The unimpressive historical case of preserving Telephone Hill
- Rich Moniak
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
By Rich Moniak
For the few remaining Telephone Hill tenants, the Superior Court ruling earlier this month upholding CBJ’s right to evict them had to be disappointing. Judge Amanda Browning also said she found their accusations of retaliation by borough officials to be meritless.
Their separate complaint regarding the historic significance of the neighborhood won’t be heard until August. However, as CBJ noted in their response to that issue in this case, Telephone Hill is not on the National Historic Register. And the bar for admission to that is so low that it contains hundreds of places that have no historic significance whatsoever.
I first learned about the Register in 1988 while employed as an engineer for the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). The state currently has 78 bridges listed on it. Another 12 were deemed eligible but have since been demolished.
Some, such as Tacoma Narrows and floating bridges across Lake Washington and Hood Canal, are worthy of the designation.
The Hammer Hammer River bridges on the Olympic Peninsula are examples of two that aren’t. According to the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation, they’re “listed in the National Register for the innovative engineering employed at the time of construction.”
Building the first concrete arches that rise above the roadway might have been a remarkable accomplishment if there were hundreds of others like them. But the fact there’s only five in the entire state suggests they’ve been preserved more as an example of an engineering mistake in a class with the Ford Edsel.
Another problem is unlike most of U.S. Highway 101, which is the main route around the peninsula, there are no shoulders on either bridge. An average of 1,500 vehicles cross them each day, among them large trucks and motor homes. Forty years ago, WSDOT made it a priority to widen bridges like that on its main highways. But since it’s impossible to widen the arches, replacing them was the only option. Instead, they chose to appease the special interests of historians over improving traffic safety.
But you don’t need to be a historian to recognize labeling a site historically significant enhances an area’s appeal to tourists.
There are 24 places in and around Juneau listed on the National Register, the most prominent being the Governor’s Mansion.
The Sentential Island Lighthouses is another. Juneau Lighthouse Tours offers opportunities for locals and tourists to visit the lighthouse as part of their whale watching and sightseeing tours.
The Cape St. Elias Lighthouse 60 miles south of Cordova isn’t as easily accessed. It was built on the western tip of the Kayak Island which extends 20 miles into the Gulf of Alaska. Getting there requires chartering a float plane or helicopter.
The lighthouse and keepers’ quarters are uninhabitable. But the Cape St. Elias Lightkeepers Association continues to maintain the site’s boathouse which is equipped with a “wood stove, water tank, propane oven, blankets, and bunks for as many as 10 paying visitors.”
Perhaps a few of the people who can afford that kind of getaway are genuinely interested in the history of Alaska’s lighthouses. But most are probably drawn to experience the uniquely remote and spectacular Alaskan setting.
Having been there several times while working for the Coast Guard, I understand if that’s the primary benefit for the site’s caretakers as well.
In other words, historical significance can be a tool for pursuing a loosely or entirely unrelated agenda. And that’s the impression I’ve gotten throughout the debate over preserving the homes in the Telephone Hill neighborhood.
In anticipation of building a new state capital building on the site, an independent Historic Site and Structures Survey of Telephone Hill was performed in 1984. Its authors believed the neighborhood and its buildings met” the qualifications for a historic district” in accordance with National Register criteria.
But it did not get approved for listing. And until CBJ began exploring ideas to redevelop the site, there had been little to no concerted effort to document, promote and otherwise preserve its history.
It’s certainly not my place to rule on the merits of the lawsuit filed on behalf of the tenants. But claiming that demolishing them would violate a section of the National Historic Preservation Act sure seems more like an argument meant for the court of public opinion rather than a court of law.
• Rich Moniak is a Juneau resident and retired civil engineer with more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector.
