Although North Park’s “Busy Corner” lies a block north, the intersection of North Park Way and 30th Street is a popular crossing for pedestrians in the neighborhood. In the heart of North Park, this intersection hosts Waypoint Public, Pigment, the North Park Parking Garage, and North Park Family Dentistry with many more businesses and residences nearby. It is also an intersection that needs improvement to increase safety and convenience for residents and visitors to North Park.
Today my neighbor recounted being hit by a car driver at this intersection last week while she was pushing a stroller and walking with her seven-year-old. The driver did not yield when making a left turn and did not use a blinker to indicate the left turn. She plowed into the group of three in broad daylight. If you walk this intersection you may have had close calls with drivers as I have on a number of occasions. We need to do much more to make our neighborhoods safer – motor vehicle crashes are the top cause of death for American children and adolescents ages 1 to 19.
For this specific intersection here are a number of improvements we can make. (The following could be applied to many areas across the city as well and hopefully some, like LPI, become the default treatment rather than reactive to areas with injuries.)
6. Add red light cameras to penalize bad actors (after remaking them legal in San Diego). In 2013 San Diego got rid of red light cameras that were used to penalize those breaking laws at intersections. Cameras are cheap and effective ways to enforce laws like speeding, running red lights, etc. and would be ideal for areas like this intersection where common law-breaking by drivers has more severe repercussions due to the high number of humans nearby.
7. Lower speed limit to 20 MPH. Lower speeds help to avoid collisions and reduce the harm when collisions occur. This article has a great interactive chart showing the relative fatality risk at various speeds.
If you’re interested in helping make this intersection better in the ways noted above (or your own) you can help by contacting our City Councilmember, Chris Ward at christopherward@sandiego.gov and the Council Office Rep for North Park, Tyler Renner – trenner@sandiego.gov.
Taking a moment to send a message as simple as “Please make the intersection at 30th and North Park Way safer. Our family walks there often. Thank you.” are great and really help to make improvements on the ground reality.
[Related note: Thank you to all that voiced support for a new crosswalk at Jefferson Elementary – located 3 blocks directly west of the intersection highlighted in this post. Mr. Renner informed me this is scheduled to be installed in 2019 as part of the new Mini-Park in North Park behind the Observatory.]
For context here are a few photos of the intersection I took today, 1/5/2019.
Little Italy continues to grow and become a better place to visit and live. The most recent addition to the neighborhood is Piazza della Famiglia – a 10,000 square foot public plaza with apartments above and 16,000 feet of retail and restaurant space surrounding. This plaza was formerly a short block of Date Street but per an agreement between the developer, H.G. Fenton, and the City of San Diego the street was vacated and a beautiful public space was created, paid for by private dollars.
The plaza isn’t fully open yet but a few of the businesses are and when I stopped by today on a sunny, gorgeous day around noon there were people chatting and having coffee, a family walking their baby in a stroller, and a number of passersby traversing the plaza on foot and bicycle. There’s currently a small tent set up with leasing information for the two apartment buildings that H.G. Fenton built next to the plaza – Vici and Amo – which add 125 units to the area.
Here are a number of photos I took of the plaza. The Little Italy Farmer’s Market (every Saturday and the best in the region if you ask me) will soon return to Date Street and the scene is going to be better than ever.
It’s awesome to see the neighborhood and the City choosing a public space over a handful of mostly free parking spaces (metered during part of the day) that previously occupied the plaza space. For a comparison I checked out the two closest similr streets, which are similar size – Cedar and Fir. When I stopped by Cedar had 10 total vehicles parked and Fir had 20, including one person moving from one meter to another and a parking enforcement vehicle looking for ticketing opportunities. Needless to say, these streets that are devoted to cars and parking had zero persons enjoying the square footage occupied by the empty traffic lanes and parking spots.
Which would you prefer for your neighborhood? 15 empty cars on a block, or a beautiful public plaza with shops, fountains, tables, and a place to sit and enjoy life? This sort of opportunity is available in spaces across San Diego, if we choose to embrace it. More likely we’ll see massive amounts of additional free street parking across the city, as soon to come to North Park, due to the City making it easier than ever to quickly give over more public land to parking. I’d prefer more plazas, trees, and life – hopefully you’ll join me in working for the same. And don’t forget to check out the Little Italy Farmer’s Market – a great start to the weekend for locals and visitors alike. I’d recommend taking a bike-share bike, hopefully by the time you visit the local business association will have stopped sabotaging those programs in Little Italy.
