MAILBAG:Newport should plan for its development traffic

I read with great interest Alicia Robinson’s article (“Newport takes on Heights,� July 19) and Byron de Arakal’s commentary (“Costa Mesa never really had leverage,� July 19) regarding the annexation of West Santa Ana Heights by Newport Beach.

Both provided excellent information and insight.

It’s very frustrating to be a Costa Mesa resident and watch the ineptness with which our elected leaders attempt to manage these annexation issues. When, in a public forum not too long ago, former mayor Gary Monahan admonished his peers on the City Council to “play hardball� with Newport Beach, I knew our efforts were doomed. Our elected officials have gone about this like a guy in a fast-draw contest without any bullets in his gun.

To paraphrase de Arakal, Costa Mesa simply has no leverage on these issues because, at the end of the day, the residents of the areas in question have screamed loud and clear for years that they do not want to be part of Costa Mesa.

Who can blame them? From a purely economic standpoint, their homes are worth at least 25% more with a Newport Beach address — probably much more.

The future of the Santa Ana Country Club, the remaining islands of county near it and the Banning Ranch remains to be seen. The prevailing wisdom seems to be that Newport Beach is not about to relinquish the Banning Ranch, but needs access to it through Costa Mesa. They seem willing to aggressively push for a bridge over the Santa Ana River at the end of 19th Street in Costa Mesa — which would dump the traffic from a Banning Ranch development onto Costa Mesa streets and keep it off Pacific Coast Highway. Costa Mesa officials have fought a 19th Street Bridge for decades, fearing the resultant traffic would overwhelm already clogged Westside streets.

Here’s my question: Will the leaders of Costa Mesa bargain for annexation of the Santa Ana Country Club property by offering the bridge over 19th Street and it’s attendant traffic through the Westside? If that bridge is built, the resultant traffic along 19th Street to the current terminus of the 55 Freeway at Newport Boulevard will dramatically exacerbate one of the most congested intersections in Orange County and create irresistible pressure to widen east 19th Street to the Newport Beach border at Irvine Avenue.

As much as I think we need to work hard on our relationship with Newport Beach, I don’t think Costa Mesa city streets should become the relief valve for traffic generated in new development in Newport Beach.

If Newport Beach plans to develop that property, they should accommodate the traffic that results from the development on their own streets.

GEOFF WEST

Annexation can prevent airport parking lot

It only makes sense that the Newport Beach Golf Course should be annexed into Newport Beach, thus uniting two pieces of Santa Ana Heights now part of Newport Beach, (“Newport takes on Heights,� July 19.)

This can prevent the owners of the golf course, the county supervisors, from turning it into an airport parking lot.

Perhaps the most creative of annexation planning could be splitting up John Wayne Airport into three pieces and annexing the pieces to Newport Beach, Costa Mesa, and Irvine in proportion to each city’s frontage at that county island.

Then the cities most damaged by the airplanes of John Wayne Airport could finally resolve what to do about it. It makes no sense to allow the county to harm our cities with a polluting airport in the middle of an urban area.

DONALD NYRE

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