A National City council vote on whether to approve the Conditional Use Permit for a second In-N-Out burger joint was kicked down the road for city staff to return with more information after several residents, community organizations and members of the dais questioned whether the fast-food joint would be a healthy choice for the city.
Doing so would have meant overturning the city’s planning commission Aug. 1 decision to deny the CUP.
National City Planner Martin Reeder said a traffic study estimated the fast food joint, proposed for 1900 East Plaza Blvd. would produce 1,655 net new daily trips with room for 29 cars in the drive through lane before the pickup window.
Council members and residents questioned how drivers attempting to enter or exit the site might worsen traffic, as well as whether the accompanying greenhouse gasses associated with a constant line of idling cars would be hazardous to local residents.
In addition to health concerns related to air quality, the planning commission stated the proposed restaurant would qualify as an ‘unhealthy fast food outlet’ in their report.
Olivewood Gardens and Learning Center Director of Development Claire Groebner reminded meeting attendees National City was celebrated as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health prize winner last year for efforts toward environmental justice.
“We have high levels of respiratory conditions including asthma at twice the county average; cars are the number one contributor to greenhouse gasses and the proposed In-N-Out will further contribute to higher levels of GHGs from traffic idling in the drive through. Furthermore, processed and fast foods contribute to obesity and heart disease, causing both social and economic impacts today and in the future. Regardless of zoning or traffic implications, the community has stated over and over we do not want more fast food in National City,” Groebner said.
In a follow up phone call, Groebner said Olivewood Gardens has participated in several outreach opportunities with residents as a member of San Diego County Food Vision 2030, a group which aims to develop a healthy and sustainable food system within the next decade.
“We’ve gathered a lot of feedback from community members here in National City and from our perspective, regardless of zoning, our community is saying ‘we don’t want this anymore’. We want to urge the council to put community first. We think this is an opportunity to bridge food access with business development,” Groebner said.
Environmental Health Coalition Policy Advocate Kelsey Genesi said the Old Town neighborhood of National City is already classified as a food desert and asked city council to deny In-N-Out the CUP because there are already four fast food restaurants in the area.
However, Genesi said, if approval were to happen some mitigations might include funding community programs through tax revenue, planting more trees throughout the area, and conducting a follow up traffic study with corrective action paid for by the owner if cars do prove to take their toll on the area after a year of being open for business.
Resident Joan Rincon said the boulevard is a potential choke point for buses, especially during rush hour and adding more cars to the thoroughfare will prove problematic for residents who rely on public transportation.
According to Metropolitan Transit System data, bus ridership throughout the system increased 41% between July 2021 and June 2022 and remains on the rise.
Gandinni Group Principal Giancarlo Gandinni, whose company conducted the traffic survey, later clarified public buses were included in the traffic survey but are generally not isolated as an individual factor.
City Council Member Marcus Bush asked whether there would be “an additional mechanism to open up the CUP a year down the road to reevaluate the traffic impacts” to which National City Principal Planner Martin Reeder said the city would most likely be looking at the site on a regular basis but details of any changes would fall to the city’s traffic engineer.
City Council Member Jose Rodriguez said he would love to see a study on how landscaping choices including native plants might impact emissions.
“We’re the densest city in the county, we’re landlocked and we’re one of the most polluted in the county,” Rodriguez said, and asked In-N-Out Development Manager Cassie Ruiz whether the company would consider incorporating more native plants into their landscape design.
“We’re mindful of what’s going to be drought tolerant and we’re more than happy to incorporate more natives but we’d probably lean toward farther away from the building because we don’t want pests coming into the building near food,” Ruiz said.
The item will be brought back to City Council on Oct. 18.
