Council approves the SeaWorld master plan, fireworks wind down included, sea level questions still open
The Oct. 13 vote approves the 2020 SeaWorld Master Plan Update for the 189.4-acre Mission Bay park, with a hotel among the horizon projects. The council also ordered most fireworks shows wound down, and questions raised the next day ask what rising water does to the roads in.
MISSION BAY: The City Council voted on Tuesday, Oct. 13, to approve the 2020 SeaWorld Master Plan Update, the long-range plan for the marine park on Mission Bay. The item, listed on the council agenda as Item 330, covers the 189.4-acre site at 500 Sea World Drive and future site enhancements across all five planning areas within the park, including updated attractions, improved visitor facilities and long-range conceptual projects.
Among the projects on the horizon are a hotel and below-grade parking, according to post-vote commentary on the approval. A community bulletin previewing the hearing listed the major projects as a 300-room hotel, a special events center and a marina expansion.
The approval also reaches the park's nighttime signature. As the council approved the new master plan this week, it ordered the Mission Bay park to wind down most of its fireworks shows, Voice of San Diego reported on Thursday. The direction follows the Planning Commission, which had recommended the update with a caveat: phase out the fireworks show over the next five years. KOGO reported in July that the commission's unanimous vote was a recommendation to the council and that the fireworks would be phased out in favor of drone shows.
The water question the vote did not answer
The day after the vote, Lori Saldana raised a different part of the plan in an OB Rag commentary: its sea level rise assessment, which she called excellent but nearly seven years old. The assessment identifies a rise of 3.3 feet as the threshold for exposure in the guest parking planning area, and it anticipates that adaptation measures for the public roads around the park would be implemented by the city before that threshold is reached, so that access to the park can continue uninterrupted.
Saldana asked whether the city has an adaptation plan and funding for the access roads, noting that SeaWorld Drive is already in rough shape, and she said she has suggested to Councilmember Raul Campillo that the council ask for an assessment of the roads leading into the park before a final reading of the agreement. Those questions now sit alongside the approval itself: the plan is adopted, the fireworks are to wind down, and the road and water work that expansion assumes remains to be accounted for.
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