San Diego Lags Well Behind Its Roundabout Targets as Climate Goals Loom

San Diego has fallen years behind on its plan to build more roundabouts, a tool the city sees as helping to cut greenhouse gas emissions and make streets safer, according to an August 2022 report from KPBS.

The city's 2015 Climate Action Plan called for 15 roundabouts by 2020. Only two were completed. The updated climate plan sets a new target of 13 roundabouts by 2030 and a further 20 by 2035, which would require the city to build an average of two to three per year to stay on course.

Roundabouts offer two main advantages. They slow traffic, which lowers the chances of fatal or serious injury crashes, and they let vehicles pass through intersections without coming to a full stop. Katie Matchett, an urban planner and safe streets advocate, said drivers do not sit idling as they would at a stoplight, which helps with climate and emissions concerns. "And then you keep people moving, but you do it more slowly, which is safer for people walking and biking," she said.

This year, the regional transportation agency SANDAG has installed several "neighborhood traffic circles," which are smaller versions of roundabouts. The city does not count those toward its own roundabout goals.

Matchett also serves as president of Beautiful PB, a group that has long pushed for traffic calming on Foothill Boulevard, one of Pacific Beach's main thoroughfares. Vehicles there rarely stay within the 25 mph speed limit. The city plans a roundabout at Foothill Boulevard and Loring Street and currently expects construction to begin in March 2023. Cost is one reason the project has taken so long, with a price tag of about $3 million.

Matchett said large roundabout projects are costly, consume a lot of space and take time to design. "But there are other smaller, quick improvements that we can make that will actually help us reach some of our goals," she said.

Advocates point to "quick-build" roundabouts as one such option. These are made with paint and plastic barriers drilled into the pavement, and they can be a faster and cheaper way to improve safety while communities wait for permanent upgrades.

The city intends to install one at Florida Drive and Morley Field Drive, at the edge of Balboa Park. City spokeswoman Anna Vacchi said the current schedule calls for installation in "late August through September." Materials for the temporary roundabout cost roughly $200,000, far below the cost of a permanent project, and city employees can install it themselves rather than hiring outside contractors. Vacchi said the Federal Highway Administration donated the materials and is studying how effective such roundabouts are.

Jesse O'Sullivan, policy counsel for the nonprofit think tank Circulate San Diego, said the city should undertake more temporary projects of this kind. "A quick-build project is a great way to show the community exactly what the benefits of these streetscape improvements are," he said.