READERS RESPOND -- Locals say more Newport Center is last thing

they need

If you build it, they will come. The recent completion of the Irvine Co.

development Corona del Mar Plaza (at the southeast corner of E. Coast

Highway and MacArthur Boulevard) and nearby low-rise office buildings

provide a taste of things to come if the Irvine Co. further increases the

density of already overdeveloped Newport Center.

Nearby San Miguel Drive was improved between Avocado Avenue and MacArthur

and was close to obsolete on the day of completion. Additional traffic

will further burden this inadequate artery. Drivers are already often

waiting through multiple signal changes to enter and exit Fashion Island,

where inadequate parking further frustrates shoppers.

I remember the Irvine Co.’s assurances that parking in Corona del Mar

Plaza would be adequate. Now, even though the plaza is not fully

occupied, parking is often not available. The adjacent library has been

forced to hire a guard at times to keep plaza customers out of the

library parking lot. The Irvine Co. has completed other office buildings

near the library without increasing parking spaces.

At a time when the city should be proactive in protecting against further

traffic and parking congestion, the opposite is occurring. Our historic

traffic-phasing ordinance, in my opinion, has been trashed.

With this item crossed off the agenda, the developers are lined up to

promote high-rise buildings and enhanced traffic congestion and parking

nightmares. These “improvements” will contribute to the “long-term

vitality” of the Irvine Co. but will not provide substantial

contributions to the city or to the quality of life of its residents.

The Irvine Co. may be worried about losing prestigious office tenants to

other developers, but I am not. I am concerned about thousands of auto

trips by nonresidents using those high-rise office towers. I am concerned

about traffic congestion of Coast Highway interfering with people who

need medical treatment who can’t get to Hoag Hospital. I am concerned

about the logic of even thinking about higher density of a commercial

development several miles from a freeway, unlike South Coast Plaza or the

Irvine Spectrum.

Fortunately, a small group of concerned residents is circulating a

petition to promote a ballot measure that will require public approval of

general-plan amendments that would promote significant construction. I

hope this measure makes it to the ballot and that our residents will be

able to avoid the evolution of a first-class city into a third-world

traffic jam. I also hope our hard-working city council will defer

approval of future developments until the will of the people on this

issue has been expressed so that the quality of life in our community can

be maintained, if not enhanced. Newport Beach is a relatively small

community. We don’t need further development grossly out of scale to our

residents’ needs.

GEORGE J. JEFFRIES

Corona del Mar

* EDITOR’S NOTE: The Irvine Co. is one of several landowners in Newport

Center that has applied to city for general-plan amendments.

Newport Center was planned with the expectation that Coast Highway and

connecting Corona del Mar and Costa Mesa freeways would surround it and

feed it. Those were unacceptable to the residents and deleted from

Newport’s transportation plans.

We have fought to balance the Newport Center traffic with the road system

ever since. The road system is essentially built out unless we want to go

to freeway-like interchanges. Residents of Newport Beach and anyone

interested in the long-term environment of the city should not support

continued major expansion plans.

JEAN WATT

Newport Beach

Enlarge Newport Center? Where are they going to go? Up? They have already

taken away all of the beauty. I suppose they can find a way to make it

uglier. I still remember the beauty of that place when they first put it

up, and you could see Robinson’s bells from Coast Highway. Now it is just

a jumble.

They have connected it with this new open-air architecture.

So we could have more fashion stores? Just what we need. And now even

Traditional Jewelers that had a classy store is now redecorated, and from

what I have seen, it looks unfinished. The showcases are of such a

charming design that the sales people have to be careful not to burn

their arms when removing items of jewelry. If this is progress, I will

take the old. We don’t need a bigger Newport Center. We just need some

more aesthetics and things. Not the new ugliness.

LYNN MERLES

Costa Mesa