Thanks to a request from the Mid-City Parking District a number of streets in North Park will likely soon be converted from parallel on-street free parking to head-in on-street free parking. The following list of requested changes will result in an increase of 254 parking spaces, using more of our public land to store empty automobiles. The proposed changes were discussed at the March meeting of the North Park Planning Public Facilities and Transportation Subcommittee – minutes including discussion can be found here. The proposed changes are on the agenda for the North Park Planning Committee consent agenda for Tuesday, April 17.
The proposed changes are spread across a large section of North Park, but the stretch of 29th Street is particularly interesting to me. 29th Street is the site of the North Park Parking Garage – a 100% taxpayer funded parking garage with low rates that rarely breaks even (and in the most recent year likely lost money due to popularity of biking, walking, and Uber / Lyft – financials aren’t yet out to verify performance). Here’s a map of the blocks of 29th Street and cross streets proposed to be converted to head-in parking (identified in red).
There are a number of reasons to oppose these conversions:
Here’s a photo gallery of each block of 29th Street to get a sense of the housing and parking. The street is very wide but as you can see, there is hardly a lack of parking although this may vary according to time of day.
Perhaps the worst bit of all is residents have basically no say in this process. The parking changes were requested by a parking agency and I don’t believe any residents of any of these streets were part of the application – apparently the mission of parking agencies are to maximize the amount of parking for vehicles. Residents will have a chance to respond negatively to the proposals, a written notice will be sent out. Who does the notice go to – property owners or residents? (Not sure.) Are the mailings certified delivery to ensure receipt by intended recipients? (Guessing no.) Even if the letters are addressed properly, and received what are the odds they are read or understood? (Not likely.) The standard to oppose is that a majority, more than 50%, of the notices sent out must be returned in opposition. If you’ve ever done a survey or mail response campaign you probably understand there is essentially zero chance of ever seeing a 50% response rate to any issue.
If there is demand from the residents on the impacted streets then an Opt-In approach would pass with flying colors. I suspect that there is not support from the residents given the above many reasons this is a bad idea. In either case, I believe the North Park Planning Committee has discretion on this matter to evaluate as they deem most appropriate. I hope they’ll opt to consider the impacts of yet more automobile-focused use of our land in this urban environment and reject this proposal to bring yet more traffic and parking and associated ills to the area. For reference, here’s the evaluation policy for this sort of proposal.
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In addition to this conversion being a bad idea there are better options for the excess roadway that does exist. Some of those better options are:
If you have an opinion on this proposal you can attend the North Park Planning Committee Hearing on 4/17 or contact the group via email at info@northparkplanning.org. Additionally, on my street – Granada Avenue – I’ll be working with the other residents to proactively state our opposition to this sort of conversion. You can consider doing the same as it seems likely the many over-sized roadways in San Diego will likely follow 29th Street in becoming a parker’s paradise.
Plaza de Panama is the central plaza in Balboa Park and for many years was devoted to automobile parking. In June 2013 reviled former Mayor Bob Filner led a push that removed the parking spots from the Plaza de Panama and created a public space for strolling, sitting, and enjoying the surrounding museums and sunshine.
Here’s a photo of what the plaza looked like as a parking lot.
Below is what the plaza looks like now, less than three years later. Today our family had a small picnic lunch on the plaza and there were people everywhere – a newlywed couple taking photos on the steps of the Museum of Art, small children riding bikes and scooters, people of all ages sitting or taking photos. In short, it felt like an authentic plaza: “a public square, marketplace, or similar open space in a built-up area“.
While a lack of parking at Balboa Park continues to be a prominent point of public discussion and debate the Plaza de Panama proves that empty parking spaces do not a great space make – no one was hanging out at the parking lot it formerly was, other than the valets for The Prado restaurant. People enjoying life and each other are what make a plaza great and if you visit Balboa Park today you’ll find such a place at its heart.
