Setback for Pacific Beach Residents Who Oppose Huge Lifeguard Station on Coastal Bluffs

Artist rendering of planned lifeguard center.

There has been a new development in the campaign by Pacific Beach residents to stop a planned lifeguard station at the end of Law Street in PB.  The PB Planning Group at their December 1 meeting, voted to approve the site development plans for construction of the station.

Here’s what we stated about the campaign back at the end of August this year:

Residents up in Pacific Beach are mobilizing against a large lifeguard command center that the City of San Diego wants to build right on the coastal cliffs at the end of Law Street. They feel the project is way over-sized and would destroy the beautiful and valuable bluff at that location.

The campaign to save the PB coastal bluffs is led by a group called Protect PB – they have a website and petition going on.

Mic Porte, an community activist in Pacific Beach, advised us of the outcome of the meeting:

[On December 1] the PB Planning Group voted to approve the site development plans for construction on the beach at the end of Law St. It was not unanimous, 3 voted against and one abstention, and the ocean thanks them. Their reasons were: too big, too expensive.

The room was full of protesters who were given one minute to speak at the end of the meeting around 8:15 pm.

Porte continued her report and thoughts of the meeting:

No story poles or scale models are being offered with this plan to better imagine the impact.  A photo of a guy on a ladder in the middle of the canyon is what is offered for scope and scale.

We didn’t have time to discuss the storm water run off system except that we were told, “it is improved”.

We didn’t have time to discuss the “sewage lift”pump station, or what might be the “rehabilitation of the eroding canyon walls,” or how cold it might be down in the buried locker room and the potential for leakage from the multiple skylights with regular irrigation of the landscaping above.

…so many questions, so little time…

We were told by the city architects that their goal was to “restore” the natural canyon. That got a laugh.

We have repeatedly been told that decisions made by city managers 13 years ago are (apparently) more important than what is happening today along the coast, both rising ocean levels and current beach demographics.

We complained that vital concerns about this project continue to not be addressed.

We turned in over 2000 signatures of locals and visitors who are against permanent development on this unique beach canyon.

For more info and for the petition, please go to the Protect PB website.