San Francisco’s election results are in, and many changes have been made. Local voters had the opportunity to vote on many different issues and after all the polling, new government changes will take place. Daniel Lurie was elected as the new mayor, and new district supervisors and measures will be put in place.
One of these measures that passed is Proposition K, which passed after 191,007 ballots voting YES on Prop K were counted. This accounts for 54.14% of those turned in, surpassing the 50% quota needed for it to be ratified. Prop K will allow the city to use the Upper Great Highway for recreational space, which will permanently close it to private motor vehicles according to sf.gov.
“Prop K was one of the more controversial measures passed from what I heard from my family and the news,” sophomore Olivia Kantor said. “Some people strongly advocate for it but others said it would be bad for the city as a whole,”
The proposition being passed means that the mile-long stretch of land along the coast is now open for use. The current plan is to turn it into a park, where the community can gather and Ocean Beach can be more accessible, according to Ocean Beach Park. The road will still need to be maintained, however, since emergency vehicles, official government vehicles and intra-park transit shuttle buses still need to be able to access the Upper Great Highway at all times. Not being able to use the road is frustrating for those used to having it available to them, according to History faculty Jason Enevoldson.
“A big part of the community uses the road, especially the surfing and fishing community which is huge; if you can’t drive along and look at the ocean you don’t know where to go,” Enevoldson said. “It is important to have basic access, and the maintenance is not that difficult— they should stabilize the sand dunes with more vegetation and that would help with the sand problem,”
Many people use the Great Highway on their commutes, so this closure will cause more traffic in the surrounding neighborhoods. When looking at the voting map of the election, those who voted for Prop K did not live near the Great Highway, and the votes against it were located nearer to the neighborhoods that would be affected. Since the margin of winning was only 4.14%, it caused anger among those living in that area since many who were unaware of the actual effects swayed a lot of the vote, according to sophomore Wren Walton.
“It causes so much traffic backup and affects commutes, and it doesn’t help the environment because those people who use it are not going to stop driving, they will just take another, less direct route,” Walton said. “I think Prop K mostly affects those living in the neighborhood so only they should vote on it, many who said yes had no idea what the Prop was doing and had no idea about the effects it could have,”
Since the southern part of the road was going to be shut down regardless of the outcome of Prop K, advocates for the closure of the entire road argue that car commutes would have to shift either way, according to Ocean Beach Park. Although no official plans have been published yet, the “public open recreational space” proposed is projected to be ready by 2026, according to sf.gov.
“I live right by Ocean Beach and Prop K will make my commute to school a lot longer,” Kantor said. “I think having more park areas in the city is nice but the effects should have been made more clear.”
