The San Diego City Council on Tuesday unanimously approved plans to add more housing to Hillcrest and University City. Councilmembers Jennifer Campbell and Vivian Moreno were absent.
“These plan updates are critical steps forward in creating jobs, strengthening our economy, addressing our housing crisis and honoring the unique cultures and contributions of our communities,” San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said after the vote in a news release. “We are creating vibrant, sustainable neighborhoods that support job growth, reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, and improve the quality of life for all San Diegans. Hillcrest and University City will remain thriving, inclusive areas for decades to come under these innovative, strategic frameworks.”
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The Hillcrest Focused Plan Amendment — an amendment to the Uptown Community Plan that was adopted in 2016 — would reconstruct the neighborhood skyline with 20-story towers, paving the way for 17,000 new housing units, in an effort to more than double the population in the Uptown community from 40,000 now to 100,000 people in 2050.
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The University Community Plan Update is a similar plan for the University City area. This plan, which replaces the 1987 plan, hopes to double the population to nearly 130,000 people by adding 30,000 housing units. It also aims to add 72,000 new jobs through building millions of square feet of commercial projects.
“These plans only get updated about once every 30 years, so if you look at doubling in 30 years that’s a 2.4% annual increase, and the housing doesn’t all go in at once and doesn’t get built the same day. What this does is authorizes a plan, so it’s not all 'willy-nilly' for housing to go in in specific places,” Will Moore, policy counsel at Circulate San Diego, who is in favor of the plans, said.
Residents Bonnie Kutch and Judy Murphy say they are all for responsible density in their University City neighborhood, but their frustrations with the plan for the area are about as sky high as its proposed two 40-story towers and one 20-story tower.
"This is not smart growth," Kutch said. "This is poor planning — very poor planning."
"They are not representing their constituents. They are catering to the developers," Murphy said.
Greg Suen is the owner of Hillcrest Pawn. He says he sees the pros and the cons.
"I don’t want Hillcrest to turn into another downtown," Suen said. "I assume more people living around here and more walking traffic, so people might come in and check out or stuff. Maybe our sales and maybe our business will go up."
Some who are in favor of the plans said they want to make sure there’s affordable housing that is built when the new developments are established.
“If you build some affordable housing in your unit, you can get incentives to build more housing or setbacks or other waivers or incentives, so there are many provisions in the law for affordable housing, but right now, today, we’re just talking about the need for housing period,” Moore said.
Both community plans also detail pedestrian, bicycle and transit infrastructure improvements and ask for more places where people can meet and walk.
As part of the projects, Governor Drive in University City could lose a lane in both directions. Over in Hillcrest, parts of University Avenue and Robinson Avenue would be reduced to one-way streets.
