Drugs, gangs and broken glass: How cruising ended in Modesto and where it’s headed

By 1990, McHenry Avenue was under siege: Beer bottles, syringes, broken windows and late-night fights were commonplace, residents on the adjacent, tree-lined Elmwood Avenue told The Modesto Bee back then.

On any given Friday or Saturday night, an estimated 5,000 cars jammed McHenry. The drivers, mostly young people, came to show off their cars and meet up with friends. But their frenetic energy spilled over, leaving many neighbors furious.

The city decided in March 1990 that the solution was to limit how cars cruised along McHenry. Police officers set up checkpoints along the road, ticketing any vehicles that lingered along the same streets too long. They put up signs saying “Cruising, Loitering Prohibited” on the thoroughfare — signs that still exist today.

In essence, Modesto banned one of the things it was most known for. George Lucas’ 1973 film, “American Graffiti,” set in 1962 Modesto, popularized cruising and helped put the city on the map. The irony of the new law made national news at the time and scared off the thousands of car buffs who once came to McHenry.

Kyle Barker, now 75, was president of the McHenry Avenue Merchants Association in 1990 and gathered signatures from business owners opposed to cruising. “The whole thing was pretty decadent: a lot of cocaine and a lot of drugs, gangs,” he said of the people who came to cruise. “It was a time.”

He paused, then added, “This is a different time.”

Last month, state legislators unanimously passed a resolution affirming cruising as a part of California’s cultural heritage, particularly among lowriders in the Latino community. Sacramento and San Jose have overturned their cruising bans, and a diverse group of advocates has formed Modesto’s Cruisers Council to lobby the city to do the same. That has prompted residents and city leaders to reexamine cruising and question the logic that has kept the ban in place for more than 30 years.

Cruising into the 21st century

On a recent day, Spider, who provided only his nickname, stood by his 1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass, emblazoned with an image of Spider-Man, his namesake. He fondly remembers cruising in the 1970s when it was “bumper to bumper” on McHenry, but he understands why the city clamped down. “People were leaving messes, messing up people’s property,” he said.

Now he is 62 years old and living on disability after two kidney transplants. Police pulled him over two years ago for having tinted windows, but he didn’t get a ticket. Instead, Spider said, the police officer told him his car was “hella nice.”

Because lowriders can’t legally cruise in Modesto, they often park by the train tracks near downtown, just to get together. There are countless car clubs in and around Modesto, and while members might initially bond over lowriders, hot rods and mechanics, these clubs also run car magazines, lead family-friendly cultural events, like the upcoming Dia de Los Muertos festival in Stockton, or create school scholarships for youth. On Friday, Sept. 9, members from 17 clubs cruised through downtown after the Cruiser’s Council struck a deal with the Modesto Police Department.

Danette Agundez, 58, grew up in Grayson and organized the local chapter of the Bay Area Latinas, an all-female lowrider club. Last year, she met up with some other lowriders in the parking lot of Vintage Faire Mall in Modesto only to have the police kick them out. “It’s like, no one was even doing anything. We were just sitting there, playing music,” she said. “We’re just coming together as our culture.”

In Sacramento, the City Council deemed the cruising ban discriminatory toward Latinos and overturned it. On June 14, Bianca Lopez, an environmental activist, joined a chorus of voices in public comment against the ban at the Modesto City Council hearing. “The racist practices when we’re cruising down the street need to stop,” she said via Zoom to the Council.

The Modesto Police Department hasn’t formally cited a lowrider for cruising in years, said Chief Brandon Gillespie. He can’t recall a single time since he joined the department in 2001 that officers have needed to set up checkpoints along McHenry, like they did when the ban first went into effect. He said he wasn’t aware of specific instances when officers had asked lowriders to disperse from parking lots, but he said those interactions probably were driven by private businesses that filed complaints.

Build a wall, make Elmwood pay for it

The politics around cruising today bear little resemblance to the conversations 30 years ago. Barker remembers the furious families from Elmwood Avenue, or “the soccer moms,” he likes to call them, as leading the charge behind the ban. Though cruising became the focal point, some of the anger was about sexual activity.

Just months before Elmwood Avenue neighbors championed a cruising ban, they lobbied the city council against another kind of cruising that took place in and around the Adult World bookstore (now Suzies Adult Superstore) at 115 McHenry.

“They meet prospective dates at the bookstore and then do their thing in the alley right beside our house. It’s disturbing, and certainly not what you want to expose your children to,” one neighbor told the Bee in 1989. “We’re tired of guys parading around in powder-blue satin stretch pants,” said another neighbor.

The solution neighbors proposed for the cars and pedestrians from McHenry was not a ban but a wall. Neighbors wanted an 8-foot-high concrete wall blocking Elmwood Avenue from McHenry Avenue, and the City Council considered it. However, once the city calculated the cost of the construction and the ways it would change water and garbage services, it asked the Elmwood Avenue residents to pay. The neighbors refused, and the City Council put forward an ordinance against cars instead.

Cruising to a compromise

Today, there is little left of the anger that drove that cruising ban. The Police Department has been working closely with the Cruisers Council, the mayor and the City Council since June to reach an agreement that prioritizes car culture and public safety.

“I’m not stuck on forever having a cruising ban,” said Gillespie. “We’re not in the ’90s. It’s a completely different time.”

The Cruisers Council includes a diverse coalition, both Latino lowriders and white hot-rodders, as well as representatives from different generations. Car enthusiasts like Samantha Nolan, 19 years old and the youngest member of the Cruisers Council, hoped that the City Council would review the driving ban in August, but the mayor and city manager did not put the item on the agenda. Now, the plan is to move slowly, rolling out a few cruising events to show the city that the worries of the 1990s are a thing of the past.

Last Friday was the first test, and Cruisers Council members joined Tuesday’s City Council meeting to share that the event saw no arrests or general disturbances. Beyond a few minor parking issues, Gillespie agreed.

The McHenry Avenue Merchants Association no longer exists, said Barker, and downtown owners along Friday’s cruising route were either neutral or supportive of cruising. “As a retailer, I don’t know if it affects me much,” said Mira East from Mira Bridal Couture. She felt that the restaurants had more to lose from the noise and exhaust of all the cars.

Ishtar Albazi has run Papachino’s on J Street for the past 20 years, and she’s seen downtown restaurants struggle, especially after 9/11 and the last two years with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Look, I do think with an increase of people, there obviously is going to be an increase in crime, just naturally, but I also think, too, that it might liven it up downtown and on McHenry enough to where some crime doesn’t happen because of it,” she said.

On Friday, her business didn’t see any change in trash or crime due to the cruising event. In fact, she saw a small increase in customers who wanted to sit out in their new parklet and watch the cars roll by. She wants to see the ban removed but for cultural reasons more than anything else: “Modesto is the home of ‘American Graffiti.’”

This story was originally published September 15, 2022 at 10:49 AM.

Adam Echelman

The Modesto Bee

Adam Echelman is the equity/underserved communities reporter for The Modesto Bee’s Economic Mobility Lab.