Los Osos Valley Road is getting a makeover in 2 key areas. See the plan
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Supervisors approved a long-term redesign plan for Los Osos Valley Road corridor.
- Proposed upgrades include bike lanes, medians, sidewalk gaps and a roundabout.
- County seeks outside funding; no timeline or cost estimates released in early stage.
Major upgrades are coming to Los Osos Valley Road, improving traffic flow and safety both in San Luis Obispo and Los Osos itself.
Unanimously adopted at the Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday, the Los Osos Valley Road Corridor Concept Plan, which was created over multiple years with community input, proposes significant improvements in two key areas.
Through Los Osos, the design plan will add buffered bike lanes, pedestrian pathways, street parking, road medians and multi-use trails to the length of the road’s main section.
And in San Luis Obispo, it will add a roundabout at the road’s intersection with Foothill Boulevard.
“The overall goal of our corridor plan is to create a comprehensive, long-range vision plan for the corridor that addresses and respects these prior efforts, but incorporates community sentiments and informs how future projects develop along the corridor for the next 20 years,” Tyler English, a project manager with the Transportation Division of the SLO County Public Works department, said at the meeting.
The plan is still in the early stages and did not yet include a timeline or price estimate for development.
What will the new Los Osos Valley Road look like?
Los Osos Valley Road, according to Supervisor Bruce Gibson, is “the heart of District 2” and “one of the most beautiful corridors” in the county.
The adopted design focuses on the main segment of Los Osos Valley Road in Los Osos from Rodman Drive to Palomino Drive.
Under the design plan, the downtown area will undergo a dramatic transformation with a proposed road downsizing that reduces travel lanes, shortens pedestrian crossing distances and calms traffic. Green-painted bike lanes and closed sidewalk gaps will create a more pedestrian-friendly environment.
The planning documents provide a sectioned design.
From Rodman Drive to Fairchild Way, traffic on Los Osos Valley Road will be reduced to one traveling lane in either direction with a dedicated left turn lane in the middle. The middle lane briefly turns into a landscaped median between 10th Street to Fairchild Way.
A multi-use path separated from the roadway and an on-road buffered bike lane will extend almost the entire stretch of the main drag from Rodman Drive to Palisades Avenue.
Between Palisades Avenue and Fairchild Way, curb extensions around street corners and closures in sidewalk gaps will protect pedestrians from long and unprotected street crossings. A pedestrian path will run along at least one side of the road from South Bay Boulevard to Palomino Drive, where the road improvements end.
Lastly, the plan suggests converting the current traffic-light-operated four-way intersection at Foothill Boulevard and Los Osos Valley Road into a roundabout to improve the flow of traffic.
One Los Osos resident, Lucia Stone, expressed concern over potential emergency evacuations.
“When you have an emergency, when you have high volume, it bottlenecks on evacuations,” Stone said during public comment. “It creates confusion under stress. Not everyone’s comfortable with those roundabouts, and they can’t get through it. There’s difficulty for large vehicles.”
Notably, the plan was developed through extensive community engagement, including six presentations at Los Osos Community Advisory Council meetings and an interactive map that garnered 613 comments and a survey that got 748 responses.
No funding is currently allocated for the project. Los Osos will be the driver for the project implementation, but the county will pursue funding from federal, state and regional sources, too.
“We feel confident that this plan presents a planning document that will improve and facilitate the flow of traffic, active transportation and safety on this most important corridor,” Deborah Howe, chair of the Los Osos Community Advisory Council, said at Tuesday’s meeting.
This story was originally published August 20, 2025 at 10:23 AM.
