Staying Focused on El Toro

For the most part, the editorial “Clarity for El Toro” (Jan. 18) hits the proverbial nail on the head, but slides off at the conclusion.

The Times correctly notes the Board of Supervisors has changed personnel since the December 1996 vote. This was done to approve a sloppily done environmental impact report that had been written, on orders, to assure an incredibly huge international airport.

Credibility was, and still is, an issue. The county and many of the airport supporters have yet to demonstrate any good faith.

The bad faith may have started with the title: “Measure A, The Orange County/El Toro Economic Stimulus Initiative.” This was placed before the voters while the county was in a recession. It was an attempt to convince unemployed voters they would have jobs tomorrow. Now, the supervisors hang their hats at each turn on its narrow victory.

That bad faith continued with the approval of the flawed environmental impact report. The county contends that some duct tape and bobby pins can fix this report; this is not the case.

The only misses in the entire editorial are asserting that the children that will live in Bonita Canyon might be victims and the conclusion that some sort of compromise on an airport at El Toro must be reached. This is absolutely not the case.

Make no mistake about the Irvine Unified School District. The district provides one of the finest educations in this country. If the children in that future development are lucky enough to attend Irvine schools, they will receive an excellent education. Those who will be the victims of the airport battle are the children who will be forced to live and to attend school under the crushing noise and pollution of the proposed airport.

JEFF HABERMEHL

Irvine

* I appreciate The Times’ continuing coverage of and editorial comment upon the El Toro airport planning process.

Your Jan. 16 article describing the El Toro airport backers’ public relations effort quotes the brochure:

“El Toro opponents are attempting to scare people with horror stories of an LAX-style international airport. . . . That is nonsense. This is Orange County, not Los Angeles, and we plan things better here.”

Besides the bankruptcy, the environmental impact report Judge Judith McConnell threw back to rewrite and the cost overruns for consultants, what did they have in mind?

ANNE K. STEVENSON

Laguna Hills

* The Times can do little to assist in the debate revolving around El Toro airport (“Study Sees Safe Flights at an El Toro Airport,” Jan. 13). The battle lines have been drawn.

As residents of Irvine since 1973, my family has endured the noise of the Orange County Raceway (now closed), El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, Tustin Marine Corps helicopters, Amtrak horns (one-half mile), an I-5 freeway expansion (250 yards), and the Irvine High School stadium (one-half mile). Incredibly, we survived each of these, as we would an El Toro international airport.

The good people of Irvine don’t mind flying to New York and Europe as long as it is not from El Toro. Airport safety at nearby John Wayne Airport has never been a concern of my fellow Irvine residents, despite its single, short, 5,700-foot runway--the shortest commercial runway in the nation!

Yet now they play the safety card to foist an international airport on some other unwilling and less powerful souls, either in San Diego or San Bernardino County.

Nor is there a peep from “environmentalists” or “social activists” or the American Civil Liberties Union to protest Irvine’s attempted dumping of both the airport and the jail expansion on cities less wealthy, less populous, less powerful.

We are told weekly that this is “war” and we must fight these “catastrophes” that will “devastate” Irvine. Let them devastate other cities instead, like Oceanside.

I understand that my neighbors don’t want more noise and traffic. Neither does anyone else. If airports are so horrendous, then don’t fly. You’re “devastating” others’ lifestyles.

JOHN JAEGER

Irvine

* Factions that support the building of an airport in El Toro are now saying that those of us who oppose the airport are writing off the future of the young people of Orange County, we’re exaggerating the number of daily flights, and we would impede tourism because people can’t find their way from LAX to Disneyland.

I have an idea to find out if we really need another airport to save our youth and to boost tourism.

First, expand John Wayne Airport so it will be able to operate at maximum capacity. Lengthen the runways. Acquire the land to do this by invoking, if necessary, eminent domain.

Second, all restrictions on flights in and out of John Wayne expire in 2006. This will allow takeoffs and landings every 3 minutes; every day, for 24 hours each day. This is what has been projected for El Toro airport.

By doing these things, we will find out if we really need a second airport, Orange County youth will not be written off, and many tourists will get to see the statue of John Wayne.

PAUL PRUSS

Lake Forest