Location Location

I love San Diego. Ok, I got that out of the way. There is not a city that is perfect. Some more than others and in many cases various factors including corruption are key.

City-wide, state-wide, California and San Diego has a homeless problem. This is related to but separate from the housing crisis or housing affordability crisis. So many names, so many names!

I read in the S.D. paper this morning that the city is considering and exploring (key words, nothing solid but considering and exploring) to utilize the old Central Library building/site as a homeless center and shelter.

That’s fine but let’s zoom out for a second; location location. The old library is located in the core of downtown. Just north are new developments to activate Broadway which has long suffered stagnation and is finally being addressed. South is a livable and walkable Market Street which has been decades in the making. West is the new redeveloped Horton Plaza which is going to attract highly salary technology companies and workers. East is Park Boulevard and a short walk to the new park and creative district at the North portion of East Village.

With that information, does it make sense to place a homeless facility at that location?

Are there better locations to address the problem? Yes.

I don’t know the inner workings of running our great city but I do understand how cities streets work.

Continuity is crucial and placing a facility in that context is a serious impediment. Put yourself on the street. You want to walk from west to east ten blocks but you must cross this sort of ‘war’ area at block five. Instead of walking, you take a car. You might ride a scooter, even hop on the bus.

That seems fine and normal is Southern California, but there are consequences. Riders don’t visit shops. Let’s say that ten downtown residents encounter the problem but only half are willing to make the walk. So five people walk the ten blocks. Let’s say that all ten have surplus spending money for a few snacks on the way. Five folks take the car, five walk. The five in the car get to their destination and do not purchase snacks on the way. That is a 50% reduction in potential sales for a ten block storefront section. At larger numbers that can have a devastating effect on a commercial district.

In terms of economics, a 25% reduction in spending potential is too much. Hell, 5% is too much if you consider the immense value of creating a vibrant ten block section of storefronts in a centralized downtown location.

That urban link between Horton Plaza and the upcoming East Village Green will be destroyed by a centralized homeless facility, which is necessary, yet dirty work.

Centralization; good for libraries and city economic engines, not so good for city services that are unfortunately detrimental to smooth urban growth.

I’ll say it, homelessness in a big city needs to be swept aside, not swept away, but removed from display. Centralized homelessness and care services is like a sideshow that we use to comfort our own fortune. It’s crazy to even consider using that site, a plot of land with ultra high appreciative value for a service that needs to be placed appropriately.

Most homeless people do not want to be on display, yet we position them in ways where one is forced to succumb to mental apathy. Basically, they stop giving a fuck. At first, they want to be shielded and seek mental shelter, then they give in. Homelessness for the homeless becomes normalized and it becomes appropriate to set up a tent on a main avenue. Those tents you see is a result of that mental anguish of those that have been broken and compiled with the convenience of drug distribution.

That distribution is a byproduct of the on the homeless issue, although we categorize them separately, they are the coupled even if a fraction of the people in the area have substance abuse issues.

So what do we do? What is a potential alternative to explore?

I travelled to Japan some time ago with my mother. We have been back ‘home’ many times. On this trip, I peeled her away from family and I took her to the Japanese National Museum via bullet train. My Japanese mother had never been to Tokyo which shocked me. From the station we walked to the museum which took us through Ueno (You-N-O) Park. The museum was located at the far end of the park.

Along the way I saw a series of rows of well organized plastic tarps. It was an interesting site. During my previous trips to Japan I had seen disheveled drunkards with missing teeth, even a few sprawled sleeping on the sidewalk, but I had never seen an encampment. The Ueno park homeless area was off to the side, in a public area that was not the most important passage. There was restrooms and someone handing out food.

After thinking about what I had seen, I realized that Japan, a country with very little slum areas, had a homeless population. In some ways it normalized Tokyo for me and I understood that that society, wonderful and beautiful as it is, has its own problems.

That experience also spoke to the way the Japanese handle these problems. They don’t have blue tarps in Shibuya, Shinjuku, or Ginza, the cities commercial areas, the tents were in a park, off to the side, out of view but not out of mind. Seeing that there were people helping those folks, said that the issue is important but it is something that can be behind the scenes.

We need to incorporate that in San Diego. We need to be mindful of locations. The following is a perfect example of how urban development catches up to services that were once located on the fringe, but is now a potential obstacle.

