The Rancho Santa Fe Association is taking steps to improve the aging and crowded parking lot on the Rancho Santa Fe Golf and Tennis Club campus. At the Nov. 7 meeting, the board supported a concept that would bring an additional 45 to 60 spaces, address safety concerns such as lighting and drainage issues, and also consider adding electric vehicle charging stations. The next step will involve more detailed construction drawings and project costs for the board to consider.
Director Scott Thurman said that from a functionality and safety perspective the Association needs to take action to address the parking lot facility: “It’s the center of the communityit should be safe for sure.”
The existing 189-space parking lot spans three levels on a slope, linked by steep staircases heading down to the golf clubhouse. The RSF Tennis Club has a small number of spaces close to its clubhouse entrance. The top level closest to Via de la Cumbre houses the RSF Connect fiber optic network operations building and also serves as an access point to the trails, with an area with benches, picnic tables and hitching posts.
Director Phil Trubey said the parking lot is not only constrained with not enough spaces for members, but the existing design is a “Mickey Mouse parking lot” that doesn’t make a lot of sense. The landscaping is “old, tired and unsafe,” there is nothing to address stormwater run-off and, additionally, the striping and curbs need a complete renovation.
In July, the Association board approved a $10,000 contract with Encinitas civil engineering and land planning firm Paso Laret Suiter & Associates to conduct a parking lot feasibility study.
At the board’s Nov. 7 meeting, Association Planning and Development Director Maryam Babaki shared the results of three main options that had been developed, ranging from an additional 22 to 66 new spaces and options to remove a hump at the entrance to the parking lot.
One option that would gain about 22 new spaces would require the least amount of grading while a “no constraints” option would grab 66 additional spaces while involving more significant grading.
Trubey said he didn’t support the option that created essentially a fourth level of parking behind the RSF Connect “fiber hut”—he said it was not only too far away but would put a parking lot on both sides of the trail.
In the board’s preferred option, the third level would move down lower and make a flatter lot. A fourth level wouldn’t go beyond the fiber hut and leaves the equine and trail rest area intact. The improvements would include new paths of travel for pedestrians including reconfigured staircases. Trubey said the “no constraints” option was a little aggressive, taking out planting areas and putting a full 22 new spaces near the player’s clubhouse. The board suggested that those 22 spaces near the player’s clubhouse could be developed as a more flexible grasscrete area that could be used as overflow event space when not needed for parking.
During the board discussion, Director David Gamboa raised an interesting point about technology and how the advent of self-driving cars might impact future needs for parking, something to consider before allocating Association funds. He also questioned whether a parking count had been done to support the need to expand the parking lot.
As a personal anecdote, Association President Courtney LeBeau said that when she went to play tennis at 9 a.m. on a Wednesday she found the parking lot completely full.