When Greg May
posted this photo I was certain I'd caught
him in an error, because this is the
intersection of Fairmount Drive and
Highway 80 (or 8) and Fairmont was never
395 -- or was it? Check out Cameron
Kaiser's US
395 web page.
That's
definitely Fairmount Avenue in the photo
where it goes under I-8. The structure on
the left of the photo is the Helms Bakery
building. Remember how they used to drive
their trucks through neighborhoods selling
their wares? The building is still there
today. I don't know that Fairmount Avenue
was ever 395, but may have been at one
time Market Street, 10th and 11th Avenues,
Cabrillo Freeway Kearny Villa road on the
east side of MCAS Miramar between SR-163
and Miramar Road are all pieces of the old
395. So is Center City Parkway in
Escondido -- George Glover ’73
Fairmount
was never 395 in my time – and that
definitely looks like Fairmount/Mission
Gorge and 80 interchange – I know those
curves intimately! -- Barbara Bright Wilder
’62
I
think 40th St. went to 395.
Fairmount intersection at 8 had the option
of going to Mission Gorge Road, and North
to Santee -- Bill Frost ’66
You
are absolutely correct, it is Fairmount
Ave and not 395. The photo is taken from
the Alvarado Estates area looking
northwest. The picture is 1958 or
after as the northbound Fairmount to
westbound I-8 structure over Fairmount Ave
is visible in the picture and that
structure was built in 1958 -- John Markey
‘67, Retired District Permit Engineer,
Caltrans District 11
Greg's
photo is indeed Fairmont Road and the new
I-8. The building on the left is the
old Helms Bakery, where they parked all
the bread delivery trucks. It is now
a Penske truck rental building. I remember
the Helms trucks. I think they were
actually Chevy station wagons without side
windows. The driver had a two-toned
whistle that he would toot as he drove
through the neighborhood. If anyone
stopped him, he would open the tailgate
and pull out enormous drawers that held
the bread. I don't remember ever
buying anything from those trucks. I was
not aware of Murphy Canyon ever being
Highway 395. I only remember the
current Highway 163 alignment.
Murphy Canyon had its own two lane road,
and that is the name I knew.
Fairmont became Mission Gorge Rd, and it
still does -- Mike Fry '60
