If you’re planning to visit Napa for the first time in more than a month or so, be prepared for a missing bridge that used to take First Street over the Napa River east of COPIA. It’s been more than a year since the Napa City Council approved the design for the spiffy new span, projected to cost roughly $10.5 million—“about 90 percent funded by the federal Highway Bridge Replacement and Rehabilitation Act,” according to city spokesman Barry Martin, who adds that the money can only be used for bridge projects.
Demolition of the old concrete-and-steel-truss span—which was the first in Napa County—is scheduled to begin this month. Built a century ago, the bridge qualified for the National Register of Historic Places. But despite preservationists’ pleas, the city council determined that the bridge, while historic, was a dangerous flood obstruction and prone to collapse in an earthquake.
The new bridge, designed by T.Y. Lin International and MacDonald Architects, will be 150 feet long and four feet higher than the old span, with benches for lingering and a series of obelisk-borne lanterns. But not until mid to late 2009: For an estimated 15 months, First Street will not cross the river. Reopening is penciled in for late next summer, though weather and unforeseen construction conditions could affect the timetable.
To cross the river eastward during the First Street bridge project, alternatives include Third Street to the south and Lincoln Avenue to the north. First Street will remain open from COPIA west to Highway 29.
When the new span is finished, there will be more than one reason for Napans and visitors alike to celebrate: a restored First Street connecting east Napa with the Oxbow District and downtown, and the completion of five major bridge-replacement projects made possible through the voter-approved Napa River Flood Control project.
Napa Valley College—then and now
“To educate citizens and train workers, Napa County voters first agreed to tax their property and found Napa Valley College in the very dark year of 1944. Are things so much worse now?”
I asked that question after a minority of only slightly more than 48 percent of Napa voters doomed NVC’s facilities bond measure on the February ballot. Measure L earned nearly 52 percent of the vote, but needed 55 percent to pass. And apparently, the answer to my question is an emphatic “Yes: Things really are that bad.”
Still smarting from an aggressive opposition campaign—one that falsely and relentlessly claimed NVC misspent the proceeds of a 2002 bond measure, the college’s first in 40 years—or perhaps simply wearied by the never-ending struggle to convince voters that perfect independent audits truly indicate good fiscal management, NVC trustees have decided not to try for another bond measure until, at the earliest, 2010.
Chalk another one up to the Big Lie Guys. But save a little of the blame for a United States-led war that’s now lasted longer than America’s involvement in the one that darkened our world in 1944; for the political tug-of-war tournaments that pass for government in this new century; for the devastating fallout from an economy addicted to gambling on real estate; and for a society that values property above knowledge.
Need a soundtrack, pronto?
You might want to give Peter Sykes a call. “I can put things together really quickly,” says the multi-instrumentalist, who founded and directs the Napa School of Music. “Sometimes it’s good to work under a little pressure.” Sykes proved he could work on deadline after the producers of the new documentary, “Harvest: Napa/Sonoma,” asked vintner Robert Sinskey if he could recommend any local composers. Sinskey suggested Sykes, his former guitar teacher.
“I had about five days to do it all,” recalls Sykes, who wrote and recorded 10 different “cues,” or instrumental pieces, for the 77-minute film. The result: A lively, made-in-Napa soundtrack for a film that focuses on the Wine Country’s most dynamic season. With music that ranges from uptempo bop to blues to Latin American beats, perhaps the best description of Sykes’ score for “Harvest: Napa/Sonoma” can be borrowed from the words of one of the documentary’s winemakers (discussing his own product): “Never is it excessive or overbearing or dominant.”
Directed by Dan Honan and David Kuhn and narrated by East Coast wine consultant Denis Toner, “Harvest: Napa/Sonoma” is a production of Plum TV, a cable and Internet media network based in New York City. Before sending its cameras to the North Bay, the network produced earlier wine-region documentaries in Tuscany, Burgundy and Bordeaux.
An initial impression that Napa and Sonoma were an afterthought is reinforced by Toner’s ponderous narration, which veers between the vapid (Napa is “where the wine industry has exploded and become something of a phenomenon”) and the hackneyed (vintners are “always after the goal of producing the ultimate bottle of wine”).
But the Plum filmmakers aim to get at what makes these wines “the equal of any in the world,” in Toner’s measured words, by visiting wineries, vineyards and restaurants in both counties (with an emphasis on Napa and how this former prune-producing county became the nation’s preeminent wine-producing region).
If your computer is equipped with Flash 8, you can watch the film online at http://www.plumtv.com/programs/harvest.
