Plan to Carve Wider Roads From Cardiff Lots Assailed

Fifteen years ago, John and Winifred Love bought their little bungalow in the Encinitas neighborhood of Old Cardiff as a retirement investment, and because they liked being near the sea.

Love, a 77-year-old Scotsman and former high school math teacher, spent hours tending a colorful front garden that prompted so many people to stop and comment on its beauty that he couldn’t get any work done.

When he put the property on the market last January, friends and neighbors told him he could easily get $250,000 for the lot. He would be turning down eager buyers by the dozens, they assured him.

Wrong.

On the first day, a real estate agent offered $220,000 for the 35-by-100-foot lot--but then promptly withdrew the offer.

He later informed the stunned couple that city officials were requiring the buyer to give up 10 feet of land from the side and front of the Loves’ lot that abut the street, creating a 25-by-90-foot lot. The land, officials said, would eventually be used to widen some dangerously narrow and outdated roads.

If the buyer didn’t agree to the land annex, the agent was told, the city would not issue a building permit for the property.

And without a permit for construction over the couple’s tiny bungalow, the listing would be worth decidedly less than the asking price.

Love says his land would be unusable anyway. Considering the city’s take and the setbacks required by law, he is left with too little to build on. Because lots in the seaside town have grown so valuable, but the houses on them are small, many properties sell as tear-downs, with more elaborate houses planned for them.

City officials see Love’s problem.

“Minus the setbacks, he won’t even be able to fit a garage on that property,” said Ted Schade, an engineer in the city Public Works Department.

Throughout Cardiff, dozens of homeowners are learning of the plans to slice off a sliver of their property, like icing off a cake.

Call it the changing face of North County, where narrow country lanes that used to accommodate horse-drawn buggies are being widened to keep pace with the sprawl of modern suburbia.

Love and his neighbors call it the Great Cardiff Land Grab.

“My property is off the market now. It’s being rented, which is the last thing I wanted to do,” said Love, who recently moved to a nearby condominium.

“It’s wrong, period. I don’t know what the city is trying to do. But we’re having a hard time selling our land now. When I bought here way back when, this is the last thing I ever dreamed would happen,” he said in a bright Scottish burr.

Tonight, Love will be among dozens of Cardiff homeowners who will meet at Encinitas City Hall to brainstorm a solution to what they call the city’s unfair annexation of private property.

Officials say the plan to widen the public right of way to 60 feet applies throughout Encinitas, not just in Cardiff. But some areas, such as Old Cardiff, are of particular concern because narrow streets--some less than 28 feet wide--designed at the turn of the century will be unable to handle the traffic of 2000, they say.

Anyway, officials emphasize, the city is just starting to lay the groundwork for a project that could take well into the next century to complete. Nobody is ripping up property yet, they say.

That’s what Public Works Department officials plan to tell residents tonight when they meet with the Cardiff Community Advisory Committee.

Opponents Organizing

Cardiff resident Pat Rudolph, who has called dozens of homeowners to summon support for the meeting, said the city is trying to ram an unpopular plan down the throats of irate residents.

“There’s not a single person in the entire community of Cardiff who is for this plan,” she said. “This city has become a place that’s being run for inanimate objects, like buildings, road and ground, and to hell with what the people think.

“Of all the terrible things, this just takes the cake--to take people’s land out from under them so that, in some cases, they can’t even sell their property or have anything left to rebuild upon.

“It’s a boondoggle. They’re running this arbitrary line that’s going to cut in front of people’s stoops, knock their porches off, rip through their retaining walls and hedges.”

The plan, she said, would have landowners pledge their land as they apply for building permits. After the city has pledges from 60% of the homeowners on a block, they could take over the rest by eminent domain.

Rudolph said the issue of widening the public right of way never arose during the most recent debate over Encinitas’ incorporation in the mid-1980s. Now it has some Cardiff residents raising the possibility of seceding from the city.

“Many times, people have just begged, ‘Can’t we please just incorporate Cardiff itself or annex with Solana Beach, anything just to get away from these people?’ ” she said.

“The bad thing is, many people don’t know what’s going on. Those who do are just sick at heart.”

Mort August, director of public works for the city of Encinitas, called the secession threats a smoke screen.

“Every time they hear something they don’t like, there’s this talk about secession,” he said. “This is not something we’re trying to implement tomorrow. We’re just trying to provide some flexibility in the event the community votes to do this.”

Safety’s the Issue

Marjorie Gaines, an Encinitas councilwoman who supports the plan, said it will eventually make Encinitas a safer place.

“Many of those subdivisions like Old Encinitas were designed and built 100 years ago when horses, instead of cars, used the streets,” she said. “But things have changed.”

The lots in the area were once 25 feet by 100 feet and, often, one house would sit on two lots.

“But now these lots have been broken down,” Gaines said. “There’s more houses and structures on them. And there’s more people and more traffic and more of everything--all going over those still-narrow roads.”

Recently, she added, emergency vehicle and school bus drivers have reported difficulty in traveling narrow streets with cars parked on both sides.

“So the City Council authorized a study some time ago to look at the street patterns in places like Old Cardiff to see how much traffic needs to go where,” Gaines said. In the meantime, the city began acquiring rights to the land.

August said the 60-foot right-of-way concept for most streets was carried over from the county requirements--rules that were seldom enforced--when the city incorporated in 1988.

“We’ve recognized the needs for 60-foot right of ways--40-foot-wide roads with 10 feet of right of way on either side--in some city sections,” he said. “But we realize they might not work in all areas of the community.”

For example, he said, Olivenhain was recently granted permission to build 30-foot-wide roads instead of the standard 40 feet. And newly built subdivisions usually feature streets built to wider standards, he said.

Officials have asked members of the city’s five community advisory boards to meet with residents and propose alternatives to the road-widening program. Their recommendations would be presented to the planning commission next month before coming before the city council in May.

“Cardiff is where most of the concerns have been raised,” he said. Because some areas of Old Cardiff have streets less than 28 feet wide and the narrowest right of way, more property would need to be reclaimed there to bring them up to standard.

“There’s been a lot of infighting, a lot of hysteria,” August said, “people stirring up community concern.”

Meanwhile, homeowners applying for building permits must sign an Irrevocable Offer of Dedication (IOD), offering the city rights to 10 feet of their property abutting the street.

Chuck Orr, vice chairman of the Cardiff Community Advisory Board, is one homeowner who stands to lose some land.

“I’m one of those people who don’t feel like contributing 10 feet of my property to the city’s project,” he said. “I don’t know, maybe I’m a curmudgeon.”

Tonight, Orr said, he will present an alternative to the road-widening plan that has been supported by some council members, including Marjorie Gaines. It would create one-way streets in some areas, with parking limited to one side, in an effort to keep the peace.