Getting gray waiting
The letter to the editor by Les Kacev in the April 13 issue of the University City/Golden Triangle News is amazing (“Hey politicians: listen to the people,” page 6). First of all, his inference that seniors in the community were coerced to vote for a particular UCPG candidate was totally false and misleading. They, of their own volition, chose to vote for the candidate who would help to balance traffic in the community by putting some of it on Regents Road. Many were long-time residents of UC and have grown elderly waiting for the Regents Road Bridge to be built! They were young family-raising individuals when the UC community plan first came into being. Now they live in senior complexes. They feel betrayed by both the city and those living near Regents Road for not having built the Bridge. Also, because of the parking situation at the Wells Fargo Bank where the UCPG elections were held, they were offered a ride in a bus that called itself a limousine so they wouldn’t have to worry about parking. Wouldn’t you do that for your elderly parents?
Mr. Kacev talks as if Rose Canyon will be destroyed if the Regents Road Bridge is built. This is not true in the least. This bridge will go over the canyon, with a footprint less than all the square footage of the walking paths presently in the canyon. It will go across the canyon (1/6 of a mile) and allow all nature to go on as usual underneath. Wetlands will still be there. In fact, the bridge will be designed to further enhance wetlands during periods of rain. Rose Canyon and its beauty and usefulness will in no way be lost to the community. Contrary to Mr. Kacev, it will become more accessible with decent parking and pathways leading to the trails, which will be usable also by the disabled.
Walkability and bikability will be enhanced for our area because both pedestrian and bike lanes will be part of the Regents Road Bridge.
Everyone in our community probably wants a fire station in south UC. But those citizens in areas east of Genesee get incensed when members of the UCPG agree with that idea, but then don’t want one in their neighborhood. “Put it out near the east end of Governor!” said one member, reinforcing the idea that some of the people in the west end of UC want nothing, absolutely nothing, to change even though a particular project would help all the residents.
Having the access that the Regents Road Bridge would provide is absolutely vital to our entire community. Let us not have to grow older and older waiting for it.
Valdene Ramrus, University City

Uniting behind community plan for Regents Bridge
When San Diego created the community plan in the 1980s, they foresaw the future growth of the northern part of the area called University City. By making the Regents Road Bridge over Rose Canyon a permanent part of the community plan, they were wisely creating a solution for increasing density and traffic.
There are two east/west natural canyons that run through University City: Marion Bear Park and Rose Canyon. There are two north/south traffic corridors within University City: Regents Road and Genesee Avenue. As called for in the community plan, both canyons will eventually be traversed by Regents Road and Genesee Avenue. University City residents will continue to enjoy walking in Rose Canyon just as they do in Marion Bear Park, crossed by Regents Road as well as Genesee Avenue
In fact, after the bridge construction there will be much better access to Rose Canyon, and people will no longer risk injuring themselves when they descend into Rose Canyon from the North and South at Regents Road. Hopefully, someday we will have the same adequate access and parking in Rose Canyon that we now have in Marion Bear Park where Genesee and Regents Road cross at SR-52.
In his guest commentary calling for University City to Unite, Larry Hogue would have us believe that fine-tuning of freeways and a few safety improvements will solve all future traffic problems (University City/Golden Triangle News, April 13, page 7). This is unrealistic. We should unite to build University City by following the community plan.
The planned bridge is the only means to equally divide the traffic between north and south University City. In addition, it is a principal way to have better transit, ready access to medical facilities, a vital emergency escape route, as well as a connection to UCSD. By all means, unite the community. Let’s do it in an orderly, active way in which Rose Canyon has better access and parking. It must develop with Regents Road crossing it, as intended in the original plan.
Herb Handy, University City

Back Brian Bilbray now!
Attention: Losing candidates ” you’re all winners for running, but please take down your road signs now!
In this troubled period for 50th Congressional District voters, unity is vital. To recapture the seat through year-end, and to win it for two more years, Republicans, Independents, conservative Democrats and Libertarians must unite today behind Brian Bilbray. We need all candidates who lost the primary to stop sending mixed gaming signals about possible intentions to split the ideological voting in June. Be pragmatic for June 6th.
Bilbray is a balanced conservative Republican, a maverick, who votes his conscience, not the party line. He’s no liberal. He’s proven, tested, competent and he proudly stands behind his voting record in several public service posts over the past quarter century. He was a border area Congressman twice elected in a Democrat stronghold ethnic district. The AFL-CIO’s last minute, extra-million-dollar boost sacked him in his third run, in that heavily Democratic district, as punishment for his voting to impeach Bill Clinton. And yes, since leaving Congress, Bilbray has earned the bread on his family’s table by continuing to be effective in Washington, getting paid for advocating for issues in which he believes.
As Brian Bilbray can attest from his breadth of pragmatic experiences in public service, there are no uniquely Republican or Democrat solutions to war and peace, national security, taxation, medical care, sewage, air and water quality, traffic, saving coastal bluffs or protecting flora and fauna. Bilbray has in situ legislative experience in all these areas, a champion in immigration reform and border security. Bilbray is a proven public servant who has earned his stripes. Let’s all unite today behind Brian.
Albert Frowiss, Rancho Santa Fe

