California Roads - Mission Bay

Mission Bay



Sunset Cliffs Blvd. NB at Nimitz Blvd. The two lanes to the left lead into the Mission Bay interchanges, while the exit to the right heads to the beginning of I-8 EB.


Advance signs on Nimitz Blvd. NB in the same location. From both boulevards, the straight (2-arrrow) movement and exit (1-arrow) movement are to the same roadways.


Sunset Cliffs Blvd. SB at that intersection.


Continuing north from there on Sunset Cliffs Blvd. (i.e. with Nimitz Blvd. traffic included) to the W. Mission Bay Dr. interchange. Is it fair to say I like the old signs better? Going straight, Sunset Cliffs turns into Sea World Dr.


Taking the "Mission Beach" exit onto W. Mission Bay Dr. NB, these are the next signs to appear. Although Sea World was the destination for Sea World Dr. EB (makes sense), there's another entrance off of Ingraham St. just ahead. W. Mission Bay Dr. NB exits itself at a trumpet interchange while the mainline continues as Ingraham St. I don't think it would have been any more difficult to make all of W. Mission Bay Dr. the mainline and have Ingraham be the trumpet, and certainly more intuitive, but this may be how traffic splits.


W. Mission Bay Dr. SB at Ingraham St. This is the trumpeting leg of the interchange, so Ingraham is a de facto left exit.


Ingraham St. SB, on the left and right of the W. Mission Bay Dr. trumpet overpass, second photo courtesy Lou Corsaro. The sign on the right is over a ramp that's forced to enter Sunset Cliffs Blvd., so there's no real reason to put it there after traffic has already made its decision (at the newer green sign in the foreground).


Continuing south on W. Mission Bay Dr. to where it becomes Sports Arena Blvd., courtesy Lou Corsaro. The reason there's an "I-8 OK" sign on the left is because while the right lane is dedicated for the loop exit to I-8 EB, pyloned off to bypass the signal at the base of the I-8 WB offramp, it's still possible to get to the loop from the main lanes. That allows U-turns from I-8 if anyone were so inclined, or could conceivably allow more than one lane's worth of traffic to enter the ramp during peak periods. Its greatest usefulness probably comes in the rare situation when there's an accident in the middle of the dedicated lane, so that traffic can still access the loop ramp. Notice the extra-wide I-8 shield to the left of the ramp entrance.


A little out of Mission Bay, this is the other end of Sea World Drive, WB from Morena Blvd., again courtesy Lou Corsaro. (If it helps, E. Mission Bay Dr. is half a block away to the northwest. That's why I specified "W." before Mission Bay Dr. in all of the captions above.)


Mission Bay Dr. becomes Mission Blvd. in the Pacific Beach neighborhood. There's nothing about the sign design that merits a photo, but it's the misspelling of "Feldspar" as "Felspar." Lest you think this is my presumption, it's between Emerald and Garnet. (Diamond, Chalcedony, and Beryl also have claims here.) Lest you think it's a sign error, the street below Garnet is "Hornblend," another spelling error as well. In other words, the platter of this neighborhood was incompetent. (Don't blame the city, they'll approve whatever names and spellings are suggested as long as they're not duplicative or offensive in some way.)

Onto I-5
Onto I-8
See more of San Diego
Back to California Roads
Back to Roads