CONNECT with the CityHow We’re Planning for the Environment & Climate
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When planning for our future, we must do so in a way that helps implement the City’s Climate Action Plan and creates a more livable, sustainable future for all of us.
Some examples of planning strategies to achieve this vision include incentivizing development in areas near transit, increasing public spaces and connection points that allow residents to walk, bike, roll or take transit, and delivering climate-resilient infrastructure like trees, bike lanes, and shaded and safe public spaces. The City Planning Department also engages in open space conservation to preserve our local network of habitat and open space, protecting wildlife and improving our quality of life.
Learn more below about our planning initiatives that help support healthy, environment-friendly communities.
Biology Guidelines Update
An update to the City’s Biology Guidelines will provide opportunities for more streamlined permitting requirements for projects that are consistent with the City’s Climate Action Plan and Climate Resilient SD, such as wetland restoration, habitat restoration and other channel maintenance necessary to ensure public health and safety.
California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Toolkit
The CEQA Toolkit will provide a one-stop shop for both public and private programs and projects that will include standardized templates for environmental documents as well as a collection of City-specific guidelines for applying the City’s CEQA Significance Determination Thresholds.
Citywide Historic Context Statement
For the purposes of historic preservation, the history of San Diego, including its architecture, infrastructure and economy, has never been formally centralized. The development of a Citywide Historic Context Statement will provide a more robust picture of San Diego’s history and topics for further study, inform future survey and context work, centralize historical information, and support the City’s efforts to identify and protect significant historical and cultural resources worthy of preservation as well as properties that lack significance and are therefore well-suited to redevelopment.
Climate Action Plan Update
This plan is an update of the City’s Climate Action Plan, which was last updated in 2022. The purpose of the update is to maintain alignment of the City’s Climate Action Plan with State targets and goals for reducing emissions through actions that also deliver core community benefits, including increased climate resilience and equitable outcomes for all San Diegans.
Coastal Resilience Master Plan
This plan will identify potential nature-based solutions for locations along San Diego's coast to improve the resilience of our coastline and communities to sea level rise while also benefiting wildlife, habitat and natural coastal resources. Development of the plan includes concept level designs for six locations, a stakeholder advisory committee, pop-up engagement events and workshops to gather public input, a pilot project design and CEQA environmental analysis.
Equity Forward: Citywide Trails Master Plan
The Trails Master Plan will guide the equitable and environmentally responsible development, enhancement and construction of existing and new trails throughout the city. In addition to trails within the City’s open space, the Trails Master Plan will also include urban pathways and other community connections.
Extreme Heat Action Plan
The Extreme Heat Action Plan will address land use drivers of extreme heat and work with community members to identify specific cooling solution projects within the City’s most heat-vulnerable neighborhoods.
Home Electrification Affordable Rebates and Technical Assistance Program (HEART)
This program, funded by the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG), aims to support low- and moderate-income households in transitioning to energy-efficient, all-electric homes. The program provides financial assistance (via rebates) and technical guidance to help homeowners and renters replace fossil fuel appliances with electric alternatives, reducing energy costs and emissions.
Preservation and Progress (Historic Preservation Program Update Package)
Preservation and Progress will provide a comprehensive update to the City’s historic preservation program that includes amendments to the General Plan Historic Preservation Element, the Historical Resources Regulations and Guidelines and Historical Resources Board policies.
Transitioning to Healthy and Sustainable Buildings: Building Decarbonization Plan
This plan will provide a strategic framework for reducing carbon emissions from existing buildings across San Diego, resulting in health benefits realized through improved indoor air quality, increased energy efficiency and long-term affordability through lower utility costs.
Transitioning to More Sustainable Buildings: Enhanced Green Building Standards for New Buildings
Working through the Building Code Update process, the City aims to adopt enhanced green building requirements to provide for healthier homes and buildings, decreased utility costs for residents and businesses and a reduced overall carbon footprint.
Transitioning to More Sustainable Buildings: Existing Building Performance Standards Policy
This effort involves the development of a policy framework to achieve specified building performance standards for existing buildings that will allow more opportunities for people to live and work in buildings that have a lower impact on the electrical grid, improve health outcomes and reduce the City’s overall carbon footprint.
