‘Forgotten Fresno’ finally remembered with opening of major connector road | Opinion
Monday marked a momentous occasion, both in Fresno and in the Galvan household.
The city celebrated the long-awaited opening of Veterans Boulevard, a vital road improvement project for northwest Fresno and neighborhoods west of Highway 99 in particular.
And the Galvans, who live in a subdivision near The Island waterpark, can finally go on a family bike ride without driving to Woodward Park or Clovis.
“We had to go elsewhere because the roads around here were too dangerous,” said Candy Galvan, who attended Monday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony on the new overpass with her 9-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son.
“But yesterday we walked this, and my husband and I think the kids can bike ride it safely.”
Opinion
Four decades since its conception — the name first appeared in Fresno’s 1984 general plan — and roughly two decades in the funding and construction stages, Veterans Boulevard finally exists. The entire 2.5-mile diagonal connection from Herndon and Polk avenues, east of 99, to Shaw and Grantland avenues, west of 99, fully opened to traffic at 5 a.m. Tuesday, including the new freeway interchange about a mile south of Herndon.
The $140 million project, cobbled together with federal, state and local Measure C funds, includes the six-lane roadway and adjacent bike and pedestrian trail that is protected from car traffic and, in a first for the region, crosses the freeway ramps in a grade-separated cloverleaf.
A litany of local and politicians spoke to commemorate the opening and, in a rarity for these types of occasions, hardly anyone uttered a gross exaggeration. Though Mayor Jerry Dyer probably tiptoed that line by calling it “one of the most meaningful and historic moments in the history of Fresno.”
Street ‘will change our lives’
Still, for residents accustomed to waiting several minutes in long traffic backups to access or cross Highway 99 at Shaw and at Herndon, only to then get stuck waiting for a slow-moving train at a railroad crossing, the positives are difficult to overstate.
Especially for folks making that drive several times a day to commute to work, take the kids to school, go shopping or reach a medical appointment.
Several hundred people attended the ribbon-cutting, many of them government employees and former members of the armed forces. The podium was backdropped by two Fresno fire trucks with a giant American flag that hung lengthwise between each truck’s extended ladder.
Onlookers to the pomp and ceremony were Fresno residents that have been watching the construction of Veterans Boulevard progress for years and are eager to take advantage of the finished product.
Chris Maldonado, who also lives near The Island, estimated the new road and overpass will save him 20 minutes per day just driving his daughter to and from Rio Vista Middle School on the other side of the freeway. But time savings is only part of the benefit.
“When the water park is busy, we can barely leave our homes. We can’t leave our area because cars are backed up all the way to Shaw,” Maldonado said.
“It’s scary thinking about what would happen if we had a medical emergency when the roads are congested. … This will change our lives.”
‘I’ve been waiting 20 years’
The only person who biked to Monday’s ceremony was Jason Oxford, a Central High graduate who’s lived his “entire life” west of 99. (Mine was in my truck, and I rode the new bike path after everyone left.)
Oxford spent 15 years bike commuting from his home near Olive and Grantland avenues to his job at Herndon and First Street. Which involved crossing 99 on narrow freeway overpasses designed and built at a time when this part of northwest Fresno was little else but truck stops and fig orchards.
Can hardly imagine how harrowing some of those rides must’ve been.
“I’ve been waiting for this for 20 years, literally,” Oxford said as one of the politicians gave a speech.
“It’s very smooth and wide. There’s plenty of room for bikes, cars, everyone. I haven’t gone all the way to Herndon yet. But that will happen today.”
A few speakers used the occasion to stump for Measure C, the county transportation tax that provided the largest share of funding for Veterans Boulevard – $79.9 million – either directly or through developer fees. (Future plans to extend the road a half mile south to Grantland, and perhaps all the way to Highway 180, may or may not hinge on its uncertain renewal.)
To me, the rightful focus should be on residents of “forgotten Fresno” that purchased homes west of 99 and have second-guessed that decision ever since.
People like Candy Galvan. Whose family can finally go on a bike ride without first getting in their car.
“We’re really excited to see this come all the way to fruition,” she said. “It feels like the area just got an upgrade.”
