OB Staff Report / September 24, 2025
With fewer than 24 hours before the San Diego Planning Commission considers the bait-and-switch Midway Rising proposal, only a handful of comments have been posted via the Commission’s web-based Public Comment Form. A Public Comment Spreadsheet revised yesterday shows five comments, and four of them support the project.
So let’s get to work! The link to the Public Comment Form is:
https://www.sandiego.gov/planning-commission/agenda-comment-form
Fill in the Contact Info blanks — red asterisks indicate required fields — the Meeting Date is 09/25/2025, the Comment type is Agenda Comment, Agenda Item Number is 2, and Position is Opposition.
The Comments section has a limit of 500 words. This comment is 250 words. Feel free to cut and paste it:
The Midway Rising project is destined to be the latest in a long line of San Diego real estate fiascos that enrich special interests, drain civic resources, and cheat the public. We were promised that all buildings would be lower than 100 feet. Now one building will be 250 feet high — and all of it luxury housing. We were promised a hotel and 250 middle-income units. The hotel has been scrapped, and the middle-income units will now be market-rate. Why these abrupt reversals? Because the developer suddenly discovered a very large and wholly unexpected sewer pipe that forced changes. The public never bought that story.
There are too many other problems with the project — on-site parking will be woefully inadequate for major events, streets in the Sports Arena district that are already clogged will become impassable. But a crisis in public trust in City Hall is the most compelling reason to deny this project. A Union-Tribune editorial raised questions about “heavy campaign contributions to (Mayor Todd) Gloria from Midway Rising official Brad Termini and his wife, Stefanie” and warned that “the city’s long history of botched real-estate deals hangs over the approval process.”
The U-T Editorial Board said it best: “It is crucial city leaders get the project right or these votes will hang over the heads and careers of every official who didn’t do their due diligence, as with 101 Ash Street.” San Diego has been humiliated enough. Please vote against the Midway Rising project.
This is — for me — the most compelling argument against approving the Midway Rising environmental impact report: “On-site parking will be woefully inadequate for major events, streets in the Sports Arena district that are already clogged will become impassable.”
If you’re concerned about this project, and at least want the Planning Commission to acknowledge the overwhelming, unmitigated impact on traffic for residents and visitors, please submit a comment, or, better yet, attend tomorrow morning’s meeting. In-person comments always have more impact. If you don’t want to speak, I believe you can cede your time to another opponent.
The Planning Commission meets at 9 am, at Development Services Department
Edric Doringo Hearing Room – “The Edric”
7650 Mission Valley Rd., San Diego, California 92108
Here’s the agenda: https://www.sandiego.gov/sites/default/files/2025-09/pc-agenda-9-25-2025-approved.pdf
I just tried to leave a comment on the planning group govt site, but it blocked on “enter a valid meeting date”…
my comment, in summary, is “UNSTABLE LAND! DO NOT ENGAGE City to infrastructure and maintenance for these projects and future lawsuits for sinking condemned buildings…
The Oceans Are Rising
Midway is sinking
If you click or hover over the “Meeting Date” blank, a tiny calendar should pop up, and you can click on September 25. Or you might see a super-small calendar icon on the right side of the blank. Click on that, and it will allow you to select September 25.
I tried to submit but the captcha thing is blank and it won’t let me submit without checking the box that I’m not a robot
Comment submitted! How can we see the spreadsheet? Is that accessible to the public?
I followed these instructions and it worked easily. Here is my comment:
I believe the Planning Commission should reject the Midway Rising project because their current proposal does reflect their original proposal, the one that got them the competitive award.
This development group has clearly demonstrated that their word is not reliable. They promised all buildings would be lower than 100 feet. Now one building will be 250 feet high, all of it luxury housing. They promised a hotel and 250 middle-income residences. They scrapped the proposed hotel. The formerly middle-income residences will now be market-rate. The developer blames the sudden, unexpected discovery of a large sewer main on the site. Along with not being good on their word, this demonstrates incompetence – or intentional duplicity – when performing due diligence for their original competitive proposal.
