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27 July 2015

Massive Trac Jams, Life-Threatening

Conges:on, Degrada:on of Life
Quality Result From Proposed
Warriors Arena, Opponents EIR Filing
Shows

Mission Bay Alliance Iden0es more than 50 Environmental
Viola0ons as part of Flaws of Proposed Warriors Arena and
Entertainment Center

San Francisco Opponents of the proposed Golden State Warriors arena

and entertainment complex today called the project fatally awed, ciQng
more than 50 violaQons of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA)
including severe trac congesQon, blocked emergency access and seismic
safety threats as part of the its ling today to the City of San Franciscos
Planning Department.

The Mission Bay Alliance said the Citys dra` Environmental Impact Report
for the proposed Warriors Arena in Mission Bay would create a trac jam
that would stretch from the Bay Bridge through SOMA, Dogpatch, and
Potrero Hill all the way to Highway 101.

The Warriors proposal calls for more than 225 events at the 18,500 seat
arena that provides only 200 parking spaces for visitors.

Our engineers and experts have scruQnized the Citys dra` EIR and
determined with certainty that this is a fatally awed project that will
gridlock trac, threaten paQent access to lifesaving care and be a disaster
for the Mission Bay neighborhood, the hospitals and City as a whole, said
Bruce Spaulding of the Mission Bay Alliance, a coaliQon of residents, UCSF
employees, UCSF paQents, and stakeholders who oppose the proposed
Warriors arena.

The responses from the Mission Bay Alliance cite various elements of the
Citys 1,000-plus page dra` EIR from transportaQon impacts and noise
polluQon to Mission Bay land use policy. Lawyers for the coaliQon conrmed
the projects environmental study fails in its aiempt to accurately analyze
the true environmental impacts of the proposed 18,500-seat arena and
entertainment center.

Conclusions about Emergency Access are Not Supported by Data, Leaving
Public at Risk

The emergency room entrance to the newly opened UCSF Benio Childrens
Hospital is located about 1,050 feet from the proposed Warriors arena and
entertainment center Yet incredibly, [the dra` EIR] concludes that the

subject project would not result in inadequate emergency access when

capacity events are taking place, writes Dan Smith, of Smith Engineering &
Management, who was hired by Mission Bay Alliance to analyze the trac
and access study of the Citys dra` EIR.

The dra` EIR oers no objecQve data to support its conclusion that
emergency access would not be adversely impacted in event travel peaks,
Smith said.

Instead, the Citys dra` EIR relies on subjecQve raQonalizaQons for why
emergency vehicles would not be slowed. When roadways are congested
with cars and sidewalks are lled with rowdy crowds, it is an inconceivable
conclusion that emergency vehicles will not experience delay, Smith
concluded.

Seconds or minutes could mean the dierence between life and death. And
paQents in emergency situaQons are not always shuiled to the hospital by
an emergency vehicle, meaning that trac patrol ocers and other drivers
may not recognize an emergency situaQon.

The Citys dra` EIRs conclusions about emergency access impacts are not
only unsupported by objecQve data but incorrect and implausible, Smith
said.

Incomplete Trac Study Paints a Limited Picture of the Projects Trac
Nightmares

While the City concedes that the project will grind the intersecQons in the
immediate vicinity to a halt, the studys trac analysis fails to
comprehensively address the projects impact on surrounding
neighborhoods including SoMA, Dogpatch, Potrero Hill or the stretch of
Highway 101 leading to the Bay Bridge.

The Citys dra` EIR arbitrarily selected only 23 intersecQons to grade on a
scale of A through F with A designaQng free-owing trac and F
being total gridlock. While it assigns E and F grades to many of the

intersecQons studied, the limited scope paints an incomplete picture that

does not convey the nightmarish condiQons experienced by commuters in
both the Financial District and SoMa, according to Larry Wymer, a licensed
trac engineer, who analyzed the Citys EIRs trac study.

In his comment leier, Wymer said the City must at the very least analyze the
roads North of the project to Market Street and it must do so in the context
of the 21 other nearby construcQon projects all of which also have their
own impact on trac gridlock. Finally he asks that the City revise its analysis
to incorporate ndings from the 2040 San Francisco TransportaQon Plan, a
City-produced study that predicts overall SoMa and Mission Bay auto trips to
organically increase by 82 percent between 2012 and 2040.

The impact of the proposed Warriors arena must be studied not in
isolaQon but as a piece in the connected fabric of San Franciscos roadways,
Spaulding said. Everyone who travels on San Franciscos roads and highways
knows that trac is bad and geqng worse. Trac caused by this project will
compound in a mulQplier eect that will grind this City to a screeching halt.

Misleading Reliance on 17-Year-Old Data

Beyond incomplete data, the Citys dra` EIR also relies on old informaQon
daQng back to a 1998 Mission Bay Master Plan to mislead the public and
decepQvely conclude that the proposed 18,500-seat arena with 730,000
square feet of oce and retail space will have limited impacts on Mission
Bay, its surrounding neighborhoods or the thousands of paQents and families
who visit the area for care at UCSF hospitals and nearby clinics.

Datasets forming the basis of signicant porQons of the Citys dra` EIR are
borrowed directly from outdated EIRs prepared in 1990 and 1998 for the
Citys 1998 Mission Bay Redevelopment Plan. The 1990 and 1998 EIRs
broadly analyzed all 303 acres in the Mission Bay area and omit site-specic
reviews on polluQon, hazardous materials and seismic safety of the current
11-acre site, aiorneys found.

Yet, the City claims that many of those old evaluaQons remain valid today.


The Citys strategy of relying on a very general environmental review
document that is more than 17 years old for topics required to be analyzed
and miQgated in detail does not work for the public, nor is it compliant with
CEQAs most basic requirements, write aiorneys Osha Meserve and Patrick
Soluri in a July 27 comment leier to the City on behalf of Mission Bay
Alliance.

The aiorneys say the risk of this site literally dissolving during an earthquake
due to liquefacQon and amplicaQon, for example, has not been properly
analyzed because seismic risks were studied dierently in the 1990s. The
proposed site would be built on so` landll ground that today is considered
a high risk for earthquake damage risks not properly analyzed in the dra`
EIR.

The City will now have several months to revise its dra` EIR, released on
June 5, and address the noted concerns. The nal version may be released
later this fall.

If the Mission Bay Alliance does not believe the nal product resolves the
EIR's legal defects, it will consider liQgaQon, Spaulding said.

As it stands, the signicant issues idenQed by our legal team all but prove
that this ill-conceived project would spell disaster for Mission Bay and the
city as a whole, he said.

About the Mission Bay Alliance
The Mission Bay Alliance is a coaliQon of UCSF stakeholders, donors, faculty,
physicians and the working men and women of San Francisco who are
concerned about the impact of the proposed Golden State Warriors stadium
on the future of the vibrant community and medical campus at Mission Bay.
The Alliance fully supports the Warriors team and congratulates its
tremendous championship win. However, the Alliance believes the proposed
arena and entertainment center is ill-conceived for this site. For more
informaQon about the Mission Bay Alliance, visit
www.missionbayalliance.org.