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19th Ave Slated for Upgrades
Improvements to the pedestrian crossings at the intersections of 19th Avenue and Judah, 19th and Taraval and 19th Ave and Sloat Blvd is set to begin sometime before the end of this year. Traffic at all three intersections will be subject to crossing closure and detour to parallel streets. This improvement work is part of an extensive series of projects that began in 2007.
The improvement work will require vehicle-traffic detours and closure of the intersections as work progresses. Ha Nguyen of SF MTA met with Sunset Heights Association of Responsible People this past Sept. 29. As project manager she and some of her staff made a presentation to the members of SHARP at that Tuesday evening gathering.
Vern Waight of SHARP said that he was impressed with Nguyen’s presentation. “It is a very extensive and complex project and while they are working on the streets crews will also work on other utilities as well as the intersection improvements,” said Waight.
Waight who worked as a traffic engineer for many years with Caltrans also admitted that while he was impressed with the presentation in the initial plans, “It’s going to be a mess along 19th Ave for a while.”
Traffic police will be directing traffic at each of the intersections while construction is taking place, he noted. “As the work gets going people will have to get used to the inconvenience,” said Waight. “Yet, once it is done it will be better and last for quite a while, at least 30 years,” he added. With the utility work that will be included in the repairs Waight said he understood the estimated cost to be at about 18 million.
The Westside Observer tried several times to reach Nguyen and Judson True at the SFMTA for verification and clarification, but requests for further information were ignored.
Waight also mentioned that at the SHARP meeting discussion about the “rebuilding of the mess at St. Francis Circle was also presented.” This work will require detours and closure of the intersection as work progresses. Described by SFMTA traffic engineer Bond M. Yee as “the most complicated intersection in the city,” St. Francis Circle is a five-legged intersection. According to a report this past February in the SF Chronicle, St. Francis Circle, which really isn’t a circle in the traditional sense of the word, has over 40,000 motorists daily. All those cars are simply trying to get to and from nearby San Francisco State University, Stern Grove, the Stonestown Mall, Interstate 280 and the West Portal commercial district. (See the full story on page one.)
Hopefully this work at St. Francis Circle as well as the work with the three intersections at 19th Ave will go smoothly. From Waight’s perspective as a former traffic engineer, 19th Ave is a “surrogate highway” as he called it. “It was never meant to handle so much traffic like a freeway.” He also said that even with the improvement work completed at the three intersections, 19th Ave would have the same six lanes.
