Council faces El Toro decision

Paul Clinton

COSTA MESA -- On Monday, the City Council will go on the record on El

Toro.

The council, which has not been as unified as other cities on the

county’s proposal to build an airport at the closed El Toro Marine air

base, is set to consider a resolution supporting the “Truly Regional

Airport Plan.”

Calling for limits at Los Angeles International, Ontario and John

Wayne airports, the plan includes the construction of an airport at El

Toro.

Drafted by the Orange County Regional Airport Authority, a loose

coalition of North County cities, the plan was brought to Costa Mesa by

former Councilwoman Heather Somers.

It’s a consensus-building effort, Somers said.

“This can no longer be a civil war that’s going on in our county,”

Somers said. “That’s my intent, to bring everybody to the table.”

Somers has been hired as a consultant by El Segundo, a city fighting

expansion at LAX. Under the regional approach, LAX would be capped at 75

million passengers a year, slightly up from the 69 million who now use

the facility. Ontario would jump from 10 million to 30 million

passengers. El Toro would handle 29 million, and John Wayne would be

capped at 8.4 million.

John Wayne, now serving about 7.7 million passengers, can’t grow past

8.4 million under flight restrictions imposed by a 1985 settlement deal,

which expires in 2005.

The proposal, rooted in transportation planning efforts by the

Southern California Assn. of Governments, would take effect by 2025.

Elected officials in Costa Mesa may not agree about El Toro --

Councilwoman Linda Dixon has questioned the need for two airports -- but

they can agree that John Wayne shouldn’t grow.

The resolution, which passed through a series of rewrites, was not

available to the media Friday. Councilman Chris Steel, the city’s

representative on the airport authority group, said he still hadn’t seen

the final draft.

Steel was pushing for more detailed language about John Wayne.

“I wasn’t quite comfortable with the resolution because it implied

that it would put pressure on John Wayne to expand,” Steel said. “I’m

certainly against the expansion of John Wayne Airport. I’m for El Toro

airport.”

The councils in Garden Grove and Seal Beach have already passed the

resolution.

South County spokeswoman Meg Waters said the resolution was misguided

and irrelevant. Talk of annual passenger counts misses the point, Waters

said.

“They assume that the customers of airports are passengers. The

customers of airports are airlines,” Waters said. “The flaw in the logic

is that they can’t control where the airlines go.”