Planners Won’t Kill El Toro Scenario

An El Toro airport will not be removed from regional transportation blueprints, a planning board decided Thursday, because members said a legal challenge could bring an airfield back to the table.

The proposal to eliminate El Toro from the plan to handle an expected increase in airline passengers was made by representatives of Lake Forest and Laguna Niguel. But it was rejected by the Southern California Assn. of Governments after representatives from other cities called the move premature.

In March, Orange County voters killed an airport at the former Marine Corps Air Station, replacing it with zoning for parkland and limited development. The day after the vote, the Navy--which still owns the 4,700-acre base--announced it would sell the bulk of the land under the new restrictions imposed by voters.

On Thursday, however, Ventura County Supervisor Judy Mikels, who chairs the association’s aviation committee, echoed several panelists’ comments when she said any attempt to remove El Toro would be premature because a lawsuit challenging the legality of Orange County’s vote is pending.

“This issue has not been resolved,” she said. An airport “is still a viable option until the court cases are decided or the land has been sold.”

The association’s Regional Transportation Plan, approved a year ago, calls for Orange County to handle 30 million airline passengers a year by 2025. It was expected El Toro would handle 22 million passengers annually and John Wayne Airport, 8 million.

The debate over how to distribute among regional airports a predicted surge of passengers has divided communities and fractured political alliances.

Officials representing cities near Los Angeles International and Ontario International airports traveled to Washington recently in a failed attempt to persuade the Federal Aviation Administration to intervene and keep an airport option alive for El Toro.

Lake Forest Councilman Richard T. Dixon proposed Thursday to begin the process of removing El Toro from the region’s aviation plan. He said he felt “a little like Don Quixote” in the quest.

Laguna Niguel Councilwoman Cathryn DeYoung argued that the regional plan will lack credibility if it includes an airport that voters rejected. “El Toro is not and will not be an airport,” she said.

The SCAG plan has been challenged in court by a coalition of 10 south Orange County cities opposed to an El Toro airport. A proposed settlement--to drop the lawsuit if El Toro is removed from the regional blueprint--was rejected Thursday after representatives from the suing cities were asked to leave a closed-door discussion.

Algird Leiga, a Claremont councilman, said later that the panel should reexamine “the whole picture” during an update of the regional aviation plan, which begins in July. A new plan will be adopted in 2004.

El Segundo Councilman Kelly McDowell, among the most adamant for keeping El Toro as part of the plan, agreed that the group should wait until July to consider any revisions. Rich Macias, aviation program manager for the regional association, said the Southern California region could absorb about 10 million of Orange County’s future passengers.