Utah has Arches National Park.

St. Louis has The Gateway Arch.

Paris has the Arc de Triumphe.

New York has the Washington Square Arch.

Rome has the Arch of Constantine.

McDonald’s has the Golden Arches.

Trump is building the Triumphal Arch.

And now Manteca has its own arch.

Its name?

The Manteca Arch works.

It’s because arches, for the most part, are erected to celebrate a victory as Napoleon did in 1806, honor a leader as the Romans did in 350 AD and New York did in 1892, or an event St. Louis did in 1965 to celebrate westward migration.

Then there’s the reason California cities up and down the San Joaquin Valley more than a century ago erected arches in downtowns to celebrate the prosperity of their greater community.

Modesto’s arch was built in 1912 to welcome automobile drivers. It displays the city’s motto that reflects civic pride: “Water, Wealth, Contentment, Health.”

The Lodi Arch — one of the few Mission Revival arches in California — was built in 1907.

It was erected to provide a formal, fancy entrance to the first Tokay Carnival, the predecessor to today’s Tokay Grape Festival.

As such, it celebrated the achievement of the community in creating a wine grape region on what was just Central Valley wilderness in 1864 that started with the first planting of six acres of Tokay grapes that are native to Algeria.

City leaders view the arch much like the gateway arches in Lathrop, Ripon, and Modesto to mark the entrance to a specific area such as downtowns.

A more techie treatment with the pillars making heavy use of LED lighting technology will distinguish it from the modern pillars in Lathrop and the classic brick pillars in Ripon.

If all goes as promise, the arch light colors will literally change with the celebratory days and seasons in Manteca.

As such, it should be viewed as an arch celebrating Manteca — where it has come from, where it is today, and where it is headed.

Manteca is becoming a more vibrant community with every passing year.

That fact tends to get lost in the tell-tale signs of expanding prosperity — seemingly endless construction and traffic — that, in Manteca’s case, has a healthy concentration on embracing families.

And that is families in the broadest sense and not in the myopic definition of a nuclear family.

Manteca is thriving not because it emulates a cookie cutter hip culture, trendy social media pop up cafes and stores, or is a haven for retirees or a specific social economic group.

It is an eclectic mixture of cultures, backgrounds, and faiths that run the gamut from farm workers, blue collar, and white collar to professionals — brought together with a desire to put down roots and grow.

And as much as some moan and groan about growth, you don’t see U-Hauls jamming the 120 Bypass to the Bay Area, heading to the Pacific Northwest or fleeing east to Idaho or Texas.

The fact the arch — with its promise of the endless possibility of light combinations to mark days such as the Fourth of July, the Watermelon Festival, the Pumpkin Fair, Christmas and more — will be far from staid, speaks to the Manteca psyche.

There has been a push from Day 1 to make prosperity the prime crop coming from the sandy loam whether it was in the form of wheat, sugar beets, almonds, watermelons, new neighborhoods, employment centers — with the likes of Amazon, 5.11 Tactical, Ford, and more — or going from California’s first water park to a 500-room indoor water park resort.

It may be at the entrance it downtown, but it is also at the city’s heart.

As such, it is a community arch celebrating the collective achievement of Manteca and drawing attention to its future.

It is also an event arch thanks to the ability to change colors instead of simply being a traditional celebratory arch.

Perhaps that is why those who have been somewhat ambivalent about the arch per se aren’t making the $620,000 expenditure the poster project for “wasteful” spending.

It’s the same sense of civic pride that prompted Modesto, Lathrop, Lodi, and Ripon put in place their own arches over the years.

It may not been on the same high plateau of stunning natural bridges near Moab or as imposing as the 630 foot high and 630 foot wide stainless steel Gateway Arch that is also the largest arch in the world.

And it may not be as grand as what is going up along the Potomac topping out at 250 feet to celebrate the USA’s 250th birthday.

However, with a span of 80 feet and height more than comfortable for semi-trucks to pass under, it will be more imposing than the 130 foot Manteca water tower that literally is just barely over a stone’s throw to the east.

It is an arch that will literally celebrate the community of Manteca.