets serve the populace in this Zona Centro.

The outer ring road, known as the Periférico, has seen alot of development over the years, with neighborhoods developing all around.

There is only one limited-access roadway which runs from the north side of the city to the south, running along a dried-out riverbed once known as the Rio de los Gómez but now knows as the Malecón. The city has expanded this road in one of its attempts to deal with the traffic. Another attempt to curb traffic has been to modernize the public autobus system using four main bus stations located in the cardinal points of the city (North, South, East and West), but the plans and projects haven't been implemented yet. Three highways pass through the city (turning into urban thoroughfares once inside the city limits): Federal Highway 45 which runs northwest (two-lane) out of the city to Lagos de Moreno and southeast (four-lane free) of the city to Silao, Federal Highway 45D which runs northwest (four-lane toll) out of the northwest, bypassing Lagos de Moreno and reaching the city of Aguascalientes, and Highway 57 which runs northeast (two-lane) out of the city to San Felipe.

A small three-gate airport called the Bajio International Airport (BJX, IIRC) is located 15 miles southeast of downtown, down Highway 45, with incoming flights from Los Angeles, Chicago, San Jose, Houston and Dallas.

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