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In Fresno, a "ghost town" sits near the end of this airport runway

An empty field along Garland Avenue in Central Fresno
Joe Moore
/
KVPR
These driveways on Fresno's Garland Avenue used to lead to homes in the Sierra Village subdivision. They were removed by the city after an expansion of the Fresno Air Terminal left them too close to the end of the runway.

It’s ghost town, hidden in plain sight, right in the middle of Fresno. Or if you prefer a "zombie" neighborhood. Not exactly alive, but not exactly dead either, located at the end of the Fresno Yosemite International Airport runway. On KVPR’s Central Valley Roots – the story of Fresno’s Sierra Village subdivision.

This story begins in 1946. World War II had just ended, and the Pentagon sold the former Hammer Field Army Air Corps training base to the City of Fresno, to become the city’s primary commercial airport. The city officially discouraged residential developments near the airport, but Fresno County had other ideas. In the 1950s the county approved a subdivision at the southwest corner of Chestnut and Dakota Avenues called Sierra Village. It contained 88 single family homes. It was your typical middle class suburban development of the 1950s. At this point, the closest homes were a few thousand feet from the end of the runway.

But things began to change with the dawn of the jet age. In 1962, the city opened a new air terminal building, and later extended the airport’s runway to accommodate ever-larger aircraft. Together with FAA policies, airport expansion put many of the homes too close to the runway, and put homeowners at the mercy of city hall.

A 1967 photo of the Sierra Village neighborhood alternates with a 2004 photo from Google Maps
Fresno State Library MALT / Google Maps
A 1967 photo of the Sierra Village neighborhood alternates with a 2024 photo of the same neighborhood from Google Maps.

A legal battle ensued that lasted all the way until 1979. Eventually the city purchased many of the homes, and resorted to eminent domain seizures against a few holdouts. Today you’ll still see city streets like Dayton, Fedora, Garland, Robinson and Dearing on the map at this corner. But where there were once homes, you’ll see dry grass, with dozens of driveways and curb cuts, leading to homes that no longer exist. Some homes in the parts of the neighborhood furthest from the runway were allowed to remain. Part of the land along Dakota Avenue that was once filled with homes now houses the stables and training grounds of the Fresno Police Department’s mounted patrol.

Fresno's Sierra Village isn't the only California subdivision that was largely leveled for the sake of airport progress. In Los Angeles, the former site of the Surfridge neighborhood sits at end of LAX's runways, overlooking the Pacific.

Joe Moore is the President and General Manager of KVPR / Valley Public Radio. He has led the station through major programming changes, the launch of KVPR Classical and the COVID-19 pandemic. Under his leadership the station was named California Non-Profit of the Year by Senator Melissa Hurtado (2019), and won a National Edward R. Murrow Award for investigative reporting (2022).