SAN DIEGO — Traffic woes continue to plague Snapdragon Stadium. Last night, Team USA took on Panama in the Gold Cup Semi Final but it's the traffic snarl getting out of the stadium that's making headlines today. Last night after the soccer game people said they sat in traffic for anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours.
Alena Leyton owns Java Garden Coffee Shop in Serra Mesa. She said, "Last night I went to Costco and I know there are signs up that say no event parking but I couldn't believe the stream of people that were coming after the game." She worried that the ice she was picking up was going to melt as she made her supply run. "It was pretty hectic. What would normally take me about 6 minutes to get up the hill with no traffic, took me about 20-30 minutes. I was waiting for all of the pedestrians to walk through the streets, and they walked thru red lights. I managed to get up the street but I did notice a huge stream of cars coming down Mission Hills Drive.
Social media from Twitter to Reddit is all abuzz about traffic and lack of direction after last night’s Gold Cup soccer match between USA and Panama. But after the game, as the sold-out crowd of nearly 25 thousand left Snapdragon to go home, they had quite the wait. We reached out to San Diego Police and Lt Adam Sharki said in an email to CBS 8: “We are committed to facilitating a safe and efficient flow of traffic. There was a full traffic plan and at least 16 SDPD Special Event Traffic Controllers working the stadium. I’m unable to confirm if it took 2 hours for anyone to leave the stadium; this is the first I had heard of that. I do know it would sometimes take up to 2 hours for traffic to clear after a Charger game at the Q.
Alena says, she's waiting to make a judgment on the new traffic plan on Mission Hills but understands people are upset. "I’ve talked to civil engineers who say this is perfectly okay. This is what it should be and it's a good proposal and it's going to work. But it's people not wanting to buy into it because they're not ready for it and you know, people don't like change. San Diego is a growing city, I kind of consider it growing pains. It's just the way it is when the city needs to expand and it's just going to converge on little communities like this."
We also reached out to Snapdragon Stadium officials for comment on this story and still haven't heard back.
Other businesses and neighbors we talked to for this story say that the traffic has indeed increased in the area now that Snapdragon is open. Some people are happy to see all of the activity while others say officials should have mitigated more of the congestion around the stadium better.
The city installed bike lanes for those who want to ditch their cars and the traffic and parking issues when coming to the stadium. Other people online were complaining about parking prices when a Reddit user commented that the trolley is just $5 bucks and you don't have to wait in traffic. There are options or you just gotta pack your patience.
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