Days Before San Francisco’s Great Highway Closure, Opponents Aim to Block It

Just three days before San Francisco plans to permanently close a two-mile stretch of the Great Highway to cars and turn the road into park space, opponents said on Tuesday that they are filing a lawsuit to block the shutdown.

A group of westside neighborhood advocates and business owners argue that Proposition K, which voters passed in November, violated California law governing permanent road closures and was adopted without adequate environmental review.

“This legal action is necessary because of the manipulation of government processes and the misleading of voters by the proponents of Proposition K and their elected proxy,” said Richard Corriea, a fourth-generation westside resident and lawyer who spoke at a news conference but is not part of the lawsuit.

The suit — which, as of Tuesday afternoon, was not yet available in the San Francisco Superior Court’s online database — is against the city and the Board of Supervisors, Corriea said.

Corriea told KQED that the lawsuit alleges Proposition K is invalid because the California Vehicle Code grants local jurisdictions the authority to permanently close down highways to cars only when the local legislative body deems it “no longer needed for vehicular traffic” or an issue of public safety due to traffic or crime.

The decision should not have been in the hands of voters, Corriea said, arguing that the Board of Supervisors is the local legislative body that should have made the call.

Secondarily, Corriea said the city needed to create an environmental impact report for the project as part of the California Environmental Quality Act.

“The court will figure that one out from a common sense point of view — imagine forcing 15,000 cars a day into a neighborhood,” he said.

The president of Friends of Ocean Beach Park, a group that rose out of the Proposition K campaign, called the lawsuit “just another in a long line of attempts by park opponents to overturn the will of San Franciscans.”

“Their prior attempts to bypass democratic outcomes include another failed lawsuit and multiple unanimously rejected appeals,” said Lucas Lux, president of the group. “Meanwhile, we are excited for the park to open in April so San Franciscans can begin enjoying the coastal park they voted for.”

The city plans to close the highway on Friday, with the park’s opening set for April 12. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit — including former District 7 candidate Matthew Boschetto, Sunset District hardware store owner Albert Chow and the transportation-focused nonprofit Livable SF — want the court to stop the closure and invalidate the results of the citywide vote on Proposition K, which passed with a 54% majority.

“When the Upper Great Highway closes, it won’t create a better city — it will hurt the people who keep this city running,” Chow said. “Everyday working families will be pushed aside so a few can have a car-less road.”

San Francisco’s westside residents in districts encompassing the Richmond, Sunset and Excelsior neighborhoods voted 61% against the proposition. The results were nearly the opposite across the rest of the city to the east, with 64% of voters in favor of closing the Upper Great Highway to vehicle traffic.

Vin Budhai, with the new nonprofit LivableSF, said closing the highway would ignore the desires of many westside residents, even though the rest of the city outvoted them.

“It has nothing to do with cars or the Great Highway for me personally,” he said. “Legally, it wasn’t the right approach. I feel that people should always have a say in things that impact their lives every single day.”

Budhai is also helping lead the efforts to recall Supervisor Joel Engardio, who represents the Sunset and co-sponsored Proposition K. The group is collecting signatures and must turn in at least 9,900 by May 22 to qualify a recall measure for the ballot, according to Budhai.

“I think the recall and this lawsuit, from my standpoint, go hand in hand,” Budhai said. “It’s just about holding our elected officials accountable.”

City Attorney David Chiu said in a statement that “once the lawsuit is filed and served,” his office “will review the complaint and respond in court.”

In an email, Engardio told KQED he has “full confidence in the City Attorney’s ability to draft legal ballot measures” and hopes “the court will quickly see this lawsuit has no merit.”