The grid is an essential part of Fresno’s identity. Major streets every half mile, all oriented to the cardinal directions of the compass. Even downtown, the biggest exception, is on its own grid, just rotated forty-five degrees to run parallel to the Union Pacific railroad. But there are a few spots that break from the grid. We explore the story of one of them today on KVPR’s Central Valley Roots: the Figarden Loop, also known as Figarden Drive.
This story begins over 100 years ago. Developer J.C. Forkner had just developed the Old Fig Garden neighborhood south of Shaw Avenue. But several miles to the northwest, he also founded a small company town called Figarden, where Bullard Avenue crossed the Santa Fe tracks. It had a packing shed for his fig orchards, a store, even a post office.
Now fast forward to the early 1970s. A young developer named Ed Kashian presented plans for a “new town” of Fig Garden on 4,000 acres surrounding the Figarden old town site. He envisioned a new suburban community of 40,000 residents, a town center with stores and a school, and a new freeway interchange at Highway 99 and Bullard. The city and county got on-board and the plan was finally built out in the 80s and 90s.
As for the loop. It’s name is Figarden Drive, and it connects Bullard Avenue on the east with Brawley Avenue on the south. But it’s not a simple curve. It swings out in a semicircle, a half-mile to the west, and a half-mile to the north. Kashian told the Fresno Bee in 1972 that it could help curb suburban sprawl by breaking up the grid. But it actually had another purpose. It limited at-grade crossings of the BNSF railroad tracks, and eliminated what would have been an awkward intersection where Bullard, Brawley and the tracks would have otherwise met. And where Figarden Drive does cross the tracks it does so at close to a right angle, making for a safer intersection.
Ultimately, the proposed high school for the development was never built, but the Bullard interchange at Highway 99 was built. It opened as Veterans Boulevard in late 2023.
