Open Space Agreement Is Unveiled in Irvine

The Irvine Co. will transfer 5,000 acres of open land to the City of Irvine for use as parks, trails and nature conservancies in exchange for concessions on development projects, according to an agreement unveiled at Tuesday night’s City Council meeting.

The landmark agreement between the city and the Irvine Co. provides that the amount of open space in the city will increase by 10%, or 5,000 acres, over the next 20 years. In exchange, the Irvine Co. will be allowed to engage in more profitable types of development elsewhere in the city, such as higher-density residential and commercial projects.

“The citizens of Irvine shall own this land,” said Councilman Ray Catalano, who represented the city in negotiations that began 2 1/2 years ago.

Largest in World?

“By my reckoning, we will have the largest municipal land bank in the nation, if not the world,” said Catalano, a land-use expert who teaches at UC Irvine.

Several steps remain before the agreement can be implemented, officials said. An environmental impact report must be prepared, and public hearings held before the City Council votes on whether to approve the agreement.

The agreement also will go before the city’s voters for their approval, perhaps on the June ballot, officials said.

The transfer would bring the total amount of land that will be left undeveloped under Irvine’s general plan to 16,000 acres from the current 11,062 acres.

Thus, Irvine would succeed Newport Beach, which has 14,400 acres of open space, as the Orange County city with the most open space.

But Michael LeBlanc, who headed the Irvine Co. negotiating team, emphasized that the 5,000 acres would not be turned over to the city all at once.

“This will be happening over an extended time period, maybe as long as the life of the general plan, which is supposed to last through the year 2010,” LeBlanc said in an interview before Tuesday night’s meeting.

“The Irvine Co. will be turning over the land gradually as development occurs,” he added.

Under the agreement, the city would receive without charge land worth millions of dollars. There is no precise dollar estimate as to the value of the land that will be transferred to the city, LeBlanc said.

Space, Not Dollars

“In our negotiations, the issue was not the dollar amount, but the amount of open space that would be preserved,” he said.

Under the plan, development would be curtailed or eliminated in several canyon and hillside areas. They include Lomas Ridge in the Santiago Hills north of Irvine Boulevard; Quail Hill near University Drive, south of the San Diego Freeway; Shady and Bommer canyons east of the UC Irvine campus, and the San Joaquin Marsh next to Upper Newport Bay.

City officials are particularly pleased that the deal would protect natural habitats like the 360-acre Quail Hill tract. It is the home of up to 3,000 Canada geese, which feed and rest there three months a year on their annual migration.

To compensate the Irvine Co. for giving up this land, the city will allow intense development at certain sites.

Under the agreement, the Irvine Co. for the first time will be able to have industrial development in east Irvine near the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station. The area now is zoned for agricultural use.

The company also would be allowed to have greater density in its planned Irvine Center, which will be built in the so-called “Golden Triangle” formed by Laguna, San Diego and Santa Ana freeways.

In addition, the zoning of an area next to the San Joaquin Marsh would be changed from golf course and commercial recreational to high-density residential. And an area east of Quail Hill, now zoned for use as a cemetery, would be changed to allow for the construction of residential, commercial or industrial projects by the Irvine Co.

Before Tuesday’s agreement, Mayor Larry Agran had warned that if an agreement was not reached, the council would unilaterally decide which land should be declared off limits to development.

But spokesmen for the Irvine Co. had said the giant land developer would go to court to block this attempt to designate its land open space without the company’s consent.

Agran had set Tuesday as a deadline for agreement so that it could be made final in time to be put on a citywide ballot in June. He contends that voter approval would legally protect the open-space plan from possible attempts by future city councils to weaken it.