It’s simple ” we’re out
The San Diego airport issue can be presented as a news item that would appear to the reader as recent. As a San Diego native of 59 years, I would like to comment on this high priority issue. The airport was never designed for the traffic we have today. During WWII, the runway was built some 8-feet-thick to accommodate bombers, such as the B24 and later the B36.
Lighter commercial aircraft were few in comparison to today. For at least 59 years, San Diego has had vast land available to build a large airport. Year after year, the developers pushed politicians towards hotels, motels, shopping centers and housing projects to include golf courses and parks. Now we are flat out of enough land ” it’s that simple.
Taking the Marine Corps Recruiting Depot would not even come close to a second runway, but it could make more developers money for hotels and a few houses or maybe a shopping center. Don’t be fooled by the people who say they are looking into the airport issue and the millions of needless dollars spent to search. North, South and East Counties are out, period.
We need to use the existing runway for short flights in California and to other cities in California for connections to flights to other states and overseas. This worked with no problem in the earlier years and will work now.
Paul Daughtery, Ocean Beach

Buy, don’t steal, Miramar
The Regional Airport Authority, instead of trying to steal Miramar from an uncooperative Navy, might offer to buy it.
Instead of considering $15 billion to build a high-speed train to somewhere or nowhere, offer $15 billion to the Navy. Instead of looking at new sites that will cost $10-$20 billion to develop, see if Adm. William Guest was right. See if the military, given the constraints imposed by Congress on military capital spending, would be more receptive to selling facilities, as the admiral said, for enough money to build state-of-the-art facilities on dirt cheap land elsewhere.
At one time, the Federal Airport Trust Fund (AATF) had more than enough money to pay for a new airport for San Diego. Maybe the trust fund still has some money left for San Diego to help pay the military for Miramar.
Fred Schnaubelt, Former City Councilman

Mayor Sanders’ true colors
With 16 hours notice (including overnight hours), Mayor Sanders called a meeting of the parties involved with proposed changes at Torrey Pines and Balboa golf courses. Showing his true colors, he met privately, before the announced meeting, with representatives of the Lodge, the Century Club and other campaign-contributing special interests, but not one group representing the public.
At the meeting he gave those groups everything they wanted. Reduced tee times for the public, increased fees, elimination of senior discounts, approval to build the Century Club operations building on city property and plans to build a new clubhouse, to Bill Evans’s specifications, after the 2008 Open. His vow of a transparent administration is a sham as he also said he would bypass the City Council’s Natural Resource and Cultural Committee, which is normally the first stop in hearing golf course issues, and go directly to the full City Council.
You can rest assured that he would not do this without having already rigged the vote with council members who are beholden to the very same special interests. One of the council members is an honorary member of the Century Club.
We citizens are naive to think that we can go up against “business leaders” who buy access and favors from our politicians. We have only one choice and that is to unite and express our anger over the treatment we get time after time. I am a member of a group of citizens called the San Diego Municipal Golfers Alliance. If you are opposed to being treated like you just fell off the turnip truck and are opposed to losing your privileges and control over our city’s Municipal Golf Courses, go to our Web site, SDMGA.ORG, and find out how to fight City Hall.
In the meantime, write and call the Mayor and your City Councilmember (addresses on the Web site) to let them know you are mad and won’t put up with being pushed around by the monied interest anymore. It’s the only hope we have before “they” condo-ize Torrey Pines.
John Beaver, La Jolla

CLARIFICATION
District 50 congressional candidate Bill Boyer was misquoted in the March 23 issue of the University City/Golden Triangle News, page 3. To clarify, Boyer said that he did not approve of wiretapping authorized by President George W. Bush because it was not legally sound, although he did think the president’s motivation was “pure.” Additionally, Boyer said that Iraq’s infrastructure should be returned to “pre-war levels” in response to a question about ending the war and returning troops home.