In the 20th century, local governments in Mexico have promoted municipal or public markets or to better regulate the selling of goods traditionally available in . In Mexico City, some of the better known of these markets are La Merced, Abelardo L. Rodriguez Market and Mercado Lagunilla. La Merced is located in an area that had been a huge for most of the colonial period as it was located at the edge of a lake (now drained). The Abelardo L. Rodriguez Market was specifically built by the government in the 1930s to try to “modernize” the sale of produce and other staples. It went as far as having a daycare center and a theater and commissioning Diego Rivera to supervise the painting of murals inside. These murals can still be seen today. However, these efforts have not eliminated the tradition; in fact, the number of such informal markets (5,836,000) far surpasses the number of (2,810,000). In Mexico City alone, there are 317 versus 1,357 . One reason is that many of these mercados are not well-maintained and few new ones have been built since the 1970s.