SAN DIEGO — Fixing streets across the City of San Diego is a long, bumpy road, but on Tuesday City Councilmembers heard recommendations to improve our roads.
The City’s Transportation Department says it won’t be cheap.
“A total need of 1.9 billion dollars is needed over the next 10 years,” said Bethany Bezak, the department’s director. And that's not to make our streets perfect, that's just to get them back up to an overall rating of satisfactory.
“That's a really big price tag,” said Councilmember Stephen Whitburn, who is also chair of the committee that oversees transportation issues. “We're going to have to make some very fiscally responsible decisions here as we try to get the roads into as good a shape as we can.”
According to a recent pavement condition report, San Diego’s road rating has now dropped into the fair category.
Several roads scored below a 10 on the 100 point scale, placing them in the failed category. The City’s goal is to have an average score of 70 or above.
Councilmembers heard from several agencies, including the Transportation Department, the City Auditor, and the Independent Budget Analyst. They looked at three options:
- Fix the worst roads first – which is the most expensive option.
- Fix the roads that impact the most people – which is also expensive, but not as costly
- Fix roads that are bad, but not horrible and will get the city back to the satisfactory level at the lowest price. The City calls this the “Best Value Plan.”
“We as a city council want to take a deep dive and make sure we're doing the right thing to address our roads going forward,” Whitburn said.
City agencies are currently recommending the Best Value Plan, but working for you, we combed through an analyst report from the Office of the Independent Budget which states, “It is concerning that over the next 10 years there appears to be no plan for addressing failed streets.”
Bottom line, there are equity concerns. Many of the worst streets are in the least affluent communities, but city leaders say they will make sure all district see improvements.
“Every single district in this city has roads that are not as good as they should be,” Whitburn said. “I can tell you every constituent in every district knows that and will share that and our job is to make as many impacts as we can in as many districts as possible.”
Tuesday’s presentation before the council was only an informational item. No final decisions were voted on.
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WATCH RELATED: Hundreds of San Diego streets are considered 'failing' (April 3, 2024)