City planners returned with a refined visionary plan to make public park and street space along Mission Boulevard more bicycle- and pedestrian-friendly at a May 30 workshop.
\nIn a follow-up to a September 2018 workshop introducing the Mission Boulevard Public Spaces and Active Transportation Plan, senior City planner Elizabeth Ocampo Vivero said: “We started working on this project in 2016, applying for a SANDAG grant as well as receiving support from various community organizations including beautifulPB, Discover PB, PB Town Council and Council District 2. The primary objective is to identify opportunities for multi-modal improvements. What this really means is improving walking, bicycling, access to transit and access to the beach.”
\nAdded Ocampo Vivero: “We also want to identify additional community spaces while strengthening the community\u2019s character. We really want to identify opportunities for future investment and projects in this study area.”
\nThe project area lies between Mission Boulevard, Pacific Beach Drive, Diamond Street and the Ocean Boulevard boardwalk.
\nIn 2015, a planning grant proposal called Pacific Beach Greenways, Parks and Transit was presented\u00a0to SANDAG, resulting in a $400,000 grant and an additional $40,000 in matching funds.\u00a0Ocampo Vivero said the new Public Spaces and Active Transportation Plan “builds upon beautifulPB\u2019s concept plan, PB parks.
\nThe PB Parks Project is a grass-roots, community-inspired vision celebrating PB culture and incorporating resources for residents, visitors and local businesses focusing on accessibility, public open spaces, improved landscape and integrated sustainability.\u00a0
\nDiscussing five alternative designs for reconfiguring PB streets, consultant Steve Cook, principal with Chen Ryan and Associates Inc. noted: “We can make the bike environment safer, more friendly and create more parking supply. We don\u2019t want to create gridlock. We do want to slow people down.”
\n“Where do scooters fit in with this?” asked one audience member.\u00a0
\n“They\u2019ll use the bike lanes,” answered Cook.
\n“What about the bike corrals, if you don\u2019t put them in by July 1, people will park on the sidewalk,” said PB activist Marcie Becket, adding the traffic refinements as proposed “would push a lot of traffic onto a purely residential street (Bayard).”
\nAfter the meeting, Beckett said, “The changes proposed for Mission Boulevard will slow traffic and increase congestion, so the plan\u00a0needs to include measures to prevent an increase in cut-through traffic on adjacent residential streets such as Bayard. “E-scooter parking corrals are currently not included in the plan, but they need to be added to every block. Otherwise, new City Code allows e-scooter parking on sidewalks in blocks with no parking corrals. We need to keep the sidewalks clear for pedestrian safety and ADA access,” Beckett said.
\n“That\u2019s something we need to take into account,” replied Cook.
\nRoundabouts are a possibility in reconfiguring Mission Boulevard.
\n“One spot we think a roundabout would work the best is at PB Drive and Mission Boulevard,” said Cook. “The idea with this is this would be used more as a gateway, with the roundabout to slow people down coming into the community, and get them used to more of a two-lane roadway alerting them that they\u2019re going into more of a different area.” \u00a0
\n“It\u2019s going to be really exciting when you have scooters, and e-bikes and bikes and pedestrians all trying to get around \u2013 very lively,” said longtime PB planner Eve Anderson. “Please do the (traffic) counts on the weekends.”
\nMore than one person expressed concern about the safety of pedestrians crossing with roundabouts.
\n“One nice thing about roundabouts and pedestrian crossings is you can really cross in only one direction at a time,” noted Cook.\u00a0
\n“The next steps after tonight are to take your thoughts and opinions about these concepts, meet with City departments and do more technical analysis of the preferred alternative,” said Ocampo Vivero. “We\u2019re going to come back with a 30-percent design, with cost estimates, at an open house in August or September, when we\u2019re going to present the final concepts.”<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
City planners returned with a refined visionary plan to make public park and street space along Mission Boulevard more bicycle- and pedestrian-friendly at a May 30 workshop. In a follow-up to a September 2018 workshop introducing the Mission Boulevard Public Spaces and Active Transportation Plan, senior City planner Elizabeth Ocampo Vivero said: “We started working […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":281623,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11559","_seopress_titles_title":"City working on mobility concepts for Mission Boulevard","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11559,11551],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-281622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beach-bay-press","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281622\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}