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Presidio Park
2727 Presidio Drive, Old Town San Diego
Presidio Park, one of the most significant historic, cultural, and archaeological landscapes in the United States, is once again under serious threat, this time from a proposed infrastructure project tied to accessibility improvements at the Junípero Serra Museum.
While accessibility is a shared value, the City and San Diego History Center, SDHC’s current design, would cause irreversible harm to a National Historic Landmark that contains buried remnants of the 1769 Spanish presidio—the first European settlement in California—as well as deeply layered Kumeyaay, Afro-Hispanic, and multicultural histories that shaped early San Diego.
The project proposes grading, excavation, a catering access road for the museum, parking modifications, and structural interventions that could:
- Destroy or disturb intact archaeological deposits, including the casa mata (fortified armory) recently identified through ground-penetrating radar
- Impact sensitive burial and structural remains from the original presidio complex
- Undermine the historic topography that defines the site’s defensive and cultural significance
- Reduce the actual historic elevation by 5 to 10 feet in key defensive areas by grading and excavating
- Threaten mature historic trees and civic leader and preservationist George W. Marston’s 1929 cobblestone landscape features
Equally concerning, the City is advancing this proposal under a Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) rather than a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR) despite overwhelming evidence that the presidio contains nationally and locally significant, unstudied archaeological resources.
A viable, less destructive alternative for ADA access already exists and has not been fully evaluated. These proposed alterations in no way constitute a routine improvement project. Careless, misguided decisions could permanently scar one of California’s most important cultural landscapes.
What You Can Do
- Demand the City complete a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR), not the minimal Mitigated Negative Declaration.
- Oppose City funding approval for the project in its current form.
- Request a formal, publicly transparent scoping meeting at Presidio Park.
- Call for full archaeological review, including investigation of the casa mata and related features.
- Encourage adoption of existing, non-invasive ADA alternatives.
- Contact decision-makers immediately. Consider these sample letters to the City and the San Diego History Center
(Scroll to view more photos)
 The project proposes grading, excavation, a catering access road, parking modifications, and structural interventions that could destroy or disturb intact archaeological deposits, impact sensitive burial and structural remains, reduce historic elevations by 5–10 feet, threaten mature historic trees and George W. Marston’s 1929 cobblestone landscape features, and undermine the historic topography that defines the site’s defensive and cultural significance. Image by Nearmap (flown May 2025). Courtesy City of San Diego
 Courtesy City of San Diego
 The historic 1820 Vallejo map of the Presidio de San Diego. Courtesy Pourade Copley SOHO collection
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