You can't get

here from there

Whenever I come from San Francisco, on 80, I always take the Columbus Parkway exit, snake around the backroads on Flosden Road and turn left onto American Canyon Road to meet up with Highway 29 and head home. In the past year, they have improved Flosden Road and installed a light at its intersection with American Canyon Road. I always turn, but my curiosity is piqued: If you go straight at the light, is there a way to connect back with Highway 29? Is this a shortcut?

The amount of development in American Canyon is insane right now. When I was growing up in Napa, American Canyon was nothing more than a route I took to get to my summer job at Marine World. In the springtime, the corner across from Parry's Market and Deli would get flooded, in the summer a dusty donkey and some horses stood in that lot. I always looked at the bee boxes almost hidden in the bushes farther up the street. That was about it.

A few weeks ago I was startled, though, when driving back from the City, to see the progress of the new Napa Junction development, which will include the much-contested Wal-Mart and already has an operational Starbucks and Jamba Juice. Those of you who don't make regular trips to American Canyon will be shocked, too.

After just slightly getting used to seeing the retail structures, now there are nine three-story apartment buildings rising behind the Wal-Mart structure. And more's coming to American Canyon -- the plot just north of Napa Junction already has construction equipment on it.

Friends of mine say, "This is not what American Canyon is supposed to be," and, as a longtime Napan, I can understand the rift between the American Canyon of the present day and the American Canyon that lives in Napans' memories.

All those new developments. All those shiny new stores. What's going on? There's a there there.

It's all new and has a heaping helping of the surreal to it. I drove around the Vintage Ranch development (straight through the light at American Canyon and Flosden roads) and the houses are all so cotton-picking new! It looks like the workers are assembling a movie set or rushing to get ready for an important visitor. I saw a man who looked like he was tiling a bus stop, and yet people walked their kids home from school and did their daily routine as if they weren't in the middle of an unfinished community.

While there's nothing old or neglected, there's very little in the way of personal touches -- aside from the occasional "Raider Nation" sign speared into new sod on a lawn. It reminds me of the McMansion area in north Napa. It could be in any town anywhere.

The answer to your question is: No, there's no shortcut. Had Measure H passed, it would have provided money to extend Newell Drive (Flosden becomes Newell Drive in the Vintage Ranch development) to join with South Kelly Road. Since that didn't pass, that extension is in limbo, according to American Canyon Eagle Editor Michael Waterson. The county supports (morally, politically, but not financially) the extension.

Another potential shortcut is a no go. If you take Newell to the end and make a left on Donaldson Way, you'll be stopped just before a set of railroad tracks, within eye-shot of Highway 29. The Arco station is across the railroad tracks, you can see it from inside the development, but you can't get there. Waterson said there's no timeframe or money to push Donaldson Way through to meet up with Donaldson on the other side of 29, but there'll be a public safety building on the Vintage Ranch side of Donaldson, so let's hope that means they'll push the street through all the way.

What is Glad You Asked?

Glad You Asked attempts to find answers to readers' questions. If a stumper has got you wandering around lost in a daze, send it to me. I'll find the path to the answer and let you know. I'm at jdecker@napanews.com or 256-2215.