Midway, San Diego
It is located at the northern (mainland) end of the Point Loma peninsula, northwest of downtown San Diego, and just west of Old Town.
[1] In addition to the core Midway area, the community plan includes portions of the historic neighborhoods of Five Points and Middletown.
Because of fears that San Diego Bay might silt up, the river was confined to its present course north of Point Loma by a levee built by the city in 1877.
It connected the settlements in Old Town and Mission San Diego with La Playa, the beach in Point Loma where ships loaded and unloaded cargo.
[3] A plaque near the southeast corner of Rosecrans Street and Midway Drive recognizes the historic importance of the La Playa Trail.
Dutch Flats was also the name of what was originally a small dirt airstrip in the area used by the Ryan Aeronautical Company, located near what are now Midway and Barnett streets.
In 1929, pioneer aviator Ruth Alexander, a graduate of the Ryan Flying School, established a new world record for women in light aircraft on a flight from Dutch Flats.
During the 1940s, the Midway area experienced a boom, with numerous war-related industrial sites and thousands of people arriving from all over the country to work at them.
It was unusual in the Point Loma area because of the diversity of its residents, which made existing homeowners uncomfortable; they lobbied the city to replace the development with something else.
During the 1960s the entire housing project was demolished and replaced with the Sports Arena and large retail and commercial areas.
Nothing remains of the former wetlands except Famosa Slough State Marine Conservation Area (a city-owned nature preserve which is technically located in Point Loma but is considered part of Midway by many people) and the San Diego River bed itself.
Most of the area is commercial or industrial in nature, but there are some residential areas, including the seniors-only Orchard Apartments (built on land owned by the city of San Diego), a Navy family housing complex between Rosecrans and Barnett, and some private apartment and condominium developments in the Pacific Highway corridor near the San Diego Trolley.
SPAWAR is a major Navy Acquisition Command, as well as the parent organization to the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center - Pacific, a research laboratory in Point Loma.
[17] Midway is also known for a concentration of adult establishments such as strip clubs, partly because city laws regulating such establishments make the area favorable for them, and partly because of the proximity of large military bases (MCRD and formerly Naval Training Center San Diego) full of young recruits.
