Restaurants would dominate planned center

Mathis Winkler

NEWPORT BEACH -- It looks like Irvine Co. representatives won’t have a

tough time tonight when they’ll present a proposed 51,890-square-foot

Bonita Canyon shopping center to the city’s planning commissioners.

The project, called The Bluffs Shopping Center, would sit at the

northeast corner of Bison Avenue and MacArthur Boulevard. Restaurants and

fast-food places would take up about 60% of the center, with the

remaining space reserved for retail stores.

Company officials said nearby residents had lobbied for more dining

places. As University Research Park gets closer to completion, the demand

for lunchtime restaurants is also increasing, said Jennifer Smith, a

company spokeswoman.

She added that the center would probably include two sit-down

restaurants and several fast-food eateries.

Commission Chairman Ed Selich said the center, which will have a

Mediterranean design inspired by agricultural compounds in Southern

Italy, Spain and Mexico, seemed like a “pretty good project.”

He added that he and his colleagues can only review the center’s site

plan and look at the arrangement of buildings, traffic circulation and

landscaping, rather than discuss the use of the land in detail.

That’s because the site lies in the Bonita Canyon Planned Community,

which was annexed by Newport Beach from Irvine a few years ago.

In 1996, Irvine officials approved a 55,000-square-foot shopping

center for the land. A 1999 development agreement between Newport Beach

and company officials guaranteed that Irvine’s approvals for Bonita

Canyon, and its shopping center, would remain in effect.

The agreement also exempted the development from traffic improvement

fees imposed by Newport Beach’s Traffic Phasing Ordinance unless plans

for Bonita Canyon were changed significantly.

Selich said that the proposed center’s restaurant and shopping ratio

was somewhat unusual, with food establishments usually taking up about

15% to 20% of a shopping center.

He added that with about nine parking spaces per 1,000 square feet of

building space, the center will have room for about twice as many cars as

similar projects in Newport Beach.

One thing planning commissioners will have to approve is a proposed

metal spire atop a 70-foot tower that exceeds height limitations by 6 1/2

feet.

But “it doesn’t seem to be affecting anybody’s view,” Selich said.

“And any time you can get things like that it’s better than plain, boring

designs.”

Company officials hope to begin grading the site by this fall and plan

to open the new center by the fall of 2002. The names of restaurants and

stores that will open at the center probably won’t be announced until

construction begins, Smith said.

FYI

Planning commissioners meet at 6:30 p.m. today at City Hall, 3300

Newport Blvd.