Building in Foothills Prohibited Until Roads Are Added

In an unprecedented move, the Orange County Board of Supervisors voted Wednesday to prohibit new development in a large unincorporated area in the foothills of the Santa Ana Mountains until roads are added or improved.

“This is a major historical action as far as planning is concerned here in Orange County,” Supervisor Bruce Nestande said, calling it a step beyond “political rhetoric.”

The action means that proposed housing tracts in an area stretching from Mission Viejo north to the outskirts of Irvine and from the Interstate 5 east to the Cleveland National Forest can be built only after the tracts’ impact on traffic is taken into account, Nestande said.

The board imposed the new conditions in giving preliminary approval to a new development and the expansions of two existing ones east of El Toro. The proposals will go before the board for final approval next week.

One of the expansions, of Portola Hills, was the target of fierce opposition from area residents who said the project would destroy their rural life styles and who complained that the resulting traffic would be a nightmare.

Residents urged the board Wednesday not to allow an expansion of that project--being built by the Irvine-based Baldwin Co. on property formerly known as the Glenn Ranch--from 1,479 units to 2,200.

Construction of single-family houses and condominiums began earlier this year at the project, near the intersection of El Toro and Live Oak Canyon roads. The company originally sought permission to build 3,556 units, then cut its request to 2,493. The county scaled down the project to its current size.

Several hundred of the units can be built before road work is finished, however, because those already had been approved by the county subdivision committee.

The other expansion request before the board Wednesday was from the William Lyon Co., which was seeking permission to build 1,400 units, rather than 882, on the Robinson Ranch, not far from Portola Hills. The new development involves 1,292 units and a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course, to be called Dove Canyon Country Club.

Santiago Ranch, another housing project in the area, also will be affected.

Representatives of residents groups said that the county’s decision to require transportation improvements before construction begins is encouraging but that it does not answer all of their concerns.

Until now, the county has allowed developers to make road improvements in and around housing projects after construction is completed. (Other conditions such as providing land for parks have been imposed on developers before building can begin.) Builders have contended that they need the money from home sales to pay for improvements such as roads, libraries and fire stations. Developers in the area affected by the board’s action Wednesday already have paid about $40 million in fees to be used to build the proposed Foothill Freeway.

Nestande made a strong plea for cooperation from cities in efforts to limit growth, pointing out that the county has imposed far stricter building limits than municipalities have. In south Orange County, where most of the unincorporated territory is, the county generally has approved housing densities of 2 to 2.5 houses or apartments per acre, yet one project in Irvine has 8.18 units per acre and another in Tustin has 4.5 units per acre, he said. Cities must join with the county to consider “the entire regional impact” of new developments, he said. “The county in and by itself is not going to be able to solve this problem.”

David Celestin, a vice president of the Mission Viejo Co., expressed concern that the new rules might result in lengthening the time it takes developers to get permission to actually start construction, a process that already can take years.