Thursday, March 27, 2008 | Competition pitting high-tech and biotech companies against residential developers is not the only crucial problem facing planners, there are also hard choices to made about just what kind of commercial development should be permitted. In University City, where I live, we have limited infrastructure, not unlike the rest of San Diego. Most problematic are the absolute limits to our water supply and traffic capacity.
Westfield has proposed nearly doubling the size of the UTC Mall and adding a 35-story condo tower. They also propose to add 18,000 vehicle trips per day (not allowed by the community plan) to an already seriously overloaded road system. Almost everyone here whom I have talked to opposes this project and believes we must be very judicious in allocating these precious resources.
Like many UC residents, I prefer to see infrastructure funds spent on the growth engines of San Diego, like Telecom and biotech industries and the expansion of UCSD, rather than wasting it on more shopping malls.