Dear Editor:

A vigilante civilian physically blocked a senior’s car with their bicycle because they weren’t convinced she should be on the experimental Diamond Street boardwalk. She unwittingly showed her identification.

After 24 months of wholly unsupervised melee, PB’s fractured community attended its first public forum where we were allowed a maximum of 60-120 seconds to defend our homes/streets. This senior woman testified that she felt unsafe because of several personal encounters with threatening behaviors – a sentiment echoed repeatedly in our petitioners’ testaments.

The planning board still voted 6-4 in favor of keeping this street – even though after two years, all members said they were unhappy with it, but because they believed it was a “great concept,” and/or if they discontinued it, they feared Pacific Beach would never have another opportunity for this metaphorical “sandbox” – due to bureaucracy.

One 46-year resident board member justified his no vote saying he travels Diamond Street regularly for observational purposes, and it is clearly not being used as intended.

Positive trendsetting must begin with elevating our experts to their rightful seats at this paramount time-sensitive table. Their scientific measurements and parameters would have provided impersonal and non-fear-based data results, and science would have never voted for the continuance of a two-year-old in-efficacious experiment just because it was a “great concept” that won a popular vote in one of our country’s most dangerous demographic.

World-renowned traffic-safety expert, Dr. Leonard Evans, uses the analogy of a pilot who informs his passengers that he must land the plane due to malfunctions. The popular vote shouldn’t prevail just because passengers don’t want to delay their travel plans.

If we plan to arrive at any destination toward intelligent effective change, we must listen to the experts instead of spinning our hypocritical wheels to beat the clock. We trust the science of climate change, but not this because the popular vote knows better.

So rather than redirecting precious time/resources toward communities in serious need of this sandbox for increasing walkability and implementing safeguards for future successful expansions, they have refuted the science and its safety methods and measurements – all in the name of science.

Cindy Van Voorhis

Pacific Beach