HomeMy WebLinkAbout4/1/2025 Item 8a, Pennelly
Brent Pennelly <
To:E-mail Council Website
Subject:Broadstone Project
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I support the plan to develop 12500 and 12501 Los Osos Valley Road, along with the unaddressed parcel.
I’m well aware that we need more housing. This has only worsened since COVID. Families cannot afford to live
in San Luis Obispo, so they go elsewhere. As a physician, I know too many nurses,
physical/occupational/speech therapists, and even physicians who have moved away due to the cost of living.
We truly live in a spectacular area and no one expects it to be cheap, but we know the truth is we need to build
more housing for be affordable enough to attract/retain the people/workers we need to.
As an avid bicyclist I wholeheartedly support the small Bob Jones Trail Extension attached to the project.
As a resident of the Meadows Development off Higuera (comprising Mariposa, Chuparosa, and Las Praderas
Dr), I do share some traffic concerns that the residents of Los Verdes also have.
I do not have access to any plans. But I would imagine it is fairly simple to connect the proposed new traffic
light on LOVR for the new development, to the North-eastern portions of Los Verdes Dr and Los Palos Dr,
allowing easy signaled access to/from the Los Verdes Developments. It seems this would make getting in/out
of those developments easier/safer than currently.
Ameliorating traffic into and out of our development unfortunately is not likely to be as easy given how our
homes were built and the lack of any alternate access points that the circumferential roads at Los Verdes
allow. While not as pressing as the traffic concerns at the Los Verdes Park Developments, our traffic issues will
likely only worsen further as more homes are built at the Avila Ranch Development and Tank Farm further
develops. Even now, vehicles very regularly ignore the “Keep Clear” on S. Higuera at Las Praderas, making it
difficult to enter/exit the development at peak hours. I would ask the city to look at methods to ameliorate
this/decrease traffic on South Higuera. The proposed Prado 101 Overpass and the LOVR to Higuera/Buckley
bypass will likely help some, but I do not think these will be sufficient with the expected upbuilding of the area.
My suggestion is consideration to realign the entrance into the Trader Joes/Food For Less shopping center,
and consider a traffic light at that location. If this new light were synchronized with the light at Suburban, it
should have minimal impact on through traffic, and would facilitate access into/out of the shopping
development as well as our housing development.
My last suggestion is to consider interconnecting these neighborhoods, in the spirit of increasing
walkability/bikability of the area. Currently, to visit my relatives in Los Verdes 1, I need to walk almost 1 mile
along S Higuera (with no sidewalk median/buffer from traffic) for what would be only 1/4 that distance if a
developer had build a small sidewalk to connect the Meadows and Los Verdes developments. For this I
recommend consideration for a bicycle/pedestrian bridge at the end of Las Praderas Dr, that would connect to
the Bob Jones Trail and thus the new developments. If combined with a traffic light at Las Praderas, this would
also allow bicycle commuters very easy and safe access to use the Bob Jones trail to get to Trader Joe’s and
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Food For Less from the eastern parts of the city. This would be further compounded with the Prado overpass is
built. The more easy/safe we make biking and walking in SLO, the more people will do them.
To summarize, I support this project with appropriate planning/foresight in city planning. I believe we could both
build the full amount of desperately needed housing proposed, provider safer/more convenient access to the
neighboring developments, and also increase interconnectivity between neighborhoods and facilitate more
pedestrian/bicycle-based trips in the South Higuera region.
Brent Pennelly
57 Mariposa Dr
San Luis Obispo, CA 93401
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