Street in Dire Straits : Residents Pave Way for Improvements to Their Service Road, Last Sealed in ’56

The year 1956 is remembered as a fine year. Yankee pitcher Don Larsen hurled a perfect game against the Dodgers in the World Series, President Eisenhower was elected to a second term, and the 8600 and 8700 blocks of Katella Avenue were repaved by the city.

But it was also the last time that stretch of asphalt was paved by the city.

“We think of ourselves as the orphans of Garden Grove,” said Marge Leonard, who has lived along the street for 22 years with her husband, Don.

After persistent complaining, the street’s residents won a small victory last week when their service road along Katella Avenue was included on a list of street projects approved by the City Council.

“One look at the street and it is apparent the dire straits we are in,” said Rosemary McQuinney, the self-appointed activist of the neighborhood who has been nagging city officials for more than a decade to smooth over the street decay. “No one knows we exist until tax time.”

But now the wait may be over.

The city “guarantees to have the street repaved in 30 to 60 days,” said Jim Howell, street maintenance manager in Garden Grove. He said the street was to be repaved last year but the job was put off when funding fell short.

The street is inside the city limits of Garden Grove but has an Anaheim mailing address. One side of the street is lined with homes, the other with a barrier of hedges that separates the houses from the thoroughfare on the main Katella Avenue and the unincorporated area of Stanton.

“It is not the only (street) in the city that has gone untouched for 20 or 30 years,” Howell said. “We are aware which streets in our city are in need of repaving, and every year we prioritize them.”

Howell said this particular street has been off the priority list for so long because it is a short lane with houses on only one side. The city budget for street maintenance has not increased as fast as the need, he said, so well-traveled streets with homes on both sides are attended to first.

Maintenance officials from other cities say Garden Grove is not the only city that has fallen behind its street maintenance schedule.

“Generally, streets should be sealed every seven years, but when city funding is short, many times streets can go 10 years or so without anything being done,” said Doris Taylor, street maintenance and sanitation manager in Anaheim. “Usually a road will last only about 15 years if nothing is done for it.”