The removal of the parking lot was the start of this new public life, but there have been many other elements that have contributed to the engaging place it is today. Below are a few and it’s encouraging to see a range of different players contributing – I look forward to see what other improvements lie ahead.
Thank you to the many people that are working to enhance Balboa Park and the experience of visiting for locals and tourists alike. The Plaza de Panama shows that even on a short time frame big changes can be made through thoughtful, low-cost projects that put people first. Cheers!
Road rage is defined as “violent anger caused by the stress and frustration involved in driving a motor vehicle in difficult conditions”. The term has some nice alliteration but a more fitting term would be “car rage”. Perhaps we use road rage because we don’t want to acknowledge the damage and deaths that our passionate and loving embrace of the automobile causes. Tens of thousands of deaths every year, yet rarely a headline in the paper. The deaths are in the paper, just in the small print area inside with some short explanations that will impugn the non-auto parties at every turn. Lots of mentions of crosswalks, lighting conditions, and visibility of clothing but few notes about Big Gulps, radio fiddling, use of phones, makeup application, driving history, or attention paid to road.
If you walk, or ride the bus, or ride a bicycle you don’t experience the same elevation of pulse, stress level, and anger as experienced when driving – especially at high speeds. It seems mostly confined to the experience of driving in an automobile. So perhaps we should retire “road rage” and start using “car rage”. It won’t do much for the victims but it will at least change the conversation a bit and recognize that the most aggressive parties on our roads (which includes in front of our homes, schools, and businesses) are those using motor vehicles.
There is also a definition for “bike rage” and helpfully included in the examples section are all the different attack methods of cyclists. For some reason, in the road rage entry (below) there not similarly prominent categories regarding attacks by car drivers.
Here’s the road rage entry with some bland categories. The mentions of violence included regard shootings: guns = dangerous, cars = Hello Kitty. It’s almost like we don’t take the responsibility and risk of driving a massive vehicle at high speeds seriously.
Drive safe, drive slow, drive less. Avoid car rage.
SANDAG is preparing to implement bicycle improvements to Pershing Drive in the near future, creating a safe and functional route from North Park and surrounding communities to Downtown. This is part of the $200M SANDAG bicycle corridors program which has yet to stripe a single foot of bike lane in the nearly 3 years since being announced. The first project, running through Hillcrest, gutted the most important segment – an east-west connection to North Park – at the last moment as detailed in this film by Dennis Stein.
Pershing Drive is very different from University Avenue; it lies in a park rather than popular communities. Pershing Drive is currently a fantastic bicycle connection in many ways. It runs through the middle of Balboa Park’s open space area. Heading into town it offers gorgeous views of Los Coronados islands, Coronado Bridge, and Downtown. It connects the densely populated neighborhoods of Uptown and Mid-City to Downtown. However, it is also very intimidating to bike on. The painted lanes are adjacent to high-speed roadways with speed limits of 45-50 MPH (and we all know that 5-10 above that is the likely reality). Heading into Downtown, cyclists need to cross two separate onramps to Interstate 5, while drivers are ramping up to Interstate speeds. Both onramps lie behind curving corners with limited visibility.
I’ve been writing about the dangers of biking on Pershing Drive since early 2014 and serious injuries continue to accrue.
So how do we best create a functional, safe and protected bicycle corridor on Pershing Drive? Following are a number of specific ideas for what this project should look like. We should start with context and a general guideline. This project lies in the heart of Balboa Park – it should connect with and enhance the park, not take away from it. A guideline that should lead any transport project is to put people first – and that means pedestrians first, bicycles second, public transit third, and private automobile fourth. This is the hierarchy of preference used by the City of Chicago Department of Transportation and one that San Diego should adopt.
The Pershing Drive bicycle corridor should establish a two-way bike lane and two-way walking / running path adjacent to the Balboa Park golf course on the south / east side of Pershing Drive. The entry point would be located at Redwood & 28th. By siting the path on this side of Pershing the major friction points of the I-5 onramps are avoided (which fall under CalTrans purview and would be very difficult to address). It also presents the opportunity to put those biking or jogging in a shaded and enjoyable place along the roadway.
