Valley Center’s Mobility Plan, which includes roads, bike paths, and trails, is also updated during the GPU.  The central theme guiding the Mobility Plan is to create a balanced, multi-modal transportation system for the movement of people and goods to, from, and within Valley Center.

A balanced system matches the anticipated needs of the Land Use Element and incorporates multiple modes of travel including motor vehicles, public transportation, bicycles, and pedestrians. The plan identifies future transportation corridors so that rights-of-way can be preserved for future mobility purposes.

Key rationales guiding the creation of Valley Center’s proposed Circulation (Mobility) Network map are:

• The devastation and loss of life during the 2003 and 2007 wildfires reminded us of the need to create alternative routes for residents to use during emergencies.
• The design of new roads and the improvement of existing roads must use rural road standards, not urban or suburban road standards.  Our community likes DG pathways, not concrete sidewalks.  Roads should go around trees, when possible.  The community wants to keep speeds down on our local roads.  The community does not want straight roads cut through hills, but rather windy roads that go around or over hills.  The community wants to keep its rural character through rural road design.
• New residents, casino traffic and other through-traffic add to the load on our road network.  To reduce traffic congestion on Valley Center and Cole Grade Roads, we need to increase the number of alternate routes available to Valley Center residents to move around our community.
• Looking ahead, our community needs additional routes to I-15.  Many residents work in the San Diego or Carlsbad areas.  Currently, to go south, they must travel on Valley Center Road to and through Escondido to get to I-15.  However, it is important that any new routes to I-15 not induce additional non-local traffic.  We do not want to encourage additional pass-through traffic.

Depending on the Land Use Map, some of the roads on the proposed Circulation (Mobility) Network map are projected to have a Level of Service (LOS) of E or F. The County of San Diego has set Level D as acceptable.