Linares is a town and municipality in the province of Jaén, traditionally known for its mining industry. The city is located in the Betic depression and at the crossroads between Andalusia, the Central Plateau and the Levante, and its strategic position has been a factor in its development. The railway line connects it directly to Madrid, Barcelona, Seville, Almería and Jaén. It is the capital and head of the judicial district of the Sierra Morena shire and the second most populated city in the province of Jaén with 55,261 inhabitants (INE 2024). The municipality covers an area of 197.5 km² and encompasses the city of Linares and the local autonomous entity of Estación de Linares-Baeza.

The mining wealth of the municipality has its peak between the mid-nineteenth and twentieth centuries, with the industrialisation of lead mining and the consequent development of metallurgical activity. The city asserted itself as an important industrial centre and threatened Jaén with the change of province capital. However, the mining decline and the closure of the Santana Motor car factory meant that the 21st century brought high unemployment rates to Linares, only surpassed nationally by Ceuta and La Línea de la Concepción.

Due to the prosperity of the 19th century, the city reached 1940 with good public facilities, such as the Mercado de Abastos, the Marqueses de Linares Hospital, the Guardia Civil Station, and the Europa, Santa Engracia and Tetuán schools, all built according to the same model. However, the constant increase in population led to the construction of new neighbourhoods and facilities. The Girón and Obra Sindical del Hogar neighbourhoods were built on the road to the Station, apart from the urban centre until the construction of the La Paz neighbourhood. The Casa de Juventud, the Ambulatorio del Seguro de Enfermedad (end of the 1950s) and the Edificio de Sindicatos (1965) were built in the area of the 19th century expansion. The industrial building of Silos de Aceite, in Paseo de Linarejos, is also a notable edifice from that period.

Meanwhile, to the north-east of the city, the Barriada Santa Ana was built to house workers, and to the north of the Arroyo de Baños there was a proliferation of workers' housing with unregulated growth. The demographic pressure in these areas led to the installation of school facilities such as the Colegio Padre Poveda, the Colegio de la Zarzuela and the school of Andalusia’s Urgency Plan, Santa Teresa. In the 1970s, the northern area began to consolidate with the delineation of the Polígono de Arrayanes. Also from the 1970’s, it can be found the outstanding buildings of Mercado de La Paz and Central Telefónica.

Towards the west, the Avenida de Andalucía was opened in the 1970s to divert traffic from the Córdoba-Valencia road [in 2025 C/ Áurea Galindo] to a wider pathway, and the area between that and the Avenida de San Cristóbal was urbanised. In the 70s and 80s, large facilities such as the San Agustín Hospital, the second ‘Cástulo’ Secondary School, the Centro de Formación Profesional and the Mariano de La Paz Sports Facilities were installed there.