Additional details will follow this post, including street sketches and other visuals. The important thing is to gather community support for real improvements now, and to do so in a constructive way. This is not about bikes vs. cars – it’s about taking real action about public health, climate change, quality of life, park space. In general, it’s about making the project area better for all San Diegans. We cannot afford to let basic, functional bicycle infrastructure get axed in a program specifically designed to create bicycle infrastructure, as happened in Hillcrest.
I would love feedback and criticisms or additional suggestions regarding Pershing Drive. Please drop them in the comments, social media, or email. Thank you.
KPBS recently ran a story mostly lamenting the lack of parking for vehicles at Balboa Park in San Diego. I strongly disagree with this premise, particularly because of the lack of parking studies to support this viewpoint. I posted a bit on my Facebook page (re-posted below) and was surprised and grateful to see it included the next day in both the San Diego Free Press Starting Line and the Voice of San Diego Morning Report.
If you live in San Diego or like to follow news from San Diego these are my two favorite daily sources for information and viewpoints from the area. You can subscribe to both of these sources via email if you’d like to get them in your inbox.
Here are my brief thoughts on proposals to pave more of Balboa Park for parking lots, garages, and roadways. It is very sad to me that in some of our most precious locations – the beachfront, the bayfront, Balboa Park, and so many others – we actively go out of our way to spend millions to erase the natural beauty that exists here. Hopefully we can start to change our ways and live in a more sustainable, and enjoyable manner in the future.
This is so terrible it’s not even funny. In San Diego, our biggest and most well-known, and well-visited, park is Balboa Park. If you’ve been to San Diego you may have been there.
Instead of preserving our park space we are actively trying to pave more and more and more of it to accommodate vehicle parking. If parking were difficult, this might be a cause worth considering.
But facts like usage of existing parking spots won’t be found in articles like this or conversations with our “Balboa Park leaders”. Maybe a quick anecdote to note that yes, there are almost always open parking spots, but then back to visions of parking garages and multi-million dollar roadways that taxpayers will pay for.
Fresh on the heels of a huge parking garage built by the San Diego Zoo (which all San Diego property owners pay for) we have visions of parking on the East Mesa (which is already a parking lot used by city trucks), and a parking garage behind the Organ Pavilion.
More parking, more cars, more pavement. Less open space, worse air, and more congestion. Everybody clap.
Two and a half years ago SANDAG announced $200 million for bike projects to create a regional network. The first of these projects is a $40 million project in Uptown. It would create a critical connection both East to West and North to South in the heart of San Diego’s most densely populated neighborhoods.
Since the original announcement SANDAG has repeatedly trumpeted these funds as a sign of commitment to healthy transport in the form of bicycles. During the time since Uptown was selected for the first SANDAG bicycle project what has changed in the area? Population, businesses, traffic, and roadways all remain the same. There remain only two real options for an East to West connection – University and Washington.
What has changed in that period is the will of SANDAG and the Transportation Committee to support and implement real bicycle infrastructure. SANDAG is now taking unilateral action, walking back any commitment to bicycles for this corridor and setting a poor precedent for the future. Worse yet is the toxic effect this will have on the many, many San Diegans that spent thousands of hours attending the public forums to give input and show support for this improvement in Uptown only to be trumped by back-room dealings hidden from the public eye that gutted the project in recent months.
We need safe streets today. There are too many deaths, too many injuries, and too little justice (or even simple apologies) to those left dead or injured.
We are a real, vibrant, beautiful city – not a collection of suburbs. We need to behave as such.
SANDAG is doubling down on the failed policies of 50 years of planning and building roadways in our region. More and wider roads, more cars, more congestion. Less open space, weaker communities, a weaker economy for both households and government, and more deaths and negative health impacts. This is the most recent example of a car first-last-and-only approach to transportation.
San Diego has many natural advantages that blunt the effects of these poor policies. These will not last forever. Cities such as Vancouver, Seattle, Chicago, New York, Paris, London, Stockholm, and many others showcase the real, tangible benefits derived from creating a livable and safe streetscape and city.
