Neighborhood Celebrates the Paving of a Street

Tina Acosta, who grew up in the El Dorado Avenue house her father has owned for nearly 50 years, vividly remembers the blight on the street.

“It was all dirt and people would throw bottles and glasses because they probably thought it was a dumping ground,” Acosta said. “It was horrible.”

On Friday, Acosta came back to join a group of neighborhood residents, including Los Angeles City Councilman Alex Padilla, in a ceremony to celebrate the paving of the street and the addition of a sidewalk and landscaping.

Padilla, along with area children and residents, placed handprints in the wet cement of the new sidewalk at El Dorado Avenue and Van Nuys Boulevard.

Work on the street began about a year ago, and on Friday a handful of city street maintenance workers poured the last block of cement and then looked on and cheered with people from the neighborhood.

“I grew up 2 1/2 blocks from here and if you ask any resident if El Dorado would ever get paved, they’d say, ‘Never!’ ” Padilla said.

“Kids no longer have to walk to school in the mud or risk getting hit by cars.”