City Heights

Looking around the I-15 University overpass it’s hard to believe this area once sprouted one of the largest gardens in San Diego. From 1991–1996 the City Heights Community Garden reconnected a community that was split in half in preparation of I-15 construction. Anna Daniels, the garden’s coordinator, tells of a dark time in City Heights when abandoned homes became havens for drug dealers and how the garden and its art became an alternative icon for the neighborhood. The garden then became a community hub where Hmong refugees from Laos found a resource to employ their agrarian skills.