“Climate Best by Government Test:” so reads the old neon sign nostalgically placed over Redwood City’s Broadway decades after its removal from El Camino Real when El Camino was expanded to four lanes from two. And yes, it’s true.
Incorporated in 1868, and the county seat of San Mateo County, Redwood City boasts the only deepwater port in the Bay south of San Francisco. As its name implies, the town started as a port for lumber in the days before the railroad came to the Peninsula in 1863. One of its oldest landmarks still bears a Civil War name: Union Cemetery, now squeezed in between El Camino and the Woodside Road overpass. I recently viewed a home for sale there that was built in the 1870s—way old for this part of the country. Redwood City makes efforts to preserve what’s left of this history.