Biodiverse SD (Multiple Species Conservation Program)
Biodiverse SD preserves a network of habitat and open space, protecting species and ecosystems that enhance our quality of life. Biodiverse SD includes the City’s Multiple Species Conservation Program which protects 85 species and delineates core biological resource areas to ensure long-term habitat conservation and the preservation of natural vegetation communities. Biodiverse SD also includes the City’s Vernal Pool Habitat Conservation Program which provides an effective framework to protect, enhance and restore vernal pool resources within the City.
Building Energy Benchmarking
The City of San Diego Climate Action Plan (CAP) calls for creating more energy-efficient buildings and ordinances to conserve and disclose energy use. The Building Energy Benchmarking Ordinance requires commercial buildings over 50,000 square feet and multifamily and mixed-use buildings greater than 50,000 square feet and with 17 or more residential accounts to submit energy data to the City of San Diego.
Historic Preservation
Historical resource preservation benefits communities through policies that stabilize neighborhoods, promote cultural heritage tourism and contribute to a vibrant, diverse and dynamic urban landscape. Preservation and rehabilitation of historic buildings benefit the environment by conserving the energy embodied by existing buildings rather than expending additional energy for demolition and new construction. These benefits include a reduction in the consumption of natural resources for building materials and a reduction in landfill waste.
Open Space and Habitat Land Acquisition
Open Space and Habitat Land Acquisition focuses on preserving areas with plants and animals specifically identified for conservation.
De Anza Natural
De Anza Natural is the De Anza Cove Amendment to the Mission Bay Park Master Plan. De Anza Natural plans for a balance of local and regional recreational needs while restoring natural habitats and preparing for the impacts of climate change. De Anza Natural envisions enhanced recreational activities in the area with new facilities, such as a multi-use waterfront trail and a small non-motorized boat lease area for the cove.
Equity Forward: Environmental Justice Element
Environmental Justice means ensuring people of all races, cultures and incomes are equally and equitably valued, protected and served by laws, regulations and policies that impact the environment around us, including those about buildings and uses of land, transportation, parks and natural spaces, the urban landscape and City services. The Planning Department is working with community members to identify neighborhoods disproportionately affected by environmental justice concerns and to develop Environmental Justice goals, policies and objectives. Once drafted, the Environmental Justice goals, policies and objectives will be incorporated into the City of San Diego General Plan.
General Plan Refresh (Blueprint SD)
With housing costs rising due in part to the scarcity of homes in San Diego, Blueprint SD will include an amendment to the General Plan to include policies to encourage more home production in areas that can best help us achieve our climate action goals and facilitate transit, bicycle and pedestrian connections. These policies will be applied as part of ongoing and future community plan updates and other land use planning initiatives.
Climate Action Plan Consistency Regulations
As part of the Mayor’s Our Climate, Our Future initiative, the Climate Action Plan Consistency Regulations will ensure new development is consistent with the City’s Climate Action Plan, which is currently being developed by the Sustainability and Mobility Department. Proposed regulations for new development include enhancing tree coverage and ensuring that development contributes to an active and healthy transportation environment to create a more sustainable future for all San Diegans.
Complete Communities: Mobility Choices
Complete Communities: Mobility Choices ensures that new developments support investments that make it safer and easier for San Diegans to walk, bike and spend time outside. This ordinance requires builders of new homes, offices and shops to invest in infrastructure like better walkways, shade trees and transit stop upgrades to reduce the car trips, which will help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support cleaner air for all. At least 50% of new funds for this safe transportation infrastructure will be located in traditionally underserved communities where the needs are the greatest.
General Plan
The City of San Diego's General Plan is the comprehensive guide for development, providing policy guidance to address the needs of a growing city while enhancing quality of life for current and future San Diegans over the next 20 to 30 years. This comprehensive plan is the foundation upon which all land use decisions in the City are based. It addresses how to allow for more homes, provide convenient and sustainable transportation options, preserve the environment, ensure high-quality public facilities and services and support the local economy. The General Plan includes the City of Villages strategy which focuses growth into mixed-use villages activity centers that are pedestrian-friendly districts, of different scales, linked to the regional transit system.
Spaces as Places
Spaces as Places is the City of San Diego's comprehensive program to allow permanent outdoor dining and other community gathering spaces within areas of the public right of way. Established regulations and a design manual offer a menu of options to create outdoor areas for dining, walking, biking, public art, education, entertainment and other activities.