Celebrating a Victory for Status Quo

After a battle with Costa Mesa officials, business owners along 17th Street succeeded in stopping a plan to widen the road--even though it meant that the city turned down nearly $5 million in county transportation grants.

The money would have been used to add lanes to the road, which the business owners likened to making Rodeo Drive into a freeway. The proposal called for turning the four-lane road into a six-lane thoroughfare. But in May, after months of campaigning by business owners and area residents--including giving the City Council a petition with 10,000 signatures--the city shelved the plan.

Even though the result was the loss of the county transportation grant, the shop owners are ecstatic. They say they’d rather have slow traffic than turn their quaint shopping street into the likes of the impersonal Harbor Boulevard.

They also weren’t happy with the prospect that the widening might have taken as long as two years to complete.

So, they are having a party Saturday to celebrate their victory.

The event, which will run from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., will include food, music, a pumpkin patch, clowns, face painting, pony rides and a petting zoo.

On a more somber note, there will also be a blood drive for victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Although the City Council voted down the street-widening project, local activist Doug Bader said some future council could take it up again. A six-lane 17th Street is part of the city’s master plan.

“We’ve never been able to change the master plan. So there’s an amnesia for each generation” of City Council members, said Bader, who lives near the road and works on 17th Street at Eco Hub, an umbrella for 10 environmental groups. Every six years for at least 20 years, the council has considered widening the road, he added.

Bader hopes to get business owners to support street beautification as a way to discourage future proposals to widen the roadway.

Peter Naghavi, the city’s director of transportation services, said he believes the widening project is necessary. Within five years, 17th Street will reach its capacity of 37,500 cars a day.

Indeed, traffic on the commercial strip is often slower than the pace of a pedestrian.