Encinitas

A Vista Superior Court judge has ordered a temporary halt to construction of a 262-unit apartment development in the Quail Gardens area of Encinitas, heeding the pleas of school officials worried about the project’s impact on the already overcrowded district.

The ruling by Judge Lawrence Kapiloff comes as Encinitas school officials gear up to fight a May decision by the Coastal Commission allowing high-density development in the Quail Gardens area.

School leaders contend the commission’s decision could add as many as 1,800 students to the school system, which they say has no room for additional pupils. Up to 500 housing units are planned on parcels in Quail Gardens.

Michael Pines, an Oceanside attorney representing the school district, said Friday that the commission failed to consider the district’s concerns while increasing maximum housing density from three units per acre to 39 on land near the Quail Botanical Gardens.

The district last week asked the Coastal Commission to reverse its decision, but commission officials declined. School officials reacted to the rebuff by going to court Thursday and asking that construction be halted on the one project now under way, a nine-acre apartment complex being built by developer James Bashor, while a lawsuit against the commission is prepared.

While Kapiloff agreed to order Bashor to stop construction, he set a July 3 hearing so the developer’s attorneys can present further arguments.