I-15 Extension Project Reaches a Crossroads

In a recent newsletter about a state-planned project to extend Interstate 15 through City Heights, community leaders ran an illustration that depicted the highway as a giant hand, crushing their neighborhood.

But, in that same newsletter, the same community leaders contended that, with the proper design, the I-15 project could become a centerpiece for the blighted neighborhood’s revitalization.

The eight-lane, 2.2-mile stretch of pavement has been on the California Department of Transportation’s drawing board since 1959, but some neighborhood activists say the project is nearing a critical period in its development. They say planning and negotiations with Caltrans during the next few months will determine which of the two prophecies presented in the newsletter will be fulfilled.

In the early 1980s, residents were convinced that the highway would destroy their neighborhood, and they fought vehemently against it. But, since Caltrans began buying parcels of land along the proposed roadway’s path about three years ago, some of the residents have altered their stance on I-15.

“The feeling now is, do it right or don’t do it at all,” said Jim Bliesner, founder of the City Heights Community Development Corp. “We’re trying to get them to do it right.”

For starters, the residents would like to see Caltrans accelerate its efforts to clear abandoned houses along the construction site, which is just east of 40th Street between Interstate 8 and Interstate 805. The vacant houses have been vandalized, burned or inhabited by drug dealers and transients in recent months, said Frank Gormlie, another member of the City Heights Community Development Corp.

“Those abandoned buildings give the whole community a sense of blight,” Gormlie said. “Right now, it’s a no-man, no-woman’s land.”

Many of the vacant lots in the neighborhood are now used for flea markets, used car sales and even trash dumps, Gormlie said.

And, since actual construction on the project isn’t scheduled to begin until 1993, the residents would like to borrow the cleared land for temporary use--such as parks, gardens, athletic fields or a police substation, said Barry Schultz, the neighborhood group’s president.

Residents have already organized committees that will decide which uses would be most feasible and how the residents could raise funds to pay for them, Gormlie said.

“At the minimum, it’s the responsibility of Caltrans and the state to remove the blight from that area,” Schultz said. “I think the temporary uses are as feasible as Caltrans wants them to be.”

But those ideas are just a small component of the neighborhood group’s plan.

In at least three cities--Phoenix, Seattle and Boston--road builders have constructed freeways in tunnels beneath ground, with development on top of the tunnels. City Heights leaders seem convinced that a covered freeway would be a good freeway. In addition to insulating the neighborhood from the freeway’s air and noise pollution, they reason that the space on top of the freeway could be used to construct some sort of commercial or cultural center for City Heights.

City Councilman John Hartley likens that idea to making lemonade from lemons.

“It needs to be some sort of use that’s going to draw people there,” Hartley said of the prospective development. “There are a lot of possibilities.”

Although a conventional freeway would cut the community in half, a covered freeway could give it a shot in the arm, Gormlie said.

“There’s a need for a new public library,” Schultz added. “There’s a need for a new police substation. There’s a need for a new cultural center.”

The City Heights group plans to hire a consultant to study the feasibility of building a covered freeway, and its members believe the study could be completed within the next nine months.

Caltrans officials say they’re willing to listen to the ideas, but all of those ideas will have to overcome the same obstacle that has kept the project in the planning stages for the past three decades: a shortage of money.

For example, a one-block section of freeway cover would cost about $18 million to build, said Glen Sparrow, one of Hartley’s aides.

“We don’t conceive that to be feasible at this point,” said Steve Saville, a Caltrans spokesman.

Caltrans has already tentatively planned to cover one block of the freeway just northwest of Central Elementary School, and the city has committed to pay for another block of cover, two blocks farther south, Saville said.

But a neighborhood task force concluded that nothing less than 5 1/2 blocks of covered freeway would satisfy the area’s residents, Schultz said.

If, as some community leaders have suggested, the business owners who leased space on a larger cover would be willing to pay the construction costs, Saville said, “We’d be willing to take a look at it.”

“We want to cooperate with the community as much as possible,” Saville said. “Basically, at this point we are willing to listen to all kinds of ideas.”

Last week, Hartley met with Jesus Garcia, Caltrans district director, to discuss the project for the first time. They decided then to form a task force that would “open a dialogue” between City Heights residents and Caltrans officials, Saville said.

And Caltrans’ plans are not yet set in asphalt, Saville said.

“We don’t want to put in a facility that the public is going to hate,” Saville said. “We’re a public agency, and we’re here to serve the public.”