HomeMy WebLinkAbout2/18/2025 Item 7b, Goswick
Jessica Goswick <
To:E-mail Council Website
Subject:2/18/25 City Council Agenda Item 76: Consider Alternatives to Prado Overpass
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Dear council members,
My name is Jessica Goswick, I'm a resident of SLO living in the South Higuera neighborhood, near where
this project is proposed. I'm writing today to ask you to reconsider the Prado Interchange and encourage
you to look towards the reduced scale options city staff presented in their report.
I greatly appreciate the detail that the city has included in this report and understand that this feels like a
project that "must" be approved because it has been written into plans for decades. However, our needs
and goals have evolved greatly since these plans were first written and the costs of the project
have increased extremely to the point where they are no longer financially viable.
I am writing to ask Council to reconsider this item and instead move forward with one of the alternative
options such as a pedestrian/bike bridge because of a few reasons:
1. The land use on the Madonna side has changed since this project was proposed, and residential
may not result in the same amount of traffic coming to this area as commercial
2. This project is in opposition to current city goals for alternative transportation, including the
prioritization of Active Transportation and Transit Innovation. This project allocates a huge sum of
money for highway infrastructure which prioritizes and incentives vehicular transportation - the
same mode of transportation we are trying to move away from.
3. The cost has gone way way up since this project was first proposed. The new cost now puts other
important city projects at risk. Our city no longer has the funds to move forward with this project
as is.
Our city is strongest when it is adaptable to change. The current $140 million Prado Interchange design
no longer reflects our goals and needs as a city, while burdening future generations with potential debt
and high maintenance costs. This money could be better spent investing in the city's goals for
sustainable transportation, fiscal sustainability, and housing and homelessness.
Thank you for reading and for your dedication to our city,
Jessica Goswick
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