At the Western portion of San Diego’s Imperial Avenue, just east of the Ballpark, is a homeless facility, navigation center, and assistance facility. Across the street is the main bus depot, which has been consider numerous times for redevelopment. The land, at the outer rim of Downtown, is an important transition into two redevelopment areas, Barrio Logan and Imperial Avenue Commercial District.

The area just east of the ballpark has already been developed with high market rate rentals and condos, another massive development on the way, and the main light rail station. This location is going to be another urban node with great access, views, and amenities.

Two blocks east is the bus and homeless facilities. One more block east is a ten lane pedestrian underpass of Interstate Five; one block south is two an important light rail corridor.

The homeless facility, a critical city service located on the outer edge, is now right in the mix. It blocks an urban transition into two districts interrupted by transportation infrastructure. Pedestrians at the market rate area adjacent the ballpark will not venture along the path of three wide city blocks, in addition to, crossing the underpass. That location is dangerous.

The urban contextual alignment along Imperial Avenue cannot be repaired. Unless there is a huge plan, that smooth transition will never happen. Even if it did, you would still need to contend with the highway underpass. Urban amenities on both sides would need to be so strong to pull people from one side to the other. It is not likely, but not impossible.

There are many locations throughout the world where pedestrians gladly cross under or bridge wide gaps to traverse the city. Add a homeless area to the chemistry and people literally vote with their feet, in the opposite direction.

Normally, you wouldn’t say that having solutions residing within government entities as an advantage, however, I might have an idea, if ultimately untenable, is at least thought provoking.

The area where we serve the homeless should be in a narrow section just east of the airport runway, bounded by Interstate Five, a few blocks south of Washington Street, and a southern edge of Sassafras Street at the Middletown Light Rail Station.

Once the city gets the Ash Street Building and Civic Center/City Hall sites situated. The Port of San Diego building will become the new homeless facility. The building, once used as a hospital during the wars, will be used to serve and rehabilitate our most vulnerable citizens; out of sight, in a safe and private location, but surely not out of mind.

The Port of San Diego Building, one of the worst positioned public service buildings in the United States, if not the world, can be moved to a place where employees want to work. Unless that building has the equivalent of a mini food court embedded, that building is drab and isolated. I scoff each time I pass it and empathize with the committed staff that is required to work there. Get those important workers a better home San Diego! Get them away from the end of the runway and into the city where they can have a decent lunch without getting into a car.

I digress. The homeless facility is appropriately located at the existing Port Building. How do I know? Because the homeless folks are already in the vicinity. The customers are already there!

That area is already a location where drug use is rampant. I know because I worked at length for a design firm in the old Brewing Building in Washington Street. There are people using heroin on the highway slopes and in the nice courtyard path adjacent to the light rail station.

The proposed locations narrow bounds allows for greater security and control. The site is expansive and has room to grow. Additionally, the site is located where any priority development will not merge or encroach in the future.

The location is served by a light rail station and a variety of bus routes that extend to all parts of the city. The site location is out of sight, not out of mind, and possesses superior public transportation connectivity. You can’t ask for more from this site.

What about the homeless facility located in the new transition area near the ballpark? Moving that location is infeasible. That collection of buildings is undergoing expansion, but at least the buildings are newer.

The solution is to get the homeless folks to a better location; better for them, better for the city and convert the homeless facility into a housing class one level up. Make the area affordable SROs rather than very low income SROs. Get the mentally ill and those with substance abuse issues to a more private place and reintegrate the collection of buildings into the urban fabric.

Doing that is a win for the facility operators. Revamped buildings can command an increase in rental revenue and incorporate new commercial storefront activity. The homeless navigation faculty, which will be relocated can become an employment center and skills training facility to get folks up to speed in a rapidly shifting technological environment. When the ballpark parking lots and bus operations center are developed that location will be thriving. Residents living on the east side of the highway and in Barrio Logan will walk to ballgames and events. That will not happen right now.

Finally, to land this plane: what happens after a plan like this is executed. With a homeless faculty in the expanse of the Port Building, which is centralized, yet not centrally located, our city can begin to place smaller satellites where the people are already located. This can be converted motels and other underutilized public and private buildings. The Sports Arena area, North Pacific Highway at Friars Road near the CHP building, Mission Gorge Road at Fairmount, the beach area, and Balboa Park, to name a few.

These are some strategies to preserve and expand the urban connectivity in downtown. It makes economic sense and social sense.

Where there is a will, there is a way.