Otay Mesa Airport Proposal Kept Alive by City Council

The San Diego City Council Monday gave three more months of life to the prospects for a binational commercial airport on Otay Mesa by delaying consideration of a housing project near Brown Field.

By a bare 5-4 vote, the council put off until June 3 a decision on Robinhood Homes’ bid to build 850 homes northwest of Brown Field. It was the first of a series of requests to build more than 12,000 Otay Mesa homes that will be heard by the council in coming years. The area is planned for an eventual 18,000 homes.

The Robinhood Ridge project is the key test case of whether the council will preserve Otay Mesa for a new regional airport or will open the vast area to large-scale development.

Airport proponents, led by Mayor Maureen O’Connor and Councilman Ron Roberts, say that approval of the housing project would send a message to Mexico that the city is not serious about putting a joint airport on the border, even as negotiations between officials from both nations are under way.

Moreover, if Robinhood--and perhaps other builders--are given the authority to start their projects, their land could become considerably more expensive to purchase for an airport.

Opponents, led by Deputy Mayor Bob Filner, say that the binational airport will never be approved. They contend that continued postponements of the decision are not fair to San Diegans who want the decades-old airport question settled, or to potential residents of Otay Mesa who badly need the relatively affordable housing scheduled to be built there.

With the Navy refusing to part with Miramar air station, the San Diego Assn. of Governments has identified Otay Mesa as the best remaining site for relocation of Lindbergh Field. In December, a delegation of city, county and San Diego Unified Port District officials met with Mexican officials and reported interest in a binational airport.

The council has had the 310-acre Robinhood project on hold for 2 1/2 years, part of the time through a blanket moratorium on building in the area.

Filner said that, in November, 1988, Roberts was asking for a 90-day delay in construction approval for the area, claiming that a decision on a binational airport was at hand. Roberts represents the district that includes Lindbergh Field and has led attempts to relocate it.

“All these discussions will produce more discussions,” Filner said. “There will be talk and talk and talk and talk and talk.”

City planners say that Robinhood’s project should not be approved until the developer shows specifically where schools will be situated. But Robinhood is stymied in that regard because the state Division of Aeronautics won’t sign off on the schools until it knows where airport runways will be situated under plans for a regional airport or under a new Brown Field Master Plan that is currently being developed.

O’Connor objected to approving a new project in the midst of the state’s record five-year drought, which has led the Metropolitan Water District to seek a 50% reduction in water consumption for all of Southern California.

A reluctant Councilman Wes Pratt, who was absent Feb. 26 when the council deadlocked 4 to 4 on the issue, decided the issue by agreeing to the postponement. He was joined by O’Connor and Roberts and council members Linda Bernhardt and Judy McCarty. Filner and council members John Hartley, Abbe Wolfsheimer and Bruce Henderson dissented.

Efforts to forge an agreement with Mexico “don’t give me any confidence that Mexico has the same interest pursuing our binational airport,” Pratt said before the vote. “I simply don’t have that. And I wonder if it’s worth continuing it for six months or even three months.”

In the interim, the city will hear from Sandag about fhe degree of Mexico’s interest in the binational airport.