Meeting Transcript

Sean Elo Rivera, our city council member for the first council district where we are this morning, Joe La Cava, and Sonny Lee, the executive director of Discover PB. I want to remind you right now, just shop local, everybody. And Charlie Charlie Nieto, who is the president of the Pacific Beach Town Council. I also want to acknowledge that we have a number of staff who are here from the city. We also have some Sandag staff here. Maybe uh Council President can help with some of that. But we have a uh our sustainability and mobility directors, uh Alyssa Mudo is with us this morning. Her deputy director, Christy Reeser, is here, uh, Christelle uh Ayela, for who's the program manager for this effort, as well as senior traffic engineer Claudia Brizzelia. Uh we are here in beautiful Pacific Beach to announce the launch of the beach bug. Uh, this new electric shuttle program is a true collaboration between the city of San Diego, Sandag, the Pacific Beach community, and the broader San Diego community. Uh the broader San Diego community, by the way, helped us by voting in an online poll and choosing the beach bug name. And community members even help to come up with the logo that you see on the vehicles. I want to thank City and Sandag staff and all the leaders that you'll hear from in a moment for all their hard work that got us to this point today. Starting today, PB residents and visitors can catch a quick, easy ride on a fleet of cool new neighborhood electric vehicles. People can hop on and off to go to the beach, to restaurants, to bars, shops, and other popular locations throughout Pacific Beach. The Beach Bug Shuttle Pilot Project will be free for everyone in the for the first three months. Let me say that one more time. I guess I sort of stumbled over that, and that's probably uh you don't want to bury the lead, right? The Beach Bug Shuttle Pilot Project will be free to everyone for the first three months. Uh by linking the Balboa Avenue Transit Station, these shuttles provide visitors from anywhere in our region uh a new hassle-free way to access the many amenities and attractions that PB has to offer. And that's where the beach bug shuttle comes in. This new electric shuttle fleet will help reduce demand for parking, making it easier to take public transit and give residents another option to get around the neighborhood, all by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. These shuttles are small, but an important part of our overall city's climate action plan. And they're an example of how in San Diego we can all work together to come up with creative and simple solutions to help chip away at some of our city's biggest challenges. The beach bug is good for San Diego's environment, but it's also a way to help make our public beaches more public. By connecting uh the nearby trolley stop uh with these shuttles to our beach, we what we can do is make the beaches more accessible to people who may not have a car or who don't want to spend a lot of time searching for a parking or maybe aren't able to walk long distances if they're forced to park far away to enjoy uh our beaches and waterfront. The Beach Bug program is an open invitation to all San Diegans to come out to Pacific Beach and enjoy everything that this incredible beach community has to offer. Uh with those comments, I'm happy to turn the podium over to the vice chair of the Sandag Board of Directors, our City Council President, Sean Elo Rivera. Council President. Thank you, Mayor Mayor Gloria. Good morning, everyone. Again, my name is Sean Elo Rivera. I serve as San Diego City Council President and as the vice chair of the Sandag the San Diego Association of Governments, also known as Sandag. Appreciate you all being here on this very, very challenging assignment on this very ugly morning here in San Diego. Um I'm excited to be to be here though because um the official launch of the beach bug represents something that um I think is super important, and that is access to our beaches and our base. Uh as beautiful as this morning is, um, as beautiful as the setting is, I can't help but think of all the residents in my district who can't get here. Uh, who the young people who have never been to the beach, um, the families who are not able to enjoy the bay if they don't own a car. And I believe that everyone deserves access to the beach and our bays, even if they don't own a vehicle. There are people throughout the county who rarely get to come out to the beach, enjoy the cool ocean breeze and take a dip in the water. The things that many of us believe make San Diego what San Diego is. And now