El Toro Base Is Private Property

The closed El Toro Marine base officially became private property Tuesday as Lennar Corp., which won the 3,700-acre former military airfield in an auction in February, closed escrow with the Navy.

The nation’s third largest home builder also signed a development agreement with the city of Irvine, which annexed the base in 2003 and named its redevelopment plan the Orange County Great Park.

Under the agreement, Lennar donated 1,375 acres of the land to Irvine for parks and roads and other public uses and committed to pay $200 million in development fees to fund public works on the site.

In return, Lennar gained rights to build as many as 3,400 homes and 3 million square feet of commercial, industrial and office space.

The day marked yet another milestone in the decade-long fight over the future of El Toro, which some regional leaders have maintained should be turned into a commercial airport.

The prospects of an airport were dimmed in 2002 when county voters passed a measure prohibiting such a development on the site and the Navy proceeded with plans to sell the property.

But airport proponents continued to lobby federal officials hoping to halt the sale and later to reverse it when Lennar won the base with bids totaling $649.5 million.

With the property in Lennar’s hands, the airport debate “is about as over as it is going to get,” Irvine Mayor Beth Krom said before joining other city officials and Lennar representatives for a brief ceremony during Tuesday’s City Council meeting.

At the event, Lennar officials handed a ceremonial check for $33.3 million to Irvine, the first of three development fee payments the company will make over the next two years.

Lennar, which formed a partnership called Heritage Fields LLC to manage the project, said construction could start as early as 2007, with the first homes going up for sale the year after.

While Heritage Fields manages private development, the Orange County Great Park Corp., a nonprofit agency formed by Irvine, will oversee the construction of infrastructure such as roads and the building of a 1,100-acre public park system that will include sports facilities and a museum district.

Irvine officials said major construction will begin in about six months with the demolition of El Toro’s runways.