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Alpine roads workshop draws a packed house
By Christy Scott
The Alpine Sun
ALPINE — It was nearly a full house at the GP 2020 road networking workshop held last Thursday, Aug. 18 at the Alpine Community Center. Among the participants were residents from all over Alpine as well as several Alpine Planning Group members and San Diego County staff.
County GP 2020 planners are dealing with road networks in the county, going through each specific area and working with the communities to get input. The county is developing various options for dealing with traffic and then will gather input from the public to fine-tune the models to be tested.
“We want to understand what residents here think, what is Alpine’s preference,” said county planner Bob Citrano. “We have all these models that are made up of all numbers, we want to get real input from the community.”
The traffic models are figured with the build-out and population growth expected from current GP 2020 plans, and current, on-the-ground, road conditions. Some audience members were concerned about some of the projected daily trip numbers, saying that they were much too high.
“We’re taking some of these numbers with a grain of salt,” Citrano said “This really isn’t exact. These are all just projections.”
By far the most popular idea among everyone present continues to be the newly named Alpine Boulevard Off Ramp, which would actually be off of East Victoria. Discussions of a new interchange have been going for many years, but now, thanks to the efforts of the circulation subcommittee, headed until this week by Scott Lamb, there has been some forward movement.
Many audience members argued that this is the only option that should be discussed.
“If you solve the problem another way then we’re never going to get the new interchange,” said Connell.
Citrano however, argued that by studying several options and finding they just don’t work it could actually help the case for the off-ramp.
“I know the interchange is everyone’s favorite idea,” Citrano said. “You can’t put all your eggs in one basket with the off-ramp.”
Further studies could also find that the off-ramp really isn’t a good idea for Alpine.
“Adding the off ramp will definitely ease traffic to the west on Alpine Boulevard, but it could raise a whole new set of problems on South Grade,” said Alpine resident Joyce Nygaard.
The town green option, concocted at the circulation subcommittee level ,and well favored among that group, was strongly criticized at Thursday’s workshop.
In this option, the center of town, west of five-way stop on Alpine Boulevard would be transformed into a walk-able town core. Alpine Boulevard would merge over with Arnold Way somewhere west of the Alpine Mercantile and would rejoin at the five-way stop.
This option, while creating a town green area consistent with plans generated by community groups during the Alpine Revitalization workshops, could landlock several businesses on the north side of Alpine Boulevard.
“What do all those business owners think of this?” asked one Alpine Boulevard business owner.
“Most of those businesses have their front entrances on Alpine Boulevard and don’t have any other entrance,” said one business owner. “Behind most of them is a huge floodway so you aren’t going to be able to build rear accesses to Arnold Way.”
According to Citrano, specifics such as these are not being looked at yet. Currently, GP 2020 plans are being looked at step by step with narrowed, specific discussions. Planners are discussing roads in the county, but are not looking at the specific character of the roads, only the traffic flow.
“There’s more things to a road than just travel lanes, it’s the whole right of way,” Citrano said. “Right now we’re only focusing on capacity, only the actual driving lanes. At a later date we will be looking closer at the actual character of individual roadways.”
“We’re just throwing out ideas here,” Citrano said. “Trying to find out what you think, whether we should even study this further as an option.”
“This town green idea may not look like the best idea,” said Rita Sterling. “But, none of the actual possible problems are being addressed here. We could see down the road that those problems could be worked out.”
As Neville Connell put it, “We need a community consensus; do we want Alpine Boulevard to be a destination for people, or do we want it to just be a thoroughfare for people traveling through town.” He took an unofficial vote amongst the workshop participants: everyone seemed to agree, and there was resounding applause for the destination option.
The audience argued that business owners need notification and must be able to give input if of the possible plans will affect them.
The next step for GP 2020 planners is to meet with the APG at it’s meeting tonight, Aug. 25 at the community center.
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Christy Scott
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