Ruins Are Foundation for New City Park

It once served as home to the Juaneno Indians who built the Mission San Juan Capistrano.

Later, it would become the focus of a battle between preservationists and developers.

Today, the two acres of city-owned property straddling El Camino Real are known as the Historic Town Park, an unobtrusive and tranquil spread of grass lined with willowy pepper trees and palms in the middle of town.

Residents finally got a chance to enjoy the property after years of disuse during an annual barbecue and hoedown last weekend sponsored by the Fiesta Assn. The event was the park’s first official coming-out party.

“This is the first time this has been used in years and years,” said Jeff Schroeder, president of the Fiesta Assn. “It was just dirt and rocks and weeds for the longest time.”

The little park was once the site of a cluster of adobes built to house Juaneno Indians during the early days of the mission.

In the 1980s, after the city bought about six acres across from the mission, developers came up with a plan to build a 125-room hotel and a 70,000-square-foot retail complex in what is now known as the Historic Town Center. The hotel would have sat on what is now the park, city officials said.

But in 1988, when previously unknown 18th-century adobe foundations, brick tiles and relics were unearthed, residents and preservationists fought the project and the plan was scuttled.

Instead, the city came back nearly two years ago with a pared-down plan: build an archeological park on the ruins, with a 100-room inn and a 20,000-square-foot retail center nearby.

No developer has expressed interest in the plan. A recent marketing study found that there is no demand for the project, Planning Director Tom Tomlinson said.

“The timing is not there,” Tomlinson said. “Maybe in several years it will happen, but it’s going to be awhile before we get there.”

In the meantime, San Juan Capistrano has decided to improve the property, Tomlinson said. Besides converting the weed-choked archeological digs into a historical park, the city is now installing antique-style lampposts to light three paved parking lots next to the Mission Promenade.

But the park will remain where it is forever, protectively blanketing the adobe ruins that lie underneath with 10 inches of grass and soil. All the archeologically significant pieces have been excavated, except for the adobe foundations.

“This will be a permanent park,” Councilwoman Carolyn Nash said. “It may be modified in terms of layout and different uses, but it will always be a park.”