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Plans are afoot to breathe new life into a ghost town on the fabled Route 66 in the U.S.
Marooned in the Mojave Desert of California, the tiny settlement of Amboy was a thriving way station on the arterial route from Chicago to Los Angeles. But it fell into long-term decline with the opening of Interstate 40 in 1973, which bypassed the town first settled in 1858 as a mining camp.
All that remain today are a neglected mid-century gas station and a handful of unoccupied one-storey buildings. Its population is zero. But tourists willing to go off the beaten track are still drawn to Amboy, sparking plans for its revival. Kyle Okura’s father Albert Okura bought Amboy’s physical assets for $425,000 in 2005 and pledged to the previous owners he would rejuvenate it.
“It is the true symbol of Americana,” Kyle, 31, told The Times of London. “Our car culture, the American dream, freedom.” As a 12-year-old boy, Kyle recalled being underwhelmed when his father gave him the grand tour of Amboy, roughly 320 km west of Los Angeles. “It was way more run down than it is today,” he said.
“There was clutter and trash everywhere. It looked like it had been closed for decades.”
Roy’s Motel and Café, which opened in 1938, still exists and is the only operational business left in town. For Kyle, the rejuvenation of Amboy became personal when his father died last year. “Dad believed it was part of his destiny. Now I realize it’s part of mine, too.”
Tour guide Jan Kuzelka described Amboy’s appeal to the L.A. Times. She said: “You sink into the ’60s here. It’s like a live museum.”