La Jollans living atop Mount Soledad may boast of San Diego County’s most panoramic views, but would some residents exchange their ability to see the beach breaks and rolling hills for serenity?
Some houses on Soledad Mountain were built among ancient landslide areas, making homeowners fear the worst, but Joe Dicks and his family live along Via Capri, an area of Mount Soledad where neighbors have begun to fear a different type of disaster.
“The first pedestrian was hit on Rue de Anne,” Dicks said, explaining that many accidents have occurred on both upper and lower Via Capri. “Then in September of ’04, on Via Avola and Via Capri, an SUV landed on the roof of a house.”
Dicks and his neighbors urged the city council, including Council President Scott Peters, to slow traffic, but city engineers said traffic calming was outweighed by the road’s unusual conditions.
“The senior traffic engineer sent a letter in March 2004 rejecting the installation of stop signs at intersections,” Dicks said. “The signs [on Via Capri] point you to freeways, so they believe this is an onramp and there’s not a single stop you are required to make.”
Dicks said neighbors believed stop signs were the best way to slow cars down, so they called Peters, urging him to take their cause.
“You move to lower Via Capri and you have more accidents that occur,” Dicks said. “July five years ago we had two cars hit.”
Dicks said that speeding cars twice plowed into cars parked in front of his home, and accidents continue to occur.
“It’s a dangerous stretch of roadway by anyone’s estimate,” Dicks said. “I’m told the island and the two pop-outs are in the planning process.”
So engineers from the city’s traffic engineering division came up with a design, said Keely Sweeny of Peters’ office.
“This is a project that is a priority for Scott,” Sweeny said. “We ran into a lot of design challenges. We determined [both] Hidden Valley Road and Senn Way at Via Capri need traffic calming.”
According to Sweeny, engineers designed a striping plan and curb work at Hidden Valley and a traffic circle at Senn Way. A traffic circle slows traffic down by narrowing the roadway, Sweeny said. Residents also wanted landscaping, so the design took longer to approve.
“The mayor didn’t put it in the budget, but we approved it,” Sweeny said. “Scott has allocated a portion of the development impact fee fund for La Jolla, for which he has discretion. There are many worthy causes in La Jolla, but Scott has chosen this one because of public safety issues.”
“It was not funded through the mayor’s budget, so without Scott it wouldn’t go through in the foreseeable future,” she added.
Although Via Capri neighbors said they want a temporary stop sign while waiting for the city to implement the work, Sweeny said the planning association voted against any stop signs.
“There are many reasons why stop signs are not an approved method for traffic calming,” she said. “It has nothing to do with wanting it or not wanting it.”
After waiting years for the city to respond to their pleas, neighbors living on Via Capri may finally see some traffic controls in the near future. According to Sweeny, the design was the largest hurdle; with that completed, Soledad residents could see work in as little as a few months.
“It looks like Engineering and Capital Improvements will be through with the design and review process in July,” Sweeny said. “It will go to bed 10 to 16 weeks after that.”
At that time, Sweeny said the city will solicit bids from contractors.
“This is something Scott has made a personal priority that he’d like to see through. He’d like to see it make its progress by the time he has to leave office,” Sweeny said.
For more information, go to www.sandiego.gov.