Downtown San Diego: Rising On The Pacific.” Close your eyes and say it softly to yourself. Whether you see something vague, nothing or a wondrous everything, you are engaged. What you are contemplating is a draft vision statement, a baby step being considered this month by a committee formed nine months ago to craft a 20-year plan for an urban center. Now the city wants you to ponder this sweeping vision statement and details like density swaps. The effort is to create a Downtown for all.

So far, 700 people have offered thoughts. Rajeev Bhatia, the San Francisco planner hired to oversee the work, says each idea is seriously considered. “We want people to stay engaged, check our Web site, show up for meetings and send us their comments,” says Bhatia, a principal in Dyett & Bhatia. “It is amazing the difference one person can make.”

The steering committee heading this effort was hand-picked by Mayor Dick Murphy and is a mix of property owners, architects and lawyers along with a heavy dose of planners and those with government connections. Chairing the group is Hal Sadler, a pragmatic veteran architect who leads by showing he’s still not afraid to think big. His pet project? Rallying support for covering Interstate 5 from First to Sixth avenues. Doing so, Sadler says, would allow Balboa Park to spill into Downtown, across newly created land that could become a mix of open space, affordable housing and maybe even a public school. “It gives us just what we want to do in trying to incorporate Balboa Park with the city,” Sadler says. “It is not an impossible dream. It has been done in Seattle and some in Kansas City.”

Another report headed for the committee this month looks at what makes a really great waterfront city. Bhatia says compared to other major waterfront cities, like San Francisco, Vancouver, Portland, Seattle and Boston, San Diego has gotten a late start.

“Other cities have had the energy going on for quite a while,” he says. “Part of it is time. You also have to have the right structure in place so that when growth happens, it happens well.”

Sadler looks at being late as somewhat fortuitous.

“I have always felt that while we sat on our fanny and had slow development, while others were actually doing it, they also were creating some of the errors,” he says. “You learn more by seeing what people did right and did wrong than if you went out and committed yourself quickly.”

In reaching this point, Sadler’s steering committee and Dyett & Bhatia, run locally by Joan Isaacson, have conducted 70 one-on-one interviews and two public meetings. A common concern reflected in the three papers issued so far is expanding both Downtown’s employment base and its supply of commercial office space. An underlying fear is that the white-hot residential market will result in office property being taken out of play. The working paper being distributed declares that “sufficient land for office development must be designated to accommodate anticipated expansion and deepening of the business sector.”

Times Of Frustration

The debate about real estate and its zoning, of course, lies at the core of what Downtown will become. In the past, these disputes have become divisive. Broker Jacqueline King says the penchant for naysayers to use litigation to delay everything from the ballpark to each phase of the convention center keeps big money from investing Downtown. “I don’t even try anymore to bring big money to San Diego,” she says. “There are too many litigious obstacles.” Her planning magic wand would produce a document immune to such obstruction.

King, who had her first Centre City listing in 1983 and moved Downtown with her two young children in 1991, is particularly annoyed now by those who declare more housing is being built than the market can support.

“I disagree with experts who think we are even close to overbuilt,” she says. “If you compare us to any other major urban residential area, 8,000 units (being built over five years) is a drop in the bucket.” The Centre City Development Corp. expects Downtown to add about 9,000 homes by 2007, growing the population from this year’s 20,000 to more than 33,000. King is more optimistic, expecting that when 2010 rolls around, more than 20,000 units will have been built, and occupied. If she’s right, that would add nearly 30,000 residents.

King also wants the planning effort to accommodate what she foresees as a future hotbed of Mexican/American art and one that will nurture a significant San Diego-based film industry, both with buildings in Downtown and its adjoining communities.

Busting The Resident Profile

Today’s new wave of Downtown residents is skewing toward retirees and second-home owners, the so-called “lock and leave” crowd who enjoy the urban amenities along with the ability to take off for an extended period of time without the hassles of caring for a suburban home. Yet planners also expect within this group to find CEOs who may then relocate their business nearby, causing younger executives and employees to move in too.

