Last week the former Orange Fire Station near Lions Park facing MacArthur Drive was demolished by the city. Below is a story about why it was built at that location.
In the summer of 1957, the Orange ‘City Dads,’ as The Orange Leader called them, had an important item at the top of the list for things to include in a new budget. The city must have a fire station on the west side of the Southern Pacific Railroad Tracks.
The project was quickly budgeted and completed. After all, the city had been booming with post-World War II housing construction as G.I.s got their home loans for their new families.
The city’s other two fire departments, Central Station in downtown (at the same site of the current one), and No. 2 station on Burton Avenue at Tenth Street. If a train was traveling through, fire trucks and firemen couldn’t get to houses and businesses west of the tracks.
The site for No. 3 fire station ended up on city property next to City Park and the City Pool. The station was built along the far east side of MacArthur Drive. (People in Orange debate whether MacArthur Drive begins at 16th Street or at the Adams Bayou Bridge. Fire Chief David Frenzel said the 1957 fire station always used a MacArthur Drive address.)
Earlier this week, the city tore down the old No. 3. It had not been used as a fire station for nearly 20. Before Hurricane Harvey flooded the building, it was used by the city parks department for storage.
No. 3 Station became obsolete as a fire station because of its location as the city’s land space moved outward and the road system was reconfigured.
But when it was new, it was a good station to run a straight route to the vast Roselawn subdivision going up on the far west part of town. When the Orange City Council discussed the need for a new station, Acting City Manager Marlin Thompson told the group Dal Sasso Construction (the developer of Roselawn) was offering lots to build the station.
The Orange Independent School District that summer already had the steel framework completed for a new elementary school (later named Salk) in the Roselawn subdivision.
MacArthur Drive had led to more land being developed west of Adams Bayou. MacArthur was built during World War II and opened for traffic in 1944.
Also, the area west of 16th Street and between Park Avenue, had grown. The Bennett subdivision of cottages was developed about 1940 north of Sholars and west of Park. Then during the war, the spacious DuPont houses were built along Hart, Burton, and Rein. After the war, came more subdivisions.
But what people who are younger than 50 might not comprehend, 16th Street did NOT run all the way from Park Avenue to Green Avenue (MacArthur Drive). The property was fenced in as part of Shangri La gardens.
Green Avenue and Park Avenue were part of one of the first interstate highways in the United States. The Old Spanish Trail (later U.S. 90), crossed from Lousiana into Orange at Green Avenue. Green Avenue ended at 15th Street. Travelers would the turn onto 15th Street and go to Park Avenue, then travel west-northwest along Park.
The state widened 16th Street from a two-lane blacktop road into a throughfare in the 1970s and the straight cut for 16th Street was finished in the late 1970s.
Chief Frenzel said No. 3 station was affected by making a large traffic stop at 16th Street and Green Avenue. When the traffic was stopped and backed up along MacArthur Drive at the light, the trucks at the station had a difficult time getting out.
Frenzel, who has been with the fire department for more than half a century, once had duty at the No. 3 station. He had been working at the station on Burton Avenue until 1972, when the city closed it. He then was assigned to No. 3 on MacArthur Drive. He recalls driving a Thunderbird to work.
The station was also next to the City Pool. “It was very convenient for me. My future wife was a lifeguard,” he said. They could stand by a common fence and chat.
He said the fire station was poorly designed. It had one driveway for two trucks. If the truck in the front wouldn’t start, the one behind it had to be backed out the back door.
Traffic wasn’t the only problem with the MacArthur station, Frenzel said. As the city expanded in different directions, the station was too close to the center of town. The city stopped getting insurance score credits for its location, he said.
The city had built a new No. 2 station in the late 1970s north of Interstate 10 on Meeks Drive at Allie Payne Road.
The new No. 3 station opened in 2002 after it was constructed on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive south of Simmons Drive. After the move, the MacArthur station served other city needs.
-Margaret Toal, KOGT-
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