Trip 6: Day 1 (Santa Clarita, Canyon Country, Palmdale)

Throughout the 1950's, the Harbor Freeway was extended south from the Four-Level Interchange (the 101 & 110 interchange, that held that name even in the 1950's) into the area referred to as the "Harbor Gateway" - the strip of land between Downtown Los Angeles and the San Pedro/Wilmington neighborhoods (formerly independent cities) that allowed the City of Los Angeles to annex the Port of Los Angeles area in 1906 (by California law, a city's incorporation boundaries must be contiguous).
As the freeway was extended, US 6 was rerouted; originally along Figueroa through Downtown LA, it had made it to Santa Barbara Avenue (now Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard) along the current Interstate 110 by 1956. As it was rerouted, you can piece together what's already known about the affect the rise of the automobile and the freeway had on Downtown LA.
As we strolled along US 6's former stomping grounds this afternoon, a block from a farmers market, it was clear that the rebirth of Downtown LA, something that has been prophesized for decades by real estate developers, has happened. The hipsters have move into their lofts, opened their upscale markets, and are ready to price out the mostly Latino population that currently shops in the areas. In the meantime, it's a weird mix of art deco buildings serving as evangelical churches, housing Irish pubs and just being outright abandoned in their upper floors. Downtown's rejuvenation means that this, one of the last bastions of gentrification resistance (not by choice, but by simple rejection from those who would gentrify it) has finally lost the war.
While I waited for my ride at the bustling Union Station, three men came up to ask me for change (all for public transit fares, of course). LA's Skid Row, just outside the renovated Union Station driveways' reaches, still exists and may always exist. Even San Diego's equivalent has refused to be pushed out by the more gentrified, condo-centric "East Village" neighborhood. You can push the poor and homeless into smaller quarters, but you can't just price them out of your city.

The middle-class have taken the hint though, and have been priced out of both the Los Angeles and San Fernando Valleys. Cross Newhall Pass on the Sierra Highway, and you enter into the City of Santa Clarita. Once several unique unincorporated and mostly rural communities, the city was created in 1987 to fend off annexation threats from nearby incorporated areas (mainly Los Angeles). Now, it's the 18th largest city in the state, and the third largest city in Los Angeles County, just after LA and Long Beach. This part of old US 6 was used as the filming location for Steven Spielberg's "The Duel" and, despite the strip malls and brown arid hills line with newly-constructed trailer homes, you can still see it.

But I started with Arroyo Seco Parkway, now known as the Pasadena Freeway, heading north from Chinatown, through the Figueroa Street Tunnels. This is the oldest section of the Los Angeles freeway system. The tunnels were built in the 1930's as part of Figueroa Street, and have never been rebuilt. From there, I took the dangerous and congested off-ramp toward Interstate 5 north, and followed it all the way to the City of San Fernando.

San Fernando is an urban enclave - completely surrounded by the City of Los Angeles, but wholly separate. Demographics have made the municipality interesting: the white population, though mostly leaving the area decades ago, has begun to again move in, pricing out the mostly Latino population, as the city keeps a separate, higher ground from the surrounding low-end Sylmar and Pacoima districts of Los Angeles, which remain decidedly Latino. Sunday afternoon on San Fernando Road in the city brought out the town: people strolled passed the boot stores, jewelers and dollar stores, chatting with each other, and watching the drunk and just generally crazy men prowl the streets. Teenage girls ate candy from bags by their mothers, and little boys followed their parents as they ambled down the street, staring into shop windows. The only separating 2010's San Fernando Road from 1960's San Fernando Road is the ethnicity of the people.

Entering into Sylmar, the neighborhood degrades into an industrial waste of auto shops, recycling plants and partially open drug motels on the west side, while the east side is the old railroad track. This section of San Fernando Road was once both US 6 and US 99, and was the historic entrance to the San Fernando Valley.
Turning off onto the Sierra Highway while essentially in the median of Interstate 5, you cross the San Fernando River and begin the ascent over Newhall Pass. Wagons coming west once followed this route to enter into the coastal chaparral of the San Fernando Valley. In the 1860's, there existed what was known as Beale's Cut: a slice into Newhall Pass to make the ascent less steep. Beale was given permission to collect tolls, and the pass operated until 1910, when the Newhall Tunnel was built by the county. By then, vehicle traffic was too heavy for Beale's Cut to support anyway. The Newhall Tunnel existed up until the 1920's, when it also became clogged with traffic. The result was the more ambitious traverse of Newhall Pass that we see today, that involved a number of larger cuts into the mountains.
Today, Beale's Cut still exists, though it's on private property, behind a fence, and is not easy to even see. When I tried to approach it, there was already someone parked in front of the gate so my intention to get closer was abandoned. A bit up the road though, almost directly west of Beale's Cut, is a monument to both Beale's Cut and the Newhall Tunnel, which was just to the west. The placard for the monument is gone, so all that's left is the stone foundation, and even that is behind a chain-link fence. There was trash strewn around the old parking area, including a shoe on one side of the fence, and a different shoe on the other side. Traffic cruised by on the 4-lane road at a good clip, and I could imagine the pull-off where I was was a popular spot for speed traps.

