Page:Motoring Magazine and Motor Life February 1915.djvu/18

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Orange County Building Good Highway.

When Orange County builds its coast boulevard from Seal Beach to Serra there will be opened to those who travel by automobile a wonderful drive through sand dunes and summer resorts, beside broad beaches and the still waters of bays, on the crests of bluffs and across promontories that reach out into the shimmering sea, along a short line where breakers forever roll in to lash themselves into foam.

When that road is finished a motorist may stand for a drive that will take him from Los Angeles through Long Beach to the Orange County line at Alamitos Bay. Seal Beach, Sunset Beach, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, Corona del Mar, Laguna Beach, Arch Beach and Serra&mdash;these are the points along the Orange County coast that he will see.

On the return trip he may journey by the inland route on the State highway, by way of the pleasant mission valley of San Juan Capistrano, the rolling hills of El Toro, the vast bean fields of Irvine, the splendid tree-lined drives of Tustin, the orchards of Santa Ana, Anaheim, Fullerton and La Habra, into the Whittier country.

As yet, the coast boulevard can be designated as a project and a certainty. While there is a movement afoot to hasten the realization of the plans, still it may not bring about the early construction of the road.

However, the Orange County Board of Supervisors is committed to the plan of building the road. In fact, the county has already started the work. A bridge has been built at Anaheim Bay, and a paved road has been constructed between Seal Beach and Sunset Beach.

Orange County has almost finished the construction of 107 miles of good roads provided for in the original plans under which $1,270,000 bonds were issued, and the County Highway Commission and the Board of Supervisors have been considering the disposal of some $240,000 that remains in the highway fund.

The determination and spirit with which the boosters for the coast boulevard are handling their project can be surmised from the fact that they offered to raise by subscription $100,000 to put with $160,000 of the county's money to build the coast boulevard clear through from Seal Beach to Serra, which is located on the beach three miles below San Juan Capistrano.

W. T. Newland of Huntington Beach, a county highway commissioner, recommended to the Board of Supervisors that $500,000 additional bonds be voted so that interior roads that are petitioned for and the coast boulevard can both be built within the next year. Newland's scheme proposes dividing the coast road off into sections, as follows : Seal Beach to Huntington Beach, six miles; Huntington Beach to Newport Beach, 2.20 miles; Newport avenue to Corona del Mar, four miles; Corona del Mar to Laguna Beach, eight miles; Laguna Beach to Serra, nine miles.

At the present time each of the beach towns has a paved road reaching from the town inland. It is proposed by the coast boulevard to unite the ends of these roads with one that will not only give easy access from one city to another, but will provide a coast automobile trip the like of which is not to be found anywhere on this coast.

Variety will be a feature. When one has felt the charm of the beaches along the lowlands, where threads of tidewater reach back into ponds and deep boating channels, he will pass on lo the rougher, more picturesque attractions of the rugged coast below Newport Bay.

Newport Bay itself is a bigger and more beautiful bay than is generally realized. Its charms and beauty will be best seen from the boulevard that is to be built.

The coast road from Seal Beach to Newport Beach, most of the way would parallel the Pacific Electric.

From Newport Bay to Laguna Beach is a stretch of coast across the property of the Irvine Company not now open to travel by vehicles of any kind. Private roads used by grain and bean growers indicate the feasibility of road building at no great expense.

From Laguna Beach, which is joined to the State Highway at Irvine by a paved road that traverses beautiful Laguna Canyon, adored by artists and others who cannot paint but who can look out upon nature and be thrilled, to Serra, a good dirt road is already in use. While the State road is being built between Irvine and Serra many automobilists journeying to San Diego turn off at Irvine, go to Laguna Beach and follow the coast down to Serra.

All along this coast line the hills and mesas come down by the water. Jutting into the blue depths of the ocean are points of rocks. Between the points are coves with sandy beaches.

The glittering sea, the pounding of the waters, the deep moss grown tide channels, the magnificent views from promontories and bluffs, the setting of the sun in wonderfully beautiful skies, these are some of the things that some day Orange County is going to make easy of access to all Southern California.



San Ardo Wants Road.

For the past two or three years, especially since the inauguration of the proposed State highways, there has been considerable agitation relative to a "valley-to-coast" highway to connect the San Joaquin Valley at Coalinga with this valley at King City or San Lucas. San Ardo has awakened to the fact that such a connecting highway would be very advantageous to her prosperity, and she is now competing with her two sister towns, King and San Lucas, to become the connecting point in Salinas Valley.



To Close Unused Roads.

Any freeholders, providing two are residents of a given road district, may be able to abolish or discontinue the use of any public highway providing the same is proven unnecessary for public use by filing a petition with the Board of Supervisors if a bill introduced by Senator Breed of Oakland becomes a law. The bill provides that following the filing of such a petition the Board of Supervisors shall call a hearing, and if it is decided that the highway is not needed will order it vacated, the property in which case will revert to its former owners free of any public easement.