Plaza Benito Juárez, Itzacalco

The Plaza Benito Juárez includes the esplanade in front of the main Alcaldía administrative building. There’s also the “Parque Plaza Benito Juárez” which includes the wooded gardens and parkland directly behind the main building. It’s the site of many of the local government’s most important civic activities, events, and commemorations.

The plaza is said to date from the 1850s when steamships began traveling the City’s canals. President Benito Juárez took to walking the edges of the canals of Iztacalco, then on the southeastern peripery of Mexico City. Although the ancient islands of the Iztacalco Center and Santa Anita Zacatlamanco Huehuetl were continuously inhabited, the municipality was only consolidated at about that time. 

Today the park also honors Silvestre Revueltas (1899–1940). He was a composer, violinist, and well-known orchestra conductor. The bust of him in the park is surrounded by a small Jardín del Arte.

And while the Alcaldía is Mexico City’s smallest, it’s also the most densely populated.  Its esplanade, then, is fittingly complex, crammed with plazas and walkways, and the popular Fuentes Danzantes, i.e.; the dancing fountains (pictured).

The northwest corner of the overall complex is sometimes home to the sculpture “Iztacalco en ascenso” (Iztacalco on the Rise) Artist Patricia Segués created the work in 1991. Restored and rededicated in 2019, it’s only sometimes on display in the gardens here. With or without the sculpture, the area at the corner of Avenida Té and Río Churubusco is one of the complex’s most pleasant. With an educational complex of schools to the immediate south, don’t be surprised if the area isn’t also swarming with school kids when you visit. 

The Iztacalco Alcaldía is about a 20 minute walk directly east of Metro Coyuya. The Metrobús Line 2 station, Iztacalco, is directly to the north of the complex on Avenida Té.