Welcome!

Welcome to the Circulation Element Update project webpage. This webpage contains important project information so that the community and other interested parties can stay informed about what the project has completed to date, as well as remain informed of any new information being developed as the project progresses.

What is the Circulation Element?

The Circulation Element is a component of the City's General Plan document. It is the City's "blue prints" for transportation within Oceanside. The Circulation Element establishes policies and goals for the various transportation components listed below:

1. Existing and Future Roadways;
2. Intersections and roadway segments levels of service standards;
3. Public Transit and Rail;
4. Neighborhood Traffic Calming;
5. Transportation Demand Management (vehicle trip reduction measures);
6. Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) technologies (use of emerging technologies);
7. Bicycle and Equestrian Facilities; and
8. Pedestrian Facilities.

Each of these transportation components are discussed in greater detail in other sections of this project webpage.

It is important to understand that the Circulation Element provides the vision for how goods and people will move throughout our City, which is based upon established goals. These goals are then bolstered by policies that can be implemented to achieve the goals and objectives as laid out. A clearly crafted and publicly-supported Circulation Element details the image a community has of itself now, and what it hopes this image will be over the life of the document.

The growth in population and business is wonderful for our City, but it brings with it increased congestion on the existing roadway network, congestion that must be addressed in order to continue to preserve the character of our neighborhoods while providing the highest possible quality of life and access to work, shopping, schools and other destinations that Oceanside residents, employees and visitors come to expect.

The availability of non-automobile options has also greatly increased from the time the Circulation Element was last amended in 1995. The Coaster, Metrolink, Amtrak and the new Sprinter Rail systems, whose northern terminus is the Oceanside Transit Center Downtown, provide connectivity with San Diego, Los Angeles and various North County cities to the east. Beyond rail, other non-automobile options are bus transit, bicycle, pedestrian, telecommuting, and car and van pooling.

The net effect of this growth and change is that it provides a unique opportunity at this time for Oceanside to recraft the Circulation Element to reflect these changes, and how to best take advantage of them.

Why Update the Circulation Element?

The last time the City's Circulation Element was amended was in 1995. As a general rule of thumb, it is important to update components of the General Plan every 10 years. This is necessary to maintain a healthy set of policies and goals that are representative of the needs of the community. Moreover, our Circulation Element has not kept pace with the change in land uses over the years, which makes it even more important to update now. Land use zoning is closely tied to determining traffic volumes on the City's arterial roadway system in the future. Future traffic volumes are derived through the regional traffic model maintained by SANDAG (San Diego Association of Governments).

Key Issues

Based upon City staff's familiarity with growth patterns in North County San Diego and within Oceanside, the project team has identified the following key issues relating to the project:

• Understanding changes in traffic patterns - Significant changes in future growth and land use development within the City of Oceanside have resulted in changes to the future projection of traffic volumes on the City's arterial street system. It is essential that future development and traffic patterns be understood in order to provide a picture of the causes behind projected traffic impacts. To a large extent, the City's approach to this project will provide an understanding of the factors that have caused the forecasted traffic changes and the impact that these changes will have on arterial street intersection operations in the future.
• Assessing Local vs. Regional Traffic Issues - Oceanside's proximity to a number of major San Diego County roadways is both a benefit and a detriment, because increasing congestion on those roadways leads many to try to avoid bottlenecks by cutting through Oceanside neighborhoods to reach their destinations. This causes the City to respond to neighborhood concerns with traffic calming measures (such as speed humps) that solve the local traffic safety issue by slowing traffic down and/or redirecting it elsewhere within the community. Identifying key roadways for improvement that will address the regional traffic needs is a key issue to be addressed in the update of the Circulation Element. Ideally, providing the means by which the City could revisit the local street system design and Level of Service (LOS) standards would be another benefit of the new Circulation Element.
• Development of Effective Mitigation Measures - The implementation of effective mitigation measures on the existing and proposed future arterial street segments and intersections located in urban areas can result in right-of-way acquisition, increasing the anticipated project cost. Improvements identified to mitigate future traffic impacts should consider both the future Levels of Service (LOS) as well as impacts to surrounding properties. The project team is working to identify mitigation measures that effectively address forecasted traffic impacts while minimizing the secondary impacts to the surrounding community.
• Consistency and Coordination with Land Use Plan - While the Land Use Element is not currently under revision, a new Circulation Element which best reflects the City's land use planning efforts is key, even as the City approaches buildout (year 2030 when all land is expected to be developed). Identification of Smart Growth opportunities, especially along improved bus and rail transit corridors could be a great benefit to the City and its residents.
• Trip Reduction Measures, Programs and Policies - The Circulation Element update will also identify "out of the box" programs and policies to foster greater mode choice options and greater flexibility in its approach to quantifying roadway operational standards. Level of Service (LOS) policy reform, Transportation Demand Management measures, creation of development plans along major transit and rail corridors are just a few examples of how this might be achieved.