Why this matters
The federal government’s construction of the interstate highway system decades ago including intentionally building through Black and brown communities and resulted in taking homes via eminent domain, exposing residents to higher levels of air pollution and unsafe pedestrian routes. Scholars — and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg — have described the practice as racist.
Beside a 10-foot-tall pile of construction debris, dozens of people sat at folding tables and brainstormed how to reclaim a piece of land in National City used as a dumping ground.
The 7-acre site at Division Street and Palm Avenue, situated underneath Interstate 805 and near on-ramps, is the product of how freeway construction divided communities decades ago. Locals are now making their mark on the barren land with hand-painted signs, new plants and public art.
They say they want to see it turned into more.
Friday’s outdoor session kicked off the first of seven workshops across San Diego County assessing how to correct harmful infrastructure to historically underserved communities. The workshops will inform a study by the San Diego Association of Governments in partnership with Caltrans meant to explore projects related to transportation, housing, green spaces, and more “that support community reconnection.”
Organizers are calling the land Maat Mataa Yum — loosely translated from Kumeyaay to “where the people come together on the land,” said community organizer Janice Luna Reynoso.
She founded and serves as executive director of Mundo Gardens, a nonprofit co-leading efforts to upgrade the land.
A coalition of nonprofits, residents and stakeholders have been tending to the land over the past few years and envisioning its future for over a decade. That includes asking local indigenous peoples to bless the land, planting seeds, painting murals, pitching ways to reduce air pollution and gathering on the land to discuss how to beautify it.
“It’s knowing that we are going to make a better way seven generations out,” Luna Reynoso said.
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Stakeholders say the land as it is doesn’t serve anyone. Aside from becoming an illegal dumping ground, many say it’s just hard to walk around it.
“On that little corner of Division, east of the 805, and west of the 805 they’re completely separate neighborhoods,” National City Councilmember Jose Rodriguez told inewsource. The Caltrans-owned land surrounds Rodriguez’s council district.
He said infrastructure built decades ago was not well planned. Today, the only way to connect travelers between the two sides is through Division and 47th streets, a freeway underpass and off-ramp — “both not very pedestrian safe,” Rodriguez said.
Locals said at the brainstorm that they want to see pedestrian and bike pathways, murals, trees, and more.
“One thing that we don’t have around here is a safe place for families to come together,” said Anahí Rodríguez, a San Diego native who said the site would be ideal for a park. Her toddler waddled a tricycle in the dirt during the brainstorm as three older children played nearby with concrete debris, rocks and fallen palm leaves.
After the workshops, regional transportation officials will lay out infrastructure connection ideas for these seven focus areas: Vista; Escondido; El Cajon; Lemon Grove and La Mesa; National City; southeastern San Diego; and Barrio Logan and Logan Heights.
Officials plan to release a final report of proposed solutions by this summer. Luna Reynoso, the nonprofit leader for Mundo Gardens, separately plans to present solutions for the National City site.
She said her organization and others had secured a $25 million grant to help upgrade areas in National City, but federal cuts prevented the money from being awarded.
Type of Content
News: Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
