Wall that segregates West Las Vegas much more than just a symbol

The road from F Street to City Hall is lined with symbolism.

Just up Bonanza Road there's the historically significant Moulin Rouge sign in front of the burned and decrepit Moulin Rouge. Rumor has it someone will return the hotel to its '50s splendor one day, but I am approaching 50 and that rumor has been recycled annually since my childhood.

On the corner of F and Bonanza, across from the tire repair shop, there's new construction in the form of a Las Vegas Rescue Mission Dining Hall facility. Ah, redevelopment has arrived. One day the very poor will have a place to eat not far from the working poor who inhabit the West Las Vegas neighborhood.

Up and down the road is castoff rubbish and human debris, symbols in their way of an area nearly bereft of business vitality and hope. If this place were in the Middle East, a reporter would call it "war torn."

Is F Street a million miles -- or is it just across Bonanza Road -- from the dream of downtown redevelopment?

Then there's the wall, the one that weeks ago closed off F Street and now separates perennially troubled West Las Vegas from the future of downtown Las Vegas. On one side of Bonanza is F Street, stubbed like a cheap cigar by the wall. On the other side the street sign reads "City Parkway."

The fact it's flanked by construction company sites is beside the point. That sign is a symbol of the vibrant things to come when the Union Park planned development starts to take shape. Meanwhile, F Street is a dead end.

The closed street is the subject of litigation filed on behalf of two neighbors by attorney Matthew Callister, who by local standards these days qualifies as a bomb-throwing radical. Callister has chained himself in the way of downtown progress. His long-shot litigation is aimed at reopening the street and has the support of West Las Vegas' clergy and church-goers.

Some of those residents will make the short walk from F Street to City Hall this morning to protest the closure and ask officials to reconsider the decision, which has been integrated into the Nevada Department of Transportation's Interstate 15 expansion plans. Harried NDOT officials contend delays in the project could cost taxpayers millions, and neighborhood residents still have access to Bonanza through nearby D Street.

Which is correct, but beside the point. As shabby as it is, F Street is one of few entrances off Bonanza into the battered and predominantly African- American West Las Vegas.

Can you imagine a gateway street in Summerlin or Green Valley being closed in the name of outside development without substantive public comment?

Not a chance.

But it's just another thumb in the eye for the punch-drunk West Las Vegas. It's probably a dizzy idea, but perhaps this time City Hall will see not only the obvious symbolism but the equally evident injustice and demand a review of the closure.

That would be a good thing, but it could lead to substantial embarrassment if someone has the audacity to ask who suggested it be closed in the first place. A well-meaning city bureaucrat? A redevelopment liaison? A traffic engineer?

Or is it a developer who loathes the idea that the bright and shiny downtown could so easily be connected with the very blighted and very black part?

Callister and F Street's long-suffering neighbors have raised the issue of racism in the decision-making process, and history is on their side. West Las Vegas has been red-lined, walled off and marginalized for decades as much of the rest of Southern Nevada has enjoyed a much-publicized economic boom.

Perhaps racism is giving the decision-maker too much credit for thinking through the decision, which to me has the feel of expedience and the traditional lack of respect the progress-minded have for the economically hapless.

"It's really a historic battle," Callister says. "I don't know if it's racism, or that we just don't want to see the poverty that's endemic on the Westside, which has been such an under-served and neglected community through the years."

District Judge Ken Cory will hear arguments in the litigation later this month, and the historic symbolism is sure to be plentiful.

Symbols aside, a wall is still a wall.

John L. Smith's column appears Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. E-mail him at Smith@reviewjournal.com or call (702) 383-0295. He also blogs at lvrj.com/blogs/smith/.