Residents in Mission Valley and Serra Mesa are fighting a proposed connector road between Interstate 805 and Friars Road that could help alleviate San Diego’s housing crisis.

In addition to allowing more dense housing projects in Mission Valley, the four-lane road would ease traffic congestion, help complete a regional bicycling network and reduce carbon emissions, city officials say.

The residents dispute those claims and say the road would sharply increase traffic, reduce safety and damage the character of the two neighborhoods it would connect: Civita in Mission Valley and Abbots Hill in Serra Mesa.

The city plans to alleviate a severe a shortage of affordable housing by encouraging more dense projects along existing transportation corridors, making Mission Valley ideal because it has four freeways and a trolley line.


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But the lack of an 805/Friars Road freeway interchange could hamper some developers seeking to build large projects.

That may be why the proposed connector road is being revived nearly a decade since it was last rejected.


The city’s Planning Commission rejected the proposal twice in 2004 and 2008, and the City Council rejected it in a 5-4 vote in 2005.

The Planning Commission is scheduled to take another look on Thursday, with another council vote expected in late October.

The road would conveniently connect Serra Mesa and Mission Valley on the west side of 805 for the first time, by widening several streets in the area and building a new four-lane road to connect Phyllis Place with Via Alta and Franklin Ridge Road.

City officials say the road would reduce vehicle miles traveled by creating a more direct route between the two communities and giving motorists another way to get from 805 to Friars.


Bryce Niceswanger, a member of the Serra Mesa Community Planning Group, said the new connection would only boost access to Mission Valley for a small sliver of Serra Mesa – 227 homes west of the freeway in Abbots Hill.

The rest of Serra Mesa gets to Friars Road on Mission Village Road or Mission Center Road, she said.

And any benefit to residents in Abbots Hill would be outweighed by creating a new connection from Friars to 805 right through the community, she said.

A city analysis said the connector would increase the average number of daily trips on Phyllis Place, the main access road into Abbots Hill, from about 2,400 to more than 34,000.


“As much as I would love to go down Civita Road and go to Costco, this will increase our delays getting out of the neighborhood,” she said. “For the 220 homes here, it will be more negative than positive.”

In May, her planning group voted 11-0 against the connector road.

City officials also say the connector would boost emergency response times and help complete a regional bicycling network that the city has prioritized to meet the goals of its ambitious climate action plan.

But Civita resident Deborah Bossmeyer said there is already a special emergency access route in the area, and that the developers of Civita are already required to build cycling lanes on the same route as the connector would take.


Bossmeyer also said the connector would divide Civita, a dense new development of nearly 4,800 homes that’s only partially built, into three separate neighborhoods and contradict the community’s smart growth principles.

“While the residents support the new guidelines of live-work-play, the freeway connector encourages all other regional traffic to ignore this practice and use Civita as a short cut from a crowded 805,” said Bossmeyer.

“Freeway connectors through this community’s residential neighborhoods undermine the very vision of the community as a smart growth village focused on walkability and limited vehicle trips,” she said. “It’s going to diminish everything this neighborhood was supposed to be.”

The Mission Valley Community Planning Group hasn’t voted on the proposal.


A city analysis of the connector’s environmental effects completed earlier this year said the city must make several additional road improvements nearby.

They include widening onramps to the 805, upgrading the Friars Road/Qualcomm Way interchange and widening Murray Ridge Road, Phyllis Place, Via Alta and Franklin Ridge Road.

The state Department of Transportation sent the city a letter on Aug. 8 endorsing the upgrades and the connector road.

Thursday’s Planning Commission meeting is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. in City Hall, 202 C St.


david.garrick@sduniontribune.com (619) 269-8906 Twitter:@UTDavidGarrick