A San Francisco supervisor is looking at opportunities to overturn the voter-approved ballot measure that permanently closed the Upper Great Highway to car traffic.
Supervisor Connie Chan, who represents the Richmond, said she will “explore a ballot measure to keep Upper Great Highway open to vehicular traffic Mondays through Fridays and closed on the weekends for recreation.” The proposal comes in response to Proposition K, the contentious ballot measure that closed the coastal road to make way for a park.
Many of Chan’s constituents are asking what can be done about the closure, and the only option is to vote on it again, a spokesperson for the supervisor said Wednesday.
Chan, an outspoken critic of Prop. K, first wrote about her intention to overturn the measure in a column in the Richmond Review, a neighborhood news outlet. Her spokesperson acknowledged that “many things will need to come together to make this happen.” In the column, Chan made clear that a new vote would hinge on whether the effort to recall Supervisor Joel Engardio makes it to the ballot.
Prop K. passed citywide with 55% of votes, but residents of the Richmond and Sunset districts voted overwhelmingly against it. The issue triggered a recall campaign against Engardio because of concerns about traffic and lack of community involvement in the process. A Standard analysis found that traffic in the Sunset got worse after the closure.
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Chan’s idea was met with pushback from park supporters.
“If Supervisor Chan is proposing we spend millions to revert the space back to a pseudo-highway, subject the city to more bureaucracy, and take away the new amenities from the community, we expect she’ll have trouble finding enough additional supervisors also willing to take away San Franciscan’s new favorite park,” said Lucas Lux, a leader of the Prop. K campaign.
If the Engardio recall campaign triggers a special election in the Sunset District this year, a majority of the Board of Supervisors would need to authorize it to become a citywide election. After that, Chan would need three more supervisors to cosponsor a ballot measure to roll back Prop. K. Aside from Chan, only Supervisor Chyanne Chen opposed Prop. K.; the others either supported or remained neutral on the measure.
Mayor Daniel Lurie opposed Prop. K but has largely stayed out of the controversy since taking office.
Jason Galisatus, a spokesperson for Engardio’s anti-recall campaign, blasted Chan’s move as a ploy “to get people to sign the recall petition in the final weeks before the deadline” and believes there is no path to getting a majority of the board to agree with her.
The park, which will officially be known as Sunset Dunes, will have its grand opening Saturday. The recall campaign has until May 22 to submit about 10,000 signatures to the Department of Elections for review.