Commentary: Mariners’ Mile should become a village akin to Corona del Mar and Laguna Beach

Let’s build a coastal city for people to enjoy now and in the future. Newport Beach should remain a charming “coastal town” along the tranquil bay.

To most Newport Beach residents, Mariners’ Mile is our Main Street and the heart of our town. This access to the beaches services our schools, neighborhoods, business districts and post office. West Pacific Coast Highway should not be a raceway or a motor corridor for commuter and commercial traffic. Newport Beach’s stretch of PCH should instead be a meeting place that’s welcoming to and safe for walkers and bicyclists.

There is a growing movement in beach towns to transform PCH into a more pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly thoroughfare. From Seal Beach to San Diego, cities are prioritizing protecting children, residents and visitors, and to do so, they have found ways to slow traffic, enhance safety, widen sidewalks and bike lanes, and make other changes that facilitate the flow of pedestrians and bicyclists.

Without a clear vision guiding the transformation of Mariners’ Mile, ongoing efforts will continue to be suboptimal and disappointing. Newport Beach cannot have it both ways. A village attracting people and a cross-town freeway are incompatible.

Today’s property owners, residents and community strongly desire that Mariners’ Mile be transformed into a village akin to Corona del Mar.

The continuing evolution is most evident in the Mariners’ Mile Strategic Vision and Design Framework, dated Oct. 4, 2000. This document recognized the inherent conflict in designing a welcoming village and high-volume highway, and it set forth a strategy “to discourage the policy of widening Pacific Coast Highway through Mariner’s Mile.”

Additional support for rethinking the widening of PCH along Mariners’ Mile comes from the concept of “induced demand.” Induced demand suggests widening a road to ease congestion, but typically ends up causing more people to choose to drive the road and therefore does not achieve the intended aim.

Property owners, local merchants, residents and communities throughout Newport Beach are now contesting the Mariners’ Mile Revitalization Plan under consideration by the Planning Commission. Information is available at protectmarinersmile.org.

The council must consider the future of Mariners’ Mile from a citywide perspective. We now have a golden opportunity to build a genuine and lasting community consensus. We can make a strong commitment to work together and to encourage city planners to prioritize safety and community. The General Plan process is the most appropriate means to assure enhancing and revitalizing our beach city’s main street to create a village for our enjoyment.

A clear vision must guide the plan’s citywide framework. We can look to seaside towns, from Sunset Beach to San Clemente, that have limited their highway to two lanes. Recently Corona del Mar and Laguna Beach have grappled with these issues and have chosen to remain two-lanes highways.

The Newport council must determine Mariners’ Mile’s future within the comprehensive framework of the citywide General Plan and work to have West PCH fall under city jurisdiction, not Caltrans’, to assure that the city determines its destiny.

PATRICK GORMLEY lives in Newport Beach.