Phase 1 of Robb Field Improvements Won’t Be Completed Until 2028

By Steven Mihailovich / Point Loma – OB Monthly SDU-T / September 8, 2025 

Though upgrades at Ocean Beach’s Robb Field appear on track to get started in the foreseeable future — raising excitement among local residents who have long anticipated them — there are still funding obstacles to overcome and the work won’t be done all at once, a San Diego city engineer cautioned in an update to the Ocean Beach Planning Board at its meeting Sept. 2.

Juliana Grotzinger, a civil engineer and project manager, said Phase I of the plan is in the design process, which is 60% complete. It is expected to reach 90% completion by March, allowing project leaders to apply for permits.

However, it’s just one step of many, she said.

City spokesman Tyler Becker said previously that the project underwent a General Development Plan amendment process in 2023 that included three public meetings and concluded with Parks and Recreation Board approval in February 2024.

A GDP amendment for any park modification “is a lengthy process,” Grotzinger said. “We can’t go to the park and just add a new facility.”

Community input from the three meetings helped provide the contents of the planned upgrades.

The Phase I work on the horizon includes new security cameras and pedestrian lighting, stormwater mitigation and landscape and site furnishings, according to the city.

The playground will be replaced with separate play areas for children ages 2-5 and 5-12, with new walkways connecting to the parking lot.

The parking area will be repaved and repainted, and drainage issues will be addressed.

The restroom facility, or “comfort station,” will be replaced, the handball courts will be moved to accommodate a future recreation center, and the community garden will be relocated at the vehicle entrance to the park on Bacon Street.

The new comfort station is expected to cost a total of $4.9 million, the new playground $2.9 million and the parking lot improvements, including new or improved walkways and lighting, $11.7 million, according to updated information from Grotzinger.

The comfort station is fully funded, while the playground and parking elements are partially funded, Grotzinger said. The playground currently is short about $500,000, and the parking lot improvements about $6 million, she said.

Construction is expected to begin in the third quarter of 2027, with completion in fall 2028, followed by a three-month period for new grass, trees and other landscaping to take root, Grotzinger said.

Ultimately, the plan for Robb Field also includes four reconfigured “pinwheel” baseball fields with lighting and concessions, two soccer fields and one enclosed soccer area, pickleball courts, padel courts, expanded parking and the new recreation center with a fitness facility.

The project is being implemented in phases because the city lacks the funding to build it all at once, Grotzinger said.

“We are not [currently] designing all the improvements, unfortunately, because there is no funding,” she said. “A 60- to 70-acre park is a huge park. It’s a lot of improvements. It’s a lot of funding.”

OB Planning Board Chairwoman Andrea Schlageter noted that though the city is moving through Phase I, the “majority of what we’re seeing” in the overall plan, such as the padel courts, would not be completed until the 2030s.

“There has been a lot of movement on getting funding for Phase I,” Grotzinger said. That includes about $3.6 million made available after SeaWorld and the city of San Diego agreed in January to an $8.5 million settlement of a dispute over unpaid rent from SeaWorld during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“But,” Grotzinger added, because of inflation, “what my estimate is for you today might not be what it’s going to cost in 2027.”

The construction bidding and contract award process is scheduled to begin in February 2027.

The nearly year-long gap between the 90% design and application mark in March 2026 and the start of bidding will provide ample time for approval from the city Development Services Department and the California Coastal Commission, Grotzinger said.

“Once they receive the package, they take their time,” she said. “Sometimes you can expedite it. We are going to be doing our best to push this.”

Grotzinger fielded several questions at the Planning Board meeting about issues not addressed in the overall project, such as improvements to the San Diego River path and lighting for the baseball fields in the park’s far southwest corner.

Grotzinger said any improvements near the river could significantly delay the project. “It’s environmentally sensitive,” she said, and under Coastal Commission oversight.

One resident asked why the east parking lot isn’t being connected to Sunset Cliffs Boulevard to provide easier access to visitors coming off Interstate 8 and help reduce traffic congestion around the park.

Planning Board member Tracy Dezenzo recalled raising that issue at a community workshop in 2023.

“The idea I had a long time ago was to have a way in from SeaWorld Drive and the freeway area, and then have Bacon be the way out,” Dezenzo said. “It looks like that just got completely ignored.”

Grotzinger replied that one of the project’s primary goals is to deliver long-overdue improvements as quickly as possible.

“All connections to pedestrian walkways, we can do,” she said. “But every time we are connecting roads, then you have the Transportation Department. Then you have Caltrans. Then you would have a process that would take three years instead of one.”

Dusty Rhodes Park
Leanne Kao, a city engineer and acting project manager, gave an update on plans to upgrade Dusty Rhodes Park, just south of Sunset Cliffs Boulevard from Robb Field.

With the design complete, the project, which Kao said is fully funded, includes a new playground with separate age-group areas similar to the Robb Field plan; a new comfort station; a renovated shade structure; repaved and repainted parking lots; and replacing the sidewalks, which will be extended to Nimitz Boulevard along the adjacent dog park.

The new restroom building will have a surf shack theme and several all-gender toilets, as well as outdoor lavatories and drinking fountains.

The new play area will be partially covered in a rubber surface. Structures will include an umbrella-covered one for children ages 2-5 and a lifeguard tower/surf shack theme for ages 5-12.

Structures for older youngsters are to include climbing rocks connected by rope bridges; swings, including a disabled-accessible swing ride; a net climber and a track ride, in which a child sits on a seat at one end of the structure and rides to the other end.

Other attractions for children include surfboard- or sea mammal-themed spring rides, a bodyboard ride, beach-themed games, and oversize drums, chimes and metallophones.

A new swale for stormwater management will be complemented by native, drought-tolerant plants, along with many new shade trees.

Several new walkways are proposed throughout the park, including a new 9-foot-wide disabled-accessible path.

The restroom project is expected to cost about $2.7 million, the playground $5.2 million and the parking lot improvements nearly $1.8 million. The project received nearly $720,000 from the SeaWorld settlement, according to the city.

The bidding process is to begin at the start of 2026, with construction beginning in the spring and ending in summer 2027, Kao said.

The perennial issue of homelessness became a theme during a lively discussion following Kao’s presentation. Dezenzo warned of potential negative consequences of planting a lot of new trees around the playground and sidewalks.

“Far be it for me to say no to trees,” she said. “I absolutely want trees. … But most of the trees we’ve had in this park have been taken down because they’ve been turned into tree houses or tree storage units.”

Board member Kevin Hastings argued that shade structures tend to become shelters for homeless people and suggested architectural methods to discourage that.

Ocean Beach Community Foundation board member Phil Cenedella, head of OBCF’s newly formed Unsheltered Subcommittee, contended the easiest solution is to directly offer storage facilities to homeless people instead of complicating community improvements to deal with the issue.

“As we plan things for five, 10, 20 years from now, we shouldn’t not put trees in or do other things because of the homeless issues today,” he said.