Many longtime residents are fuming about the prison’s demise. After several failed protests, some have even sued to compel the city to rebuild the complex — which included police and fire stations — exactly as it was, arguing that it was illegally demolished.

“We don’t have too many historical references that can fortify our identity as Tijuanenses,” said Victor Clark Alfaro, a human rights advocate and lifelong resident. “Maybe in terms of architecture, they’re not extraordinary, but they represent the history of the city.”

Preservation disputes are rarely about bricks or design alone, and in the case of La Ocho the argument has become a proxy for this city’s larger struggle over identity, and how much of Tijuana’s sordid past should shape its future. Now, perhaps more than ever, this sprawling border city of 1.6 million people is at a turning point.

Illegal emigration to the United States is down and the tsunami of American tourists that defined Tijuana, starting with Prohibition in the 1920s, has receded as fears of crime and dread over the time it takes to cross the border back into California have increased. Many of the bars that once catered to American students coming here to party are now closed with steel gates. Some say it will be a decade before the flow of young Americans returns.