Traffic-calming Foothill-Loring roundabout nearing completion

Residents are referring to work nearing completion on the Foothill-Loring roundabout in Pacific Beach as "the beginning of the end" in their long struggle to get a traffic-calming device there.

Following recent delays of more than a year due to drainage repairs on streets connected to the roundabout, it is now on track to be completed in late December or early 2025.

Tom Coat, who lives along Foothill Boulevard and has spearheaded the long-term project, has been monitoring its steady progress. "Three sides of what may be the City's largest roundabout already are framed and graded," he said. "The actual roundabout has already been framed and graded."

The traffic-calming project has been decades in the making from conception to actualization. Coat produced a Beach & Bay Press from July 1993, 31 years ago, stating "Police say Foothill Boulevard is considered one of the most dangerous streets in Pacific Beach... Foothill residents want a solution to the excessive speed problem on their street."

Noting the current roundabout project began more than a decade ago when then-Councilmember Lorie Zapf submitted a request for the roundabout after community input, Coat said: "Residents hope the roundabout will slow the huge volume of traffic that uses the La Jolla-Pacific Beach connector street daily. Traffic often speeds through Foothill's curves and hills, sometimes well more than the posted 25-mph speed limit, making the road extremely dangerous for residents pulling out of driveways and pedestrians in the single-family neighborhood."

Reflecting on the long-drawn-out effort to improve traffic safety in his PB neighborhood, Coat said: "I moved here in 1986 and folks living in the area had already been raising a ruckus that we needed traffic calming. I went down to the PB planning group in 2013 to complain about the traffic. To their credit, the planning group put it as one of their priority items to have it looked at."

Coat said nothing else happened until 2015 when Zapf concurred that the roundabout was much needed and helped move it along in the City's planning process for infrastructure improvements. "That process started in 2016," said Coat. "We got [the City's] blessing, but they warned us it would be a lot of years before it was completed."

Previously, concerning delays to the roundabout and other associated upgrades on Foothill Boulevard, Tyler Becker, City spokesperson said: "Construction began in 2023, but the originally anticipated completion date in late 2023 was delayed due to project changes, including storm drain improvements and water main relocation. These changes pushed the expected project completion to September 2024 and increased the total construction contract cost to $2.2 million from the original construction amount of $1.7 million.

"The total project cost, which includes construction contract, design, and construction management, increased from $2.3 million to $3.8 million. To date, construction crews have already completed all water main improvements related to this project."

But there is more work yet to be done to slow traffic flow and improve safety on Foothill Boulevard. "The completion of this roundabout will give San Diego traffic engineers a chance to see if a second traffic-calming device is needed on another section of the road," Coat said.

"Residents who have grown accustomed to seeing traffic speed along Foothill, then hitting the brakes just before the roundabout construction zone, say they would welcome even an all-way stop with a pedestrian crossing somewhere north of the roundabout on Foothill. Time will tell on that issue."