Latest proposal is as bad as before...

Latest proposal is as bad as before

St. Andrews, as part of its promise to the city of Newport Beach,

is required to deliver a long-term lease with the Newport-Mesa

Unified School District for parking, if they want to move ahead with

their controversial and massive expansion plans.

Most recently they have asked the school district for this

permission and a long-term lease. The school board is very leery of

this, but St. Andrew’s has greased the skids with $2.5 million in

property improvements and incentives. To sell the idea to the public,

St. Andrew’s officials now think they should offer the parking

anyway, without the big project. Of course, if they just happen to

get the parking agreement with the district, the Planning Commission

and City Council will better afford to give them what they want -- a

huge, high-occupancy expansion and underground parking garage on

residentially zoned land that needs so much parking, St. Andrews

can’t pack it onto its property.

So, when you see the nice little parking proposal advertised by

St. Andrews, think of it as a detonator to a bomb that St. Andrews

wants to drop. That’s right, the long-term lease is like a detonator.

It is a detonator to the most horrible and expansive development bomb

that includes two years of trucks and construction in Newport Heights

and Cliffhaven for a parking garage. This development is so large it

requires a general plan amendment. St. Andrews wants to drop this

expansion bomb in the neighborhoods of Cliffhaven and Newport

Heights. In order to do this, all they need is a school district

long-term lease required of them by the city. St. Andrews has

sugar-coated the lease/detonator so that the neighbors will think

it’s a parking valentine.

The latest sugar-coating by St. Andrews is a series of public

meetings designed to tell the neighbors how nice everything would be

if the church would be able to have long-term parking available so

they don’t have to park in our driveways every Sunday. Please contact

the school board and the City Council and tell them that St. Andrews

is too big for the neighborhood, that they need to start remodeling

and stop expanding and stop trying to deal their parking onto

adjacent public property.

BARBARA RAWLINGS

Secretary, Newport Heights Improvement Assn.

CenterLine already behind the times

I thought CenterLine should have been in a long time ago, with the

energy crisis the way it is. I think for social consciousness we

should have had it a long time ago. We did have it in former times.

Anything you do until we get that is just a waste of money, more

buses and all that. It just should have been done a long time ago.

CAROLINE CRAWFORD

Newport Beach

City’s traffic not the problem

Is Costa Mesa traffic bad? Not really. Even though during rush

hours it can take 15 minutes to drive the mile between Bristol Street

and Harbor Boulevard, other cities are much worse. The same distance

in Hollywood or downtown Los Angeles could take twice that long. In

Manhattan it could take that long to go three blocks.

Our problem is not Costa Mesa’s traffic. It is the rush hour (more

like three hours) freeway traffic between cities to and from Costa

Mesa that give us the most severe headaches. For instance, the

northbound afternoon traffic on the San Diego (405) Freeway between

the Costa Mesa (55) freeway and Euclid (roughly 3.5 miles) can take

30 to 40 minutes. Northbound on the 55 freeway from the 405 to

Edinger Avenue (about the same distance) can consume the same amount

of time. At 65 mph those trips are accomplished in a few minutes.

Some kind of rail traffic needs to be seriously considered.

Ideally it would either parallel or ride above existing freeways. The

existing public transportation consists of buses that travel from

Newport Beach to as far away as Fullerton. If a rail system existed,

each bus would only need to travel a right angle from a train stop to

a destination no more than 5 miles away. Instead of three or four

30-mile round trips daily, each bus could make three or four times

that number of trips.

Our traffic problems have been exacerbated by the unparalleled

population explosion in Orange County. Our cities and the county

governments just didn’t expect this much growth. Were they

shortsighted? Sure, but their staffs of planning professionals were

also caught unaware. Few people could have predicted the

unprecedented development that has occurred, and those who did were

completely ignored. It’s very difficult for a city government to turn

its back on millions of dollars worth of annual tax income, and

precious few did. Costa Mesa certainly didn’t, yet our city has

handled the vast bulk of our traffic problems effectively, if not

with too much grace.

Planners from the beginning have given us the big lie. They kept

telling us, “With this much traffic, we need more roads.” What should

be obvious is that where there is no road there is no traffic. That’s

what roads do -- they bring traffic.

ALAN REMINGTON

Costa Mesa

Check the parking lot, it’s empty

In the Thursday article, “Beachfront hullabaloo makes waves,” we

get the following statement from Bill McDonald: “I own that beach

down there, and I can’t even drive down there, park down there, or

anything.”

These comments clearly illustrate the misinformation and lack of

knowledge surrounding El Morro. McDonald can certainly drive down to

El Morro and use the beach anytime. Today, for example, the parking

lot is empty. That may not be the case on the Fourth of July, but I

challenge him to find parking at any beach on a crowded summer day.

Parking and beach access at El Morro are now, and always have

been, available to the public, on the same basis as every other state

park: Pay a small fee, and when it’s full, too bad.

I really don’t think McDonald has made much of an effort to visit

“his” beach. If he did, I’m sure he would enjoy the lovely

environment, the nice walk under the tunnel and the friendly and

homey atmosphere.

JENI CUNNINGHAM

Newport Beach