Connecting the Park with SD High School: An Update

By Mike Stepner

A rendering by David McCullough and Rob Quigley envisions an enhanced treatment of Park and Russ boulevards.

Following the city’s approval in 2021 for a new 99-year lease for San Diego High School in Balboa Park and the subsequent start to a multiyear rebuilding program, the Balboa Park Committee of 100 assembled a working group at the request of the City Council to explore ways to capitalize on these actions.

The council received the Balboa Park-San Diego High School Connections report on Sept. 8, 2025. Council members praised the effort and referred its 59 recommendations to the mayor and city departments to consider implementation steps.

Some suggestions, such as public improvements to Park and Russ boulevards, have already been shared with the city’s Development Services Department and the San Diego Unified and San Diego Community College districts.

Other suggestions range from more landscaping and wider sidewalks to slight restrictions on vehicular traffic on Russ, which separates the high school and City College. The thinking is that so many high school students take classes at City College that a more pleasant public space could encourage even closer relations.

Architect Rob Quigley, landscape architects David McCullough and Michael Singleton and school and college districts’ staff and consultants, sketched out some ideas detailed in the report.

The Downtown San Diego Partnership and Burnham Center for Community Advancement also showed interest in the report’s findings that park institutions and management could be improved and enhanced through closer cooperation with outside business and institutions.

Ideas include more internships and volunteer opportunities in the park and more integration of park resources in curricular development in nearby schools.

The working group even came up with a tagline: Park Boulevard with its many educational and cultural institutions represents life-long learning from “from pre-K to Ph.Ds” and beyond.

Since the report’s release, the city has embarked on an update to the 1989 Balboa Park Master Plan — an effort that could be informed by incorporating many of the report’s ideas.

Existing park documents include many recommendations yet to be implemented. The connections report offers still others with a practical way to see they go forward.

They include more parking garages and alternate means to access the park — thus freeing up asphalt parking lots for more park use.

More and better designed pedestrian bridges over freeways could  promote biking and walking. More public art in and around the park would enliven the walking experience. And new campus athletic, arts and classroom facilities — from a beautified San Diego Stadium to new performing arts centers — offer greater joint-use possibilities.

The report also explored “social infrastructure”  — programs and communications initiatives to unify park institutions and partner them with businesses and public and private institutions.

Ideas include a park magazine, free or low-cost access for students to park museums and a merger of  the park and downtown into one planning unit as a way to approach the future of the two areas of the city holistically.

The city and park have issued many reports, studies and land-use planning documents over the last century, but many good ideas have yet to result in any action; they just gather dust in the storerooms at City Hall.

The working group along with the City Council realized that here was a report that should not sit on a shelf but be kept close at hand as future generations move to improve both the park and communities around it.

The report was prepared by a subcommittee of C100 board members; Ross Porter, Roger Showley, René Smith and Mike Stepner. The recommendations can make their way not only into the updated park master plan but also priorities for the park and the study area extending far beyond the park’s boundaries.

The full report is available on the C100 website, balboaparkcommitteeof100.org and tinyurl.com/bp-sdhs-2025.

A presentation of the report is being scheduled for the San Diego High School Alumni Association. Anyone interested in arranging a similar presentation should contact contact Lucy Jackson, C100’s speakers bureau chair, to make arrangements: axjax4045@gmail.com.