Fitting some of that desired profile is Greg Koch, 38, the CEO of Stone Brewing Co. Except he’s not likely to move his brewery.

As a two-year Downtown resident and fan of the urban lifestyle, Koch advises planners to take into account a more middle range of housing prices, the type his employees could afford. “I enjoy hanging out with a diversified crowd much more than I do a non-diversified crowd,” he says. “Homogeneous crowds are boring.” The residential development pattern so far serves primarily the very poor, the elderly and those with higher incomes. Indeed, the Draft Planning Principles now in circulation promote more diversity: “Attracting middle-income households, families and Downtown employees will reinforce neighborhood stability and will also be essential to meeting Downtown’s population targets.”

A fan of urban culture, especially the Sushi performances at the Carnation Building, Koch would like to see more entertainment options. “A place like the Casbah (on the northern fringe of Downtown) is a terrific place for live music,” says Koch. “We need more of that.”

He could do without cultural additions like the Hustler store. “Personally, I find this trendy trailer trash chic thing to be one of the less enduring trends to happen in recent years,” he says. “It is an interesting study in brand name.”

As a resident, Koch is enjoying the increased level of walkability and expects it to only get better. “It will be common to walk around the ballpark district over to the marina district and to the financial district,” he says. “It should be not just pedestrian friendly, but visually friendly so people want to walk.”

Some Plan, Some Do

Among the committee members is Doug Wilson, a veteran developer who was a partner in the building of the Symphony Towers office tower in the 1980s and last month, saw residential sales begin in his Parkloft across from the new ballpark. His confidence in Downtown is so great that when litigation halted the ballpark, Wilson pressed ahead and now has beaten everyone in that area to market.

Wilson has great expectations that the planning now under way will deal with the “global” issues such as better connecting Downtown’s neighborhoods, encouraging a variety of development that includes schools. “If you don’t have kids you don’t have a complete Downtown,” he says.

One thing Wilson would like to get accomplished soon — before the plan is finalized more than a year from now — is approval for density transfers. Under such a system, used in markets like Chicago and Denver, a property owner who did not develop to the maximum square footage the zoning allows could sell the excess to a different property owner. He also favors allowing buildings to be stepped back farther from the property line.

Although Parkloft is residential, Wilson remains interested in the commercial market. He is pondering a mid-rise with the larger floor plates that technology companies prefer. Before taking that step he is looking for more promotional support. “We need to get the EDC (Economic Development Corp.) and Downtown Partnership saying Downtown is a viable alternative for these tenants,” he says.

A Positive Outlook

One difference between this planning effort and the one in the late 1980s is the general mood. Then, East Village was a wasteland called Centre City East, the El Cortez seemed a candidate for the wrecking ball, retail could only survive in fortress Horton Plaza and developers were turning back blocks now topping out as condo towers. Today’s outlook is decidedly positive.

“If I could wave a magic wand over Downtown, I am not certain there would be a lot of changes,” says Jeff Cavignac, president of Cavignac & Associates and one of Downtown’s 4,096 active and licensed businesses. “The current administration, CCDC, the Downtown Partnership, all those groups have done an excellent job of putting San Diego on track to really be a one-of-a-kind city.

“I think with the ballpark being built and all the residential construction, those projects will put hundreds of thousands of people on the street — in a positive sense,” the insurance executive continues. “They will spur new restaurants, retail. I think the North Embarcadero plan is exciting. I would like to see a new (City Hall) and I would like to see trolley access to the airport. As someone who lives in Mission Hills and works Downtown, the majority of time my wife and I go out we go Downtown. We go to dinner, we go to the movies and we walk around. It is exciting what is happening.”

Sadler, who also serves as CCDC’s chairman, is clearly excited about what the group can accomplish. “What an opportunity for the city and all of us who are working on it,” he says. “We have been given, if not the best, then awful close to, the best land, layout and configuration to do what we want to do.”