Painted Bridges - Coronado Bridge Approach (2)

The paintings on the Coronado Bridge columns have long been a source of controversy. Before the land was seized as 'Chicano Park,' artists may have felt greater freedom to express themselves on bridge columns. After the park became managed by the neighborhood, there was more control over what was painted.

Caltrans also felt uncomfortable with images of Ho Chi Minh, Che Guevara, Fidel Castro, Salvadore Allende and other revolutionaries on it's bridges. Caltrans District Director Pedro Orso eventually met with civil rights leaders, and decided that free expression was more important than who was painted on the columns and he even gave some money to help renovate the park.

Groups taking land under a bridge and turning it into a place to practice their cultural activities is fairly common in California. I had a bridge in Oakland and the ground underneath was used by teenagers who turned it into a skateboard park. I protested that the concrete poured around the columns was reducing their effective length and making them unsafe (with higher shear) during earthquakes. Although California politicians listened to my arguments, they sided with the teenagers.

An even more common occurrence is poor people who turn the underside of bridges into their homes. On a positive note, its nice that our bridges fill so many peoples' needs.

Painted Bridges - Coronado Bridge Approaches (2) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

Painted Bridges - Coronado Bridge Approach

The northeastern approach to San Diego's Coronado Bridge (see Google Earth Map below) is beautifully painted with images that reflect the cultural heritage of the Hispanic community. The land under the bridge became Chicano Park through the efforts of the Mexican-American population around Barrio Logan. Almost every vertical surface in the park has been decorated with political, religious, and historical images.

The park and the paintings are so important to the community that Caltrans had many meetings in the neighborhood when they had to retrofit the seismically vulnerable approach structures. All of the murals were carefully protected while the bridge was being retrofit, the murals were examined afterwards, and any damage was repaired.

Sensitivity to a community's wishes is generally a good idea. However, it can sometimes be taken to extremes. The new East Bay Bridge in San Francisco Bay is an example where a community's desires turned a simple bridge replacement into a very expensive and decades long construction project.

Painted Bridges - Coronado Bridge Approach by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.