Remember How The Lincoln Park Murals Used To Look?

The Lincoln Park area in central El Paso used to boast some of the coolest painted murals in the city and possibly the country. The area under the Spaghetti Bowl has undergone a huge change because of a major TxDOT project that, when completed, will ultimately connect I-10 to Loop 375, also known as the Chavez Border Highway. TxDOT announced the major change in that area of town in 2014 and it included the loss of some beloved murals and possibly another landmark in the area.

MURALS NOT THE ONLY THING THAT COULD BE LOST
For a while it looked like the project would include tearing down the Lincoln Center, a community center that was badly damaged in Storm 2006 and has been closed ever since. So far, the Lincoln Center building still stands but it still isn't open to the public.

PAINTED MURALS LOST
When TxDOT announced that some of the iconic murals on the pillars that hold up part of I-10 would be lost because they could not be preserved there was a huge outcry from the public. I took the time to go and photograph some of the pillars that were going to be demolished. It's really a shame that they couldn't be moved somewhere else but we do still have a number of amazing painted pillars that remain standing in the Lincoln Park area being lost because of a TxDOT project.

The first mural that was painted, an amazing image of the Virgin Mary, will be spared. TxDOT officials say they will cut the column off and "fix the top of it so it doesn't look like it was cut off and just left there." The Virgin Mary mural was painted 1981 by the late artist Felipe Adame. I reached out to the Lincoln Conservation Committee but they did not answer my emails or phone calls about the history of the different murals. I am glad that the majority of these amazing works of art will remain. They really are not-so-hidden gems in our town.