Oceanside residents near Camp Pendleton sometimes can’t get in or out of the neighborhood

Geraldine Afshari told the Oceanside City Council what it was like when she could not get into her neighborhood near Interstate 5 and State Route 76 for hours. She couldn’t do her job as a caretaker for her daughter, who she said has “severe health conditions” and is in a wheelchair. 

That 7-hour closure in March was due to an unattended package found at the neighboring Camp Pendleton, causing the military base to close its gate and shut down the northbound Interstate 5 off-ramps to Harbor Drive and Vandegrift Boulevard, Times of San Diego reported. 

It’s one of at least three times this year that the Capistrano neighborhood next to the military base, which has hundreds of homes and just one route in and out, has been blocked off for hours. 

“There needs to be another road for entering and leaving the Capistrano neighborhood,” Afshari wrote in her email to the council. “As it is now, with only one road, everyone in the neighborhood is in danger when there is an emergency. Even on regular days, there are long lines of cars, and it is difficult with the Pendleton traffic. An emergency closure is unacceptable.”

Afshari was one of over a dozen residents who wrote to the City Council ahead of an April meeting, when Deputy Mayor Eric Joyce and Mayor Esther Sanchez brought the problem to the City Council. 

Neighbors described regularly being blocked either in or out of their neighborhood for hours due to traffic — and their fears about what would happen during a wildfire or other potential emergency.

The Oceanside City Council will discuss possible solutions Wednesday that would give neighborhoods in the Capistrano neighborhood another exit. 

The neighborhood of homes, which borders State Route 76 to the south, Interstate 5 to the west, Camp Pendleton to the north and a canyon to the east, is accustomed to traffic buildups. But security threats increase during periods of heightened security threats like the Iran war, and residents have found themselves blocked from accessing their homes in recent months.

Joyce said city officials should do something.

“There is an increased anxiety and increased frustration from a neighborhood that already feels cut off from the city,” he said in April.

Potential solutions 

Staff prepared 10 options for City Council consideration Wednesday. Apart from two cheaper alternatives opposed by Camp Pendleton, the options range from $35 million to $150 million, and staff said the city could receive up to $20 million in federal funding from the Defense Community Infrastructure Program. 

Staff is recommending two options to the City Council, one of which was a favorite of representatives from Camp Pendleton who reviewed the options. 

Both would cost $90 million and require coordination with the California Department of Transportation. Each would take around 7-10 years to implement, the staff report said.

Staff rated both a six on a difficulty scale of 1-10.

Camp Pendleton staff support connecting North Loretta Street to State Route 76, building a bridge over the San Luis Rey River and adding a signalized leg to the existing Loretta Street and State Route 76 intersection. It would require modifying the San Luis Rey River Trail.

The other option would be to build a one-way on-ramp access from North Loretta Street to State Route 76. This could be done without impacting the San Luis Rey River Trail and without  impacting State Route 76 as much as a signalized leg. 

Camp Pendleton said they would not support connecting Carnation Street to Capistrano Drive, and would only open the Camp Pendleton Gate in an “extreme evacuation scenario.”

Joyce, the deputy mayor, said that the city owes it to residents to explore all the options. 

“No one else faces this kind of challenge with access to their own homes,” he said.