University of California at San Francisco is in support of the construction of an 18,000-seat multi-use arena for the Golden State Warriors, as long as there is secure access to its newly built medical center across from the proposed arena in the city's Mission Bay neighborhood, UCSF officials said Monday.
Barbara French, vice chancellor of university relations at UCSF, said Monday -- the final day for comments on the arena's draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Report -- that there needs to be a contingency plan in place should traffic get out of control and hinder access to medical care and patient safety.
French said that while the UCSF Medical Center at Mission Bay supports construction of the new arena overall, "We have remaining concerns" and that it's important that the UCSF community voice those concerns before it's too late.
Mindy Magnusson, a Marin County resident whose daughter is receiving cancer treatment at UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital, located across the street from the proposed arena site, said she already schedules her daughter's hospital appointments to not hit game day traffic at AT&T Park, the San Francisco Giants' ballpark located not far away from Mission Bay. But when her daughter unexpectedly had a fever on a recent Friday, Magnusson had to rush her daughter to the hospital and they got stuck in severe Giants traffic.
[REWIND: Nurses: W's SF arena would have 'disastrous impacts' on patients]
Magnusson said that when her daughter gets a fever, "it becomes an emergency" and getting her to the hospital is incredibly difficult on game days. She expressed concern that on days when both the Warriors arena and the Giants stadium hold events, traffic could get much worse. Magnusson said that as a parent caring for a child with cancer, she has a lot of worries, but "getting to the hospital shouldn't be one of them."
French said that the medical center is seeking a binding agreement that would mitigate traffic issues and allow patients, patient families and patient care workers to get to the hospital. When dual events are happening at AT&T Park and at the new arena's proposed location at 16th and Third streets, some 60,000 fans can be expected to inundate the neighborhood.
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