Pacheco, CA

Pacheco sits where two freeways cross in central Contra Costa County, with Martinez, the county seat, to the north and west, Concord to the east and Pleasant Hill to the south. It is a small unincorporated community, and plenty of people driving between the Carquinez Strait and Walnut Creek have passed through without catching the name. The name comes from Salvio Pacheco, whose Mexican land grant covered much of the Mount Diablo country. In the 1850s and 1860s, boats worked their way up Walnut Creek to load grain from farms across the inland valleys, and Pacheco was the county's busy shipping point. Then the floods of the early 1860s silted the creek, the channel became unusable, and trade moved to Concord. A 2012 vote on joining Martinez covered only the northern edge and ended with annexation losing by a single vote. Today the center of town is the stretch of Pacheco Boulevard that continues north from Pleasant Hill. Taquerias, a Korean kitchen, a Filipino lumpia counter and pizza places line it, along with a bowling alley and a card room. Beyond the boulevard the housing is plain and low-slung, built in the postwar decades. For open space, people look outward. Pacheco Marsh, a tidal wetland restoration on Suisun Bay in Martinez, has a paved half-mile path, bird blinds and a launch for kayaks and paddleboards. The Contra Costa Canal Trail and the Iron Horse Trail, both paved, link Martinez, Pleasant Hill, Walnut Creek and Concord into one network. Getting around is the town's strength. Highway 4 runs east toward Antioch and Brentwood and west toward Hercules, while Interstate 680 goes south to Walnut Creek and north across the Benicia bridge. BART runs from stations in Concord and Pleasant Hill, and Martinez has the Amtrak station on the Capitol Corridor. The cost of being a crossroads is that the town has no quiet middle. The interchange takes up much of the land, and noise reaches the homes closest to the ramps. Pacheco is usually noticed on the way somewhere else, and it rewards anyone who pulls off at lunchtime.