Editor’s Column:
Tunnel Fever
Douglas Towne
P
buildings,” says historian Donna Reiner.
“The effect is even greater
at twilight.”
Trains and their rails
were
treacherous
impediments for the
10,000 autos that typically
traveled daily on Central
Avenue to south Phoenix
in the mid-1930s according
to a 1940 Phoenix Gazette article.
Accidents were common. Reg Manning,
Boy Scouts distributed
commemorative
windshield decals to the
first 5,000 vehicles to
transit the tunnel.
Images courtesy of ABC Archives
hoenicians who enjoy underground
haunts, or merely the opportunity
to toot their own horn, savor
entering downtown from the south via the
Central Avenue Underpass. Built in 1939 to
circumvent both the Southern Pacific and
Santa Fe railroad tracks, the subterranean
corridor has evolved into one of the city’s
most notable wormholes.
“It’s a passage from one era to
another, from an Art Moderne structure to
a modern 20th century city of tall glass
cartoonist for the Arizona Republic,
regularly satirized the crossing, drawing
cars rearing and plunging like bucking
broncos over the multi-track traffic hazard
locals termed the “cascades.”
The Arizona Highway Department had
already used federal funds to construct a
nearby underpass at 17th Avenue in 1935.
The contract was awarded to R.C. Tanner
and W.E. Hall, with a low bid of $90,000.
The underpass was completed in six
months and eliminated two dangerous
railroad crossings. It also
improved traffic flow
along the “Broadway of
America,” U.S. Highway
80, the transcontinental
road that went from
Savannah, Georgia to San
Diego, California.
As early as 1928, and
well before the successful completion of
the 17th Avenue Underpass, the Phoenix
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Winter 2015