Skip to main content

Calaveritas Road


Calaveritas Road is a five-mile mountain highway in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of Calaveras County, California.  Calaveritas Road connects from Mountain Ranch Road in San Andreas southeast to Dogtown Road by way of the Gold Rush community of Calaveritas.  Calaveritas was founded in 1849 by Mexican miner and is the location where the ruins of the Costa Store can be found.  The Calaveritas Creek Bridge can be found on Calaveritas Road and is the oldest example of a top chord Warren pony truss in California having been constructed during 1928.  




Part 1; the history of Calaveritas Road

Calaveritas Road is named after the small community of the same name located southwest of San Andreas.  Calaveritas was founded by Mexican miners in 1849. The community is thought to have peaked with a population of about 800 by 1857. Much of Calaveritas would burn in a fire during 1858 which would lead to it declining. For a time, the community as known as "Upper Calaveritas" to differentiate it from a nearby "Lower Calaveritas."

Calaveritas Road can be seen connecting San Andreas to the vicinity of Indian Creek via Calaveritas on the 1914 C.F. Weber Map of Calaveras County.  


The Calaveritas Creek Bridge is located just south of the namesake community along Calaveritas Road.  The structure is a top chord Warren pony truss which was constructed during 1928.  The structure was found to be oldest remaining such design left in California during a study in 2015 (Calaveras Enterprise).  The structure was added to the National Register of Historic Places during August of said year.  



Part 2; a drive on Calaveritas Road

Calaveritas Road begins in San Andreas at Mountain Ranch Road.  


As southbound Calaveritas Road begins traffic is warned of the 18,000-23,000lb weight limit four miles ahead at the Calaveritas Creek Bridge.


Calaveritas Road continues south as a two-lane road and drops to a single lane approaching the Cement Plant Road trestle.  


















The Cement Plant Road trestle was built over Calaveritas Road in the late 1920s by Calaveras Cement.  Calaveras Cement incorporated in 1925 and was based out of a plant located on Pool Station Road.  The company is most well-known for supplying cement to the construction site of Pardee Dam.  The company would construct a 5.5-mile private road from their plant to quarries located east of Calaveritas. Calaveras Cement would be sold in 1959 and again in 1979.  The company would be shuttered in 1983 due to being unable to compete with foreign cement prices and a high cost to modernize their plant.  Despite the shuttering of Calaveras Cement the road to the quarry remains private and inaccessible to the public. 


Calaveritas Road passes through the town site of Calaveritas.  The remains of the Costa Store constructed in 1852 harkens back to the era of the Gold Rush.  The Costa Store operated in the community into the early twentieth century.  A State Registered Landmark plaque can also be found in the community.











Calaveritas Road continues south over the Calaveritas Creek Bridge. 







Calaveritas Road climbs from Calaveritas Creek and terminates at Dogtown Road.  







Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Pollasky Bridge

The Pollasky Bridge near modern day Friant is a ruined highway bridge which was completed during early 1906 as part of the Fresno-Fresno Flats Road.  The structure is one of the oldest known arch concrete spans to have been constructed in California.  The bridge briefly carried California State Route 41 following the destruction of the Lanes Bridge in 1940.  The Pollasky Bridge itself was destroyed by flooding during 1951, but the ruins can still be found on the Madera County side of the San Joaquin River.   Pictured as the blog cover is the Pollasky Bridge as it was featured in the 1913 book "The Concrete Bridge."  The structure can be seen crossing the San Joaquin River near Friant below on the 1922 United States Geological Survey Map.   Part 1; the history of the Pollasky Bridge The Pollasky Bridge site is near modern day Friant of Fresno County.  The community of Friant was established as Converse Ferry during 1852 on the San Joaquin Rive...

Trimmer Springs Road (Fresno County)

Trimmer Springs Road is an approximately forty-mile rural highway located in Fresno County.  The corridor begins near in California State Route 180 in Centerville and extends to Blackrock Road at the Kings River in the Sierra Nevada range near the Pacific Gas & Electric Company town of Balch Camp. The roadway is named after the former Trimmer Springs Resort and was originally constructed to facilitate access to the Sanger Log Flume.  Trimmer Springs Road was heavily modified and elongated after construction of Pine Flat Dam broke ground in 1947.   Part 1; the history of Trimmer Springs Road Much of the original alignment of Trimmer Springs Road was constructed to facilitate access to the Sanger Log Flume.   The  Kings River Lumber Company  had been established in 1888 in the form of a 30,000-acre purchase of forest lands in Converse Basin.  This purchase lied immediately west of Grant Grove and came to be known as "Millwood."  The co...

When was Ventura Avenue east of downtown Fresno renamed to Kings Canyon Road? (California State Route 180)

California State Route 180 was one of the original Sign State Routes designated in August 1934.  The highway east of Fresno originally utilized what was Ventura Avenue and Dunlap Road to reach what was then General Grant National Park.  By late year 1939 the highway was extended through the Kings River Canyon to Cedar Grove.   In 1940 General Grant National Park would be expanded and rebranded as Kings Canyon National Park.  The Kings Canyon Road designation first appeared in publications circa 1941 when the California State Route 180 bypass of Dunlap was completed.  Kings Canyon Road ultimately would replace the designation of Dunlap Road from Dunlap to Centerville and Ventura Avenue west to 1st Street in Fresno.   The Kings Canyon Road would remain largely intact until March 2023 when the Fresno Council designated Cesar Chavez Boulevard.  Cesar Chavez Boulevard was designated over a ten-mile corridor over what was Kings Canyon Road, remaini...