DANA POINT : 2 Bus Lines May Be Rerouted by OCTA

Like clockwork, the large Orange County Transportation District buses have rumbled past Mike Reed’s Camino Capistrano home starting at 5:20 a.m. each day for the past 10 years, often carrying only a handful of passengers.

By sundown, about 156 of the 40-passenger buses will have passed by Reed’s home, causing a steady stream of noise and air pollution that he and other residents have been trying to curtail for years.

In recent weeks, Reed and about 100 of his neighbors received a boost in their efforts to reroute the large buses out of the area when both the Dana Point and San Clemente city councils asked OCTA to start using mini-buses to run from Doheny Park Road through Dana Point’s Capistrano Beach area to K mart Plaza on Camino de Estrella.

But exactly how the rerouting of the two regular bus lines now serving K mart Plaza will be made remains to be seen since the cities, after weeks of negotiations, have failed to reach a consensus on the changes needed.

“There are major differences between the two cities,” Dana Point Mayor Karen Lloreda said. “At this point it’s in the hands of OCTA and they will look at all the information.”

On Tuesday, the Dana Point City Council reaffirmed an earlier recommendation to OCTA that the K mart Plaza stops be eliminated for bus routes 1 and 85, with those lines ending on Domingo Road in the Doheny Park area.

Under the proposal, a Route 394 minibus would instead be rerouted to shuttle people between K mart Plaza and Domingo Road in place of routes 85 and 1, a move that residents believe would eliminate the noise and pollution problems in their neighborhoods.

“It’s just a win-win situation,” said Reed, who spent $8,000 several years ago to install double-paned windows in his home to help shut out the bus noise.

In a change from their earlier proposal, Dana Point council members agreed with San Clemente officials that no changes should be made to Route 91, a popular San Clemente line that includes a stop at K mart.

Last week, San Clemente council members agreed to modify Route 85 to avoid Capistrano Beach, but stopped short of eliminating the K mart stop for routes 85 and 1, saying they didn’t want to make bus travel inconvenient for local residents.

Instead of eliminating the K mart stops, the council recommended that the buses make U-turns from the plaza on Camino de Estrella and avoid Capistrano Beach, much as Route 91 buses do already.

OCTA officials, who allow U-turns only under certain conditions, are expected to act on the two recommendations in mid-July, said Judith McCourt, manager of commuter management services.