The city of Newport Beach, Calif., would have had a large freeway running right through the heart of it, if not for a group of residents and politicians known as the Freeway Fighters. “There’s a high demand for people to go up and down the coast, and that was the idea for the freeway plan,” former Newport Beach city councilman and civil engineer Don Webb told the Epoch Times. The new coastal freeway was planned in the 1960s and would have been up to 12 lanes wide and separated the harbors and beaches from the city, along with connecting to what’s now known as the Costa Mesa Freeway. The freeway system included a five-level interchange that would have destroyed area businesses and homes. It would have also brought in an estimated 187,000 vehicles on a daily basis. City councilman and future mayor of Newport Beach Howard Rodgers opposed the plan and …