By Dave Pasley for CollegeParkSA.com

I finally got a chance to look over the UTSA master plan for the athletics complex.  Generally speaking I like the plan but I’m a little concerned about the way the plan addresses (and does not address) UTSA Drive, which seems suspiciously ambiguous and vague.

Further heightening suspicion/concern is the fact that the plan does explicitly state that; “UTSA Park West is located approximately half a mile from the Central Campus if traveled via UTSA Boulevard and 1.5 miles from the Central Campus if traveled via Loop 1604.”

To say that another way, the UTSA Blvd./Drive connection between the two campuses is three times more efficient than the alternatives.

Perhaps the plan is to run shuttle buses between the two campuses via UTSA Blvd./Drive? If so it would be natural to also accommodate pedestrian and bicycle traffic at this entrance.

I wonder why this isn’t this discussed in the plan? I don’t think it is necessarily a bad idea, and it is certainly preferable to extending UTSA Drive into the campus as a through street. But it concerns me that there is no mention of any plans for the extension of UTSA Drive, other than the visual depiction.

Obviously it would be a simple thing to remove the turn around and connect UTSA Drive directly to the internal street system on the West Campus. Thus, I’m suspicious that a through street extension may be the ultimate intent and that the Figure 4 drawing could a charade-like placeholder.

I also wonder to what extent the plan has been vetted and coordinated with the city. The plan is written as if it is a fate accompli – and it may well be. However, I notice that in the section on the planning process all of the coordination that is mentioned is internal to the institution. There is no mention of any coordination with anyone outside of the UT system.

Theoretically, at the time of platting, the city would object to the proposed alignment and design of Kyle Seale Parkway. KSP is an important arterial street on the city’s major thoroughfare plan  intended to ultimately connect Prue Road to the new I-10 intersection at the entrance to The Dominion (via Huermann Road).

Because the UTSA West Campus sits in the middle of two already built sections of KSP, theoretically, KSP should be extended straight through the property with enough right-of-way (86 feet) to ultimately accommodate a median-divided, four-lane arterial street.

That does not seem to be what UTSA has in mind. The master plan seems to envision KSP as being more like a campus roadway than an arterial street. For instance, the plan calls for a “pedestrian mall” to cross KSP on the southern end of the site and the northern is treated almost like a driveway intersection.

I wonder if the city will allow that?

Other than KSP and the potential extension of UTSA Drive there are many things to like about this plan, first and foremost being the proposed land use. Of all the things that could have happened with this property having it develop as a university athletic complex is one of the least objectionable uses I can imagine. In fact I think it will turn out to be an amenity, which is how I view the existing campus.

I think a lot of College Park residents will like the idea of being able to walk or ride a bike over to the athletic complex to watch Division I sporting events.

Furthermore, the floodplain of Huerta Creek protects many of us in Phase I from directly abutting the developed areas of the site, and in those areas where there is a direct abutment the plan calls for residential uses (I would assume for student-athletes).

In summary, I’m cautiously optimistic it could turn out OK...or even better than OK.