We need a firm, meaningful commitment to healthy, safe, and responsible transport. Cars and bicycles are not equivalent transport. Bicycles are better for safety, health, wealth, and should be put at a higher priority than cars. Chicago Department of Transportation does exactly this by using the following order of priority for transportation:
San Diego and SANDAG should take a page from this leading example and do the same, backed up by the allocation of funding and policies. The opposite is the reality.
The lion’s share of all money goes to cars and roadways for cars while all other modes are made to beg for scraps or sue to compel what should be the course being set by our own leaders. We need to create a true network for bikes, starting with University Avenue. It will be a major step forward to improve our city and the individual well-being of our citizens.
If SANDAG is unable to implement the Uptown bicycle corridor with real, safe bicycle infrastructure throughout this $40 million should be moved to a different neighborhood where such a project can be realized. If you can’t walk the walk, stop talking the talk. Greenwashing is not a substitute for responsible, forward-thinking action.
More than two and a half years have passed since $200 million was promised for bike projects by SANDAG. 77 miles of bikeways in 42 projects was promised to be finished within ten years. Where do we stand today? Without a single foot of paint striped and the first project gutted and providing a maximum of three blocks of protected bike lanes. A poor omen for the future projects, unless the desire to see a bicycle network was not genuine in the first place. Hopefully the remaining projects will see real, on-the-ground results in quick order. I would not hold my breath.
I am writing to you today to ask you to join me in the fight to make San Diego a world-class bicycling city by pledging to make a monthly donation BikeSD. Give today.
BikeSD is a bicycle advocacy organization with the vision to “transform San Diego into the world’s best city for bicycling”. Although a young organization in its third year of existence this vision has already been pushed from complete fantasy to “probably not going to happen”. Every day this push continues and the vision comes closer to reality. This ongoing progress is due to the efforts of the organization and the many, many members, volunteers, friends, and supporters working together each day.
I first became familiar with BikeSD a few years ago when I began regularly attending meetings relating to SANDAG bike corridor projects. I quickly became reliant on the BikeSD Twitter, Facebook, and website for news of meetings I could not attend. The sources, especially Twitter, were pretty much the only place to get a true picture of what was going on and being said for those not present. At the meetings I was present for it was very clear to me who the voices in the room that I supported most belonged to – those of BikeSD volunteers and members. This is the biggest reason I contribute monthly to BikeSD, to ensure my opinion has a voice at those meetings I can’t attend personally, and to increase the reach of the voice of the organization. If you look around the city today and compare to five years ago the difference in the policies, infrastructure, and discussion around bicycling is starkly different. The major change in that time period? The arrival of BikeSD as a powerful force for the interest of bicycle riders of all experience and ability.
Until this year, BikeSD was solely a volunteer organization. All the time and efforts put forth were done by people that care about San Diego and were willing to devote significant time to make this a better, safer place to live. This year the organization is increasing the capacity to create positive change and that requires dollars. Recently the first part-time hire for BikeSD was made – Kyle Carscaden receives a small monthly payment and is working to partner with businesses to provide secure, attractive bicycle parking for customers and employees. Samantha Ollinger, Executive Director, is now receiving a small monthly stipend for her time. We need to increase the ability to support these people, hire additional resources, and pay for physical materials and campaigns. You can help and ensure that the ability of BikeSD to make San Diego great is amplified and safer streets become a reality.
BikeSD is doing great work in San Diego and though many have helped and supported the organization, that has largely been due to the efforts and sacrifices of one person – Samantha Ollinger. Any city in the country would be lucky to have such a capable individual leading the push for safer streets and a healthier, happier city. The impact that Sam has had on the city is hard to overstate and shows how important it is to support her voice, and add more voices, with enhanced resources for advocacy. We need to support Sam and enable her to continue working full-time on these important issues. Her leadership and rational, uncompromising approach to building a better city has pushed the entire conversation in San Diego in a meaningful way. We need more of this, and more voices joining her.
I hope you’ll join me and support BikeSD Outreach* on a monthly basis. Whether $5 or $500, you will help to make San Diego a better place to live for all. Thank you.
[This post originally appeared on the BikeSD blog.]
* Contributions are tax deductible to the fullest extent permitted by law
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