El Toro: world’s best planned airport?...

El Toro: world’s best planned airport?

Ex-Irvine resident Hanna Hill writes from her sanctuary in

Minneapolis that the jets would have been flying at El Toro now if

the Airport Working Group had used tact and political savvy and had

been more cooperative (Dear Joe, “Lessons still have not been

learned,” Thursday).

Unfortunately, her letter contained many problems of fact, but

when she said the FAA wanted northerly takeoffs to turn left and fly

over Santa Ana, she misquoted the FAA, the pilots and the laws of

physics.

The FAA has approved the planned El Toro international airport’s

Airport Layout Plan, and in “Proposed Civil Aviation Reuse of Marine

Corps Air Station El Toro,” (Aug. 29, 2001), the FAA said: “The FAA

has determined that the reuse of the former MCAS El Toro as proposed

by the LRA (county of Orange) can be conducted in a safe manner.”

I hope Hanna Hill returns to Orange County to witness the flights

from the El Toro international airport because it just might be the

best planned airport in the world.

DONALD NYRE

Newport Beach

Fish, not Newport’s fishermen, need saving

The Aug. 1 story regarding the local championing of the dory

fishermen is troubling to me (“Newport Beach comes to dory’s

defense”).

Naturally, no one wants

to see hard-working people put out of work, but it happens all of

the time as times change.

If California’s rock fish populations are in serious enough

decline to warrant such extreme measures (and they undeniably are),

then so be it. Every locale has some good reason to resist the ban on

catching these species of fish. However, none of them is as pressing

as the very existence of the fish in question.

Fishermen deny their greedy takes and any decline in fish numbers,

just as loggers defend their tragic clear-cuts and swear that there

are more trees than ever. All the tired old arguments are bankrupt.

In the case of deep-water fishes, one cannot possibly know what is

netted or hooked until it is visible, by which time it is too late.

As it is, it is probably too late to save a couple of the most

depleted species. As a taxpayer and citizen and a respecter of

fellow-voyagers on Earth, I demand that the rock fish be given a

good, long breather from my fellow citizens who see them as nothing

but cash or “sport.”

By the way, unless your article was in reference to a particular

dory, it should have read “comes to dorries’ defense.”

WALLACE WOOD

Costa Mesa

17th Street could use some cleaning up

As I have raced in and out of stores on 17th Street, I have

wondered who oversees the condition of the sidewalks and parking lot?

It seems to get a little worse each year. I have wondered about some

of the people who weren’t racing, just sitting or standing, looking

each shopper up and down sometimes asking for money.

One just figures loitering is acceptable in this area. I have

observed restaurant-type trash being kicked out of the car door into

the parking lot.

During one of these observations, I wished I would have had a

camera to catch the action (I didn’t) and get the car license. Where

would I have taken it? Does anybody care?

One wonders if the dirty sidewalks and dirty parking lot might

attract people who would pull a woman out of her car, as they did on

Aug. 4 in this parking lot (“Costa Mesa police arrest 3 carjacking

suspects,” Aug. 6), throw her to the ground (better than being

kidnapped) and steal her car? I wonder, I wonder, can’t help it if I

wonder.

KATHLEEN BRENNAN

Newport Beach