 

Going over the pass, you enter the former town of Newhall. Originally a railroad stop, the town was one of several that merged to form the City of Santa Clarita and was now a sprawling, faceless suburban wasteland. The tract housing in the hillsides in the distance signaled the entrance to the Santa Clarita Valley, one of the fastest growing regions in California.

North of Golden Valley Road, Sierra Highway is a strip of condo and apartment complexes, and low-end retail. At Via Princessa, maps show an unusual ramp system leading on to CA 14 to the east. This was actually a planned part of CA 126. As it is today, CA 126 winds through Santa Clarita between I-5 and CA 14 but, in the 1960's, the plan was to route a freeway generally along the Santa Clarita River to connect the two highways. However, neighborhood opposition and lack of interest in funding the project eventually led to it being removed entirely from the plans. The legacy of the CA 126 freeway plan are these long ramps, and a grassy embankment on both sides of Sierra Highway, where the westbound mainlanes would have been.

  

Sierra Highway's intersection with Soledad Canyon Road has quite a bit of history, stemming from its important location as a suitable stopping point for traffic coming in and out of Los Angeles. Until the Antelope Valley Freeway to the east was completed, this was road that Angelenos used to reach the Eastern Sierras and Lake Tahoe. Nicknamed Solemint Junction for the meeting of Soledad Canyon to the east and Mint Canyon to the north, the Solemint Store operated into the 1950's as part general store and part roadside attraction. The business apparently saw much of Hollywood's most famous stars come through at one time or another, on their way to the mountains in the north. Eventually, like most places, it burned down. Today, there's no remnant of the Solemint store or the importance of the intersection, and the it's is now just another strip mall center, with a Yoshinoya and a Nissan dealership.

Solemint Junction in Santa Clarita

Past Soledad Canyon Road, Sierra Highway leaves CA 14's path and enters into Mint Canyon. The area becomes decidedly more rural and the road goes from 4- or 6-lane divided to 2-lane. There's relatively little traffic and the landscape is mostly larger lot homes and horse farms.

Three points of interest along the route that are more just interesting to know than to actually see.
The first is Tony Alamo Christian Church, the base of Alamo Christian Foundation, and headed by convicted child sex offender, Tony Alamo. It started as one of the many Southern California cult-like religious movements in the 1970's (the "Jesus Movement"), but, like most others, became much darker as membership grew. Eventually, Alamo relocated to Arkansas and began a publication and media business. By 1996, the IRS had revoked their tax exempt status, and, by 2009, Alamo had been convicted of ten counts of sex trafficking of minors. At present, it looks like the church may lose its land in the Santa Clarita Valley, as they owe several million dollars in restitution from civil suits filed by Alamo's victims after his conviction and sentencing. The church building still stands but is relatively unassuming in appearance.
The other site of interest is Sweetwater Springs Ranch. Named for the adjacent Agua Dulce community, the ranch was once a Western ghost town themed roadside attraction, built for tourists traveling on the Sierra Highway. By the 1970's, the Antelope Valley Freeway had been completed and sucked up the traffic, so the attraction closed. At present, it serves as a filming location, and still features some of the faux ghost town buildings, including the gold mine.
Just past the Alamo Church is La Chene. The iconic rock building was built in the 1920's as the expansion of a gas station. The restaurant opened 1980 after serving as a roadside diner through the 60's and 70's. La Chene is now a highly-regarded and popular French restaurant.

Sierra Highway south of
Escondido Canyon Road

Snaking through the rolling hills of the Agua Dulce area, you eventually again reach CA 14. For the next few miles, the old path of US 6 closely follows the freeway. At Crown Valley Road is the community of Acton, though much of the community lies to the south, and all that's at the intersection is a strip mall and a few fast food places. The Acton Metrolink commuter rail station is just a bit farther down, along Sierra Highway. The station building was designed to look like a building from an Old West town, a homage to the motion picture production that occurred in the area.

   

Sierra Highway again separates from the path of CA 14 at its CA 138 exit. Historically, the US 6 - CA 138 intersection was a bit farther east, and is now the intersection of Sierra Highway and Pearblossom Highway. To stay on US 6, one must now turn left at the traffic signal.
At the exit ramp is a sign for Pasadena. This is the Angeles Forest Highway. It rises into the Angeles National Forest and intersects the Angeles Crest Highway (CA 2).
Just after the turn, you enter Palmdale.

Historic US 6 sign in Palmdale

I don't know what I expected of Palmdale, but I had budgeted quite a bit of time there. For a city of over 100,000, I expected something. But I didn't see anything redeeming about the place. There are some new civic buildings in its tiny Downtown area, but most of it appears to go back and forth between tract housing or low-end trailer parks, and open desert. From what I could tell, Palmdale is a pretty awful town.