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The key roadway to a once-prominent western suburb of Roanoke shows signs of returning to its former glory.
Location
Wasena neighborhood of southwest Roanoke City.
Features
The historic Wasena Bridge, the highest in Roanoke, and a once-thriving neighborhood commercial district mark Wasena’s well-traveled Main Street.
Annexed into the city in 1919, the Wasena neighborhood possesses much of the same architectural style and urban personality of the adjoining Raleigh Court section. The name “Wasena” comes from a Native American word for “beautiful view” and was used first in 1909 by the Wasena Land Company that had purchased the large farm of George Howbert. The land company erected a steel bridge across the Roanoke River to connect its planned subdivision with the affluent Highland Park and West End neighborhoods.
A 1912 advertisement by the land company boasted “a beautiful suburb lying on Roanoke River and gently sloping ground beyond, with a wonderful view and delightful mountain air.” The land company’s bridge was at the terminus with the Highland Park streetcar line and the company promised the most modern amenities for the time—sewers, sidewalks, lights, water and telephones!
All of this activity caught the eye of Ronnie R. Fairfax, who was developing the Villa Heights and Waverly Place sections of Roanoke such that by 1916 he had formed the Wasena Corporation whose residential lots adjoined those of the Wasena Land Company. Fairfax’s salesmen were brokering lots for $2 down and $2 per week thereafter.
With all of this activity by two realty development companies, a central avenue was created beginning at the bridge’s northern terminus and running south to Sherwood Avenue. It was aptly named Main Street.
The corridor became the gateway into Wasena from the city and the center of commercial activity for the neighborhood. By the 1920s, the then-100 and 200 blocks of Main Street (today’s 1100 block) were bustling with two grocery stores—the Wasena Grocery and Jamison’s Grocery—the Wasena Pharmacy, and Wasena Barber Shop. The groceries and barber shop exchanged hands numerous times over the next decade. By the 1940s, the two groceries were a Kroger and a Mick-or-Mack, chain stores. Main Street also had a Gulf filling station, a bakery (Parsell’s Pie Shop), a furniture repair business, dry cleaner, and Garland’s Drug Store No. 3. During the 1950s and 60s, the commercial district remained vibrant with Ben’s Barbershop, Wasena Hardware, Pete Parsell Grocery, Wasena Market Grocery, Circle Television, and Wasena Cleaners.
The most dramatic change to Main Street came in 1939 with the completion of present-day Wasena Bridge, at a cost of just under $332,000. It replaced the small steel bridge built by the land development company. Massive by Roanoke standards, the Wasena Bridge officially opened with fanfare on Saturday, August 12, 1939. With excited motorists lined up to cross the structure, city police allowed vehicles to begin crossing 30 minutes before the formal opening, but at 4 p.m., the Virginia Heights and Wasena buses moved across the bridge marking its official use. The Roanoke Times reported the following day that “motorists by the hundreds came to inspect and cross the new bridge.”
For several weeks, Main Street became one of the most travelled roads in Roanoke with the new bridge and its sodium vapor lights set atop large concrete pillars.
Later generations found another attraction for going along Main Street at Wasena Bridge, the United States Army Jupiter rocket. Standing several stories high, the rocket’s nose could be seen above the bridge railing by passing vehicles. The rocket was part of the collection of the Virginia Museum of Transportation that opened in 1963 under the bridge. Today, the rocket sits at the museum’s current site along Norfolk Avenue downtown. For several years, however, the rocket remained near Wasena Bridge after the museum had relocated following the disastrous flood of 1985.
Significance
Main Street remains a vital gateway to the Wasena and Raleigh Court neighborhoods as well as the primary connection between downtown Roanoke and Brambleton Avenue (via Brandon Avenue), leading to well-populated southwest Roanoke County.
The historic structures of the nearly century-old commercial corridor at the south end of Wasena Bridge remain, and hold potential for a restored neighborhood business district. Recent efforts to revitalize Wasena surrounding Main Street have borne fruit. The Green Goat restaurant has opened in the former Virginia Museum of Transportation exhibit building at Wasena Park; the Roanoke River Greenway is alive with bikers and pedestrians; and in the former Roanoke Ice and Cold Storage building along the Roanoke River is the Wasena Tap Room and Grill that opened in 2012 on the ground floor and 128 apartments on the floors above. The multi-million dollar ice house renovation into the River House Apartments was completed in 2011. All of this public and private investment is within a block of Main Street.
What happened?
As with many older city neighborhoods, the 1970s proved to be difficult, as residents moved to county suburbs for newer homes and homogenous school populations. Shopping malls sapped small, neighborhood businesses of customers, and many of the once-prominent older homes were carved up into apartments. Main Street began to show its age, and the quaint stores and shops became used (and some still are) for storage.
City officials and the Wasena Neighborhood Forum have developed an ambitious plan for Wasena that focuses on Main Street, especially its commercial center. City leaders recently announced the replacement of Wasena Bridge with an $11 million post-tension arch span bridge by 2022 to include bike lanes, wider sidewalks, and overlooks at key points where the bridge spans the Roanoke River and railroad tracks.
These efforts, coupled with the private investment in the ice storage plant and in structures along the greenway system nearby, hold promise for a renewed Main Street. Just within the past two years, new businesses have opened in the 1000 block of Main Street including the Barber Shop on Main, the Red Rooster Coffee Tasting Room & Lab and True Blue Yoga Studio. If these efforts prove sustainable, then what is old will truly become new again.
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