Thomson Expressway and Bay Freeway received substantial support before public opinion turned against them. We didn’t know how fragile it was,” the woman says sorrowfully as the camera whizzes past the divided landscape. “We didn’t know how easy it would be break our city. “The highway department had a tremendous amount of power in this city and there were a lot of people who were in favor of freeways and thought of them as progress and the future,” Martin said.īut after the construction of I-5, many residents felt uneasy about what this so-called progress would mean for their city and neighborhoods.ĭuring one particularly haunting moment of “Ramps to Nowhere,” archival of footage of the newly completed I-5 cutting through the center of Seattle is accompanied by the recording of a woman’s lament for what was lost with the construction of the interstate. Photo credit Seattle Public Libraries Special Collections. Thomson (Empire) Expressway and the Bay Freeway, two major freeway projects that would have displaced thousands of Seattle residents and given the city the dubious distinction of being home to the then densest concentration of freeways in the world in a one mile grid. Martin’s documentary combines archival film and photographs with modern day interviews to tell the David and Goliath story of how an unlikely group of citizen activists stopped construction of the R.H. I made this film hoping that young people will see it and be inspired by what citizens accomplished 50 years ago by working together.” Activists Fought to Stop a Concrete Jungle “We have such an uphill battle right now with so many threats facing us that are very real in our democracy and our environment. “It was a lot of time and love to tell the story of this important historical moment,” Martin said. The film was supported by grants from organizations like 4 Culture, Shunpike, and the UW Simpson Center for the Humanities, but it was largely the result of a dedicated volunteer effort. The result of their collaboration is the documentary film, “Ramps to Nowhere,” which made its world premiere at the NW Film Forum on Wednesday (September 26 th) as part of the Local Sightings Film Festival. “They were trying to tell this story which apparently nobody really knew about and so I was fortunate to be on the heels of that,” said Martin. Thomson Expressway, a major road project which Freeway Revolt activists successfully stopped. Part of that work meant preserving some of the Ramps Nowhere, construction relics from the R.H. Led by a group of volunteers, including Priscilla Arsove and Anna Rudd, Seattle ARCH was then expanding its efforts to ensure that the story of Freeway Revolt would be preserved for the future. This image of struggle stuck with Martin as she was introduced to and became involved with Seattle ARCH, an organization dedicated to preserving the history and honoring the citizen activists behind Seattle’s Freeway Revolt. A deciduous tree had grown thick branches around one of the structures, providing a vivid metaphor of the struggle between nature and the abandoned built environment. As a result, she returned repeated to the Ramps to Nowhere, in part to photograph a particular image that had captured her attention. Having been requested by a programmer at NW Film Forum to create a film short about land use, Martin felt certain there was a bigger story to tell. The experience left Martin with many questions. It felt like it was a true community space,” said Martin. There were people who had their dogs off-leash and all of this activity and energy that I had never seen yet in the city.
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“My dog always pulled me into places that I wouldn’t explore otherwise and she pulled me into the Ramps to Nowhere, these gigantic concrete structures that had ivy all over them. Documentary filmmaker and UW Bothell professor Minda Martin was a recent arrival to Seattle when she first stumbled by accident on the Ramps to Nowhere during a walk through the Washington Park Arboretum.