VISTA — Policies regarding temporary and permanent street closures and one-way streets in downtown Vista could be presented to the City Council in the next year as the city seeks ways to increase multimodal access and invigorate the downtown.
At a March 26 meeting, Councilmember Corinna Contreras led an open discussion with her council colleagues about possibly closing certain streets downtown to make them more accessible to pedestrians and allow more events in the city.
“What I really wanted to do was open a discussion with my colleagues to gauge the temperature, so we could provide some direction to staff if there was consensus on reimagining our downtown,” Contreras said. “There’s a possibility that some segments can be permanently closed, there’s also the possibility that we might want to have a temporary closure and have some more events downtown.”
The council conversation followed a separate discussion by the Central Vista Business Improvement District (CVBID) board earlier this month, where members discussed the pros and cons of downtown street closures with a small group of business owners.
CVBID noted that street closures could draw more foot traffic to businesses and create additional space for people to walk, bike, sit and dine outside; however, they said this change would also likely increase traffic congestion and decrease parking availability.
Business owner Carly Dede, who owns a business along Main Street, said at the March 26 meeting that temporary street closures in the area have hurt her clinic in the past due to impacts on parking, as patients are required to walk further distances.
“To temporarily close things… if it was during business hours, it would be detrimental to our business,” she said.
Fellow council members said they were open to the idea of street closures and other things to invigorate the downtown, with the caveat that negative impacts on local businesses should be mitigated as much as possible.
Councilmember Joe Green said the downtown could benefit from more temporary closures along South Indiana Avenue, especially near the Vista Village Gazebo and at the intersection with East Broadway, to allow for more events. He proposed trying out more temporary closures for three to four days at a time and then analyzing the impact.
“If we find we have more boots on the ground in our community, our business owners are doing good, and we don’t have the issues with parking that they’re thinking we were going to have, I would be open to looking at closing it permanently if it’s going to improve businesses there, as far as Indiana goes,” he said.
Green also said he would not be in favor of permanent closures on Main Street or East Broadway but that they could be made into one-way streets to allow for more parking spaces.
Councilmember Katie Melendez noted that the city is already familiar with temporary street closures downtown, with the annual Vista Strawberry Festival along Main Street in May and smaller art events throughout the year.
In addition to opening the streets to more events, Melendez said the community in the neighboring residential areas would also benefit from having dedicated pedestrian- and bike-friendly areas downtown.
“It’s not even really closing an area, it could be seen as opening it up for more multimodal uses,” Melendez said. “I could also see it being a space for residents to have more access to the public right-of-way.”
She and Contreras also said they would like to see Vista have an annual all-wheels event in downtown, similar to Cyclovia in the city of Encinitas, where bikers and skaters can enjoy downtown in an open streets-style event.
For the next steps, the council directed the City Manager to conduct outreach with downtown businesses to discuss options for street closures, develop potential plans for making Main and Broadway into one-way streets, better advertise parking options downtown, and look into the possibility of a community bike event.
