LAGUNA BEACH : Popular Dog Park Temporarily Closed

Every day, before her master can even finish reading the newspaper, Julie starts getting antsy about going to “Bark Park.”

The 2-year-old Rottweiler is one of hundreds of dogs who count on an unleashed romp at the county’s only canine park as part of their regular routine.

“She asks to go every day,” Julie’s owner, Carole Noia of Laguna Beach, said. “We have to spell ‘BP.’ You can’t even say ‘Bark Park’ because they know what that is.”

But for the next two weeks, Julie and other dogs will have to cool their heels while the park is closed so that sewer lines in the area can be repaired. The closure began Monday, and the park will reopen April 5.

On Sunday, while bulldogs and boxers, collies and whippets streaked through the two-acre strip of grass along Laguna Canyon Road, dog owners admitted that it won’t be easy to do without the park, one of only a few in Southern California that cater to dogs.

“I don’t know what we’re going to do,” Aliso Viejo resident Bill Salge said, leading his dog, Oz, from the fenced area. “It’s a great thing. I wish they’d open one in all the little communities around here.”

But unless they want to risk losing the Laguna Beach park altogether, pet owners will have to be more careful about parking legally and picking up after themselves and their pets, animal control officer Joy Lingenfelter said.

Gesturing to a creek bed marred by litter, Lingenfelter said much of the cleanup is left to Rescuing Unwanted Furry Friends, or RUFF, a volunteer group that works with the city animal shelter just north of the dog park.

Lingenfelter said she plans to organize a workday so dog owners can help clean up the creek bed. She also would like to create a network of workers to tidy the park on a regular basis.

“Our group has been cleaning up two to three times a week what is left over,” she said. “Somebody’s got to pick up the slack.”

Other problems include letting dogs off their leashes before they get inside the park--two have been hit by cars on Laguna Canyon Road, one was killed--and illegal parking.

“We’ve asked some people to move (from the no-parking areas), and they’ve declined,” Lingenfelter said. “We are going to start citing and towing.”

But if dog owners don’t always behave, their pets do quite well. Lingenfelter said there have been no reports of dogs biting humans and no serious dogfights.

City officials admit they have been caught off guard by the popularity of the park, which draws dog owners from as far away as Los Angeles. On weekends, as many as 75 dogs may be gathered at the park at one time. Pet owners sometimes bring coffee or pack meals, visiting with other dog lovers while their animals “socialize” nearby.

During January, when the park was sometimes closed because of heavy rains, Lingenfelter said, the two most common telephone inquiries received by the Police Department were whether Laguna Canyon Road was passable and whether the dog park was open.

The current closure will be the longest since the City of Laguna Beach Dog Park--its official title--opened five months ago. If some dog owners are frustrated by the temporary inconvenience, others are stoic.

On Sunday, Irvine resident Paul Horn, who exercises his husky-Rottweiler, Hammer, regularly at the park, was already planning creative alternatives.

“(I’ll) put my roller-blades on and take on the challenge of the pavement,” he said.