The public never bought that story. I don’t believe that story. I worked in the San Diego construction industry for 40 years, much of it involving underground utility work. That main crossing the property is part of the city’s main trunk sewer line and was known by many people in the industry. Regardless, a cursory review of the existing utilities could not have missed this trunk main.
Along with incompetence, or outright duplicity are serious questions about the large campaign contributions that Brad Termini, a high-ranking Midway Rising official, and his wife gave to the current mayor. The entire approval process is suspect.
The city needs to reject the Midway development as proposed and the city needs to start over in its effort to redevelop the area. If the presence of the sewer main caused such major changes to Midway Rising’s original proposal, that information needs to be shared with new proposers to see what effect, if any, the sewer really has on developing the site. Awarding this now is a disservice to all the other groups that proposed on the project and a disservice to the citizens of this city, of which I am one.
There are many serious deficiencies with this project. These include the traffic impacts, excessive heights, and the many geological problems: the subsurface water, soil quality, earthquake safety, and impacts of sea-level rise.
Consider the park deficiencies. 4,254 housing units would add about 10,000 residents. That’s over half the population of Coronado, on a small piece of land.
Using the common national standard of 3 to 5 acres of parks per 1000 people, the new project should have a minimum of 30 acres of parks and sports fields. Yet the current plan includes only 8.1 acres of parks, about one-quarter of the needed park space.
Alternatively, measured by Recreation Value Points, the plan is still highly deficient.
The proposed design includes no fields for soccer, baseball, no areas for skateboarding, disc golf, tennis or pickleball. Do the developers anticipate no families as part of the 10,000 new residents? No need for adult sports?
The city should not approve this plan, without requiring more space for parks and sports fields.
I did a rough count of the public comment spreadsheet — 67 opposed, 23 supporting. Well done! We have to lower expectations for today’s outcome. All seven commissioners are Todd Gloria appointees, and this is one of his pet project. But if they read the comments, they should be sobered.
The Commission unanimously voted to recommend the project, but questions about transportation challenges raised serious concerns that will be front and center when this comes before the City Council. Look for a Rag post with more details later today.
OB resident here, and I’m extremely stoked to see the Commission approved the project. We desperately need more housing and that area is the perfect place to go vertical.
We live in a wonderful corner of the world and we need to welcome future neighbors and generations, as past generations building homes allowed us to live here. I have two children who will never be able to afford to live near their home area if we don’t allow for significantly more building and infrastructure.
I know it’s hard to let others in but if past generations were as anti-development as many of the posters in this thread, I know I wouldn’t be able to live the wonderful OB life my family enjoys now.
With kindness,
Tommy
Okay, but what happens after it’s built and your kids (and future ones) still can’t afford a house? and on top of that they have to deal with the extra traffic and disruption for the next decade when trying to visit… Agree to disagree, towers in OB next?
I haven’t heard any general opposition to the housing aspect of Midway Rising, especially the inclusion of low-income housing (though the developer did reduce the amount of low-income housing that was promised in their initial presentation.)
But it’s important to remember that none of this housing will be for-sale homes or condos. These are rentals only. It’s unfortunate that the Mayor’s focus on what he generically and misleadingly refers to as “housing” and his boasts about the number of “new homes” built refers almost exclusively to `rental units, most of which are not “affordable.”
Home ownership will remain out of reach for most of our children and current renters unless something is done to increase our for-sale housing stock. And unfortunately, the Mayor’s policies are actually reducing that housing stock by encouraging developers to buy existing entry-level homes and convert them to multi-unit ADUs and apartments.
The opposition to Midway Rising includes concerns about unmitigated traffic impacts, (mostly caused by the 16,000 seat arena for which there are just 2,100 parking spaces),which will be a nightmare, and the lack of adequate park space for the 4,000-plus new apartments. Also, the Carpenters’ Union opposes the project because of documented employment abuse by the developer, who uses a drywall subcontractor who has been penalized by state officials for underpaying employees.
Traffic is always the documented problem, but I promise you that sewer and water become the number one issue when reality sets in.
I agree
I heard on the news this morning that they are raising water rates due to increased cost in having to purchase water and have it brought here. So, I just question how are we going to have enough water for all these new buildings (collectively all the new, massive building) throughout the region.