The City of Tustin has identified some expected, unexpected and curious sites for potential future residential development over the next five years or so.
The city, like others across OC, has been undergoing planning for over a year to find sites to help it comply with California’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), a state law which aims to improve what government officials see as a housing shortage in the area.
Current RHNA mandates Tustin, which currently counts a population of nearly 80,000, to “accommodate the construction of at least 6,782 dwelling units,” the city said.
Under its prior zoning, Tustin fell short of that requirement by 2,168 units.
The potential construction of 900 apartments on the Tustin side of The Market Place shopping center would take care of a large portion of that shortfall. An 18-acre section of surface parking at the center, between the Best Buy and The Home Depot stores, is one site the city has ok’d for potential future development.
The Irvine Company, the retail center’s owner, is currently well underway on a 1,200-unit complex on the other side of The Market Place, which is Irvine.
Also eyed for rezoning: Enderle Center, the shopping center near the 55 Freeway and 17th Street. Nearly 12 acres of surface parking at the site could hold up to 413 housing units, the city believes.
Rezoning three parts of the massive Tustin Legacy development could “add a total of 855 additional residential units to these neighborhoods,” city filings indicate.
While there’s abundant amounts of undeveloped land at Tustin Legacy, one of three sites the city rezoned sits yards away from the remains of the burned-down North Hangar, which is still undergoing environmental remediation and numerous questions regarding public health concerns, one year after the fire destroyed the blimp hangar. Good luck with that.
The City of Tustin remains mired in legal and clean up work related to the destroyed North Hangar; a closed session with lawyers at a Nov. 19 City Council meeting noted a discussion regarding the city’s “significant exposure to litigation” due to the “the release of hazardous materials” from the Navy-owned property.
For plans concerning the remaining South Hangar, the city’s strategy appears to be one of kicking the can down the road. It recently took up plans to spend $1.4M on a new fence that would surround a portion of the site.
Tustin Legacy may not have enough land left to hold a new golf course, but city filings suggest there might be room for something better.
City records indicate there’s been negotiations to sell a chunk of land north of the Flight office complex to a developer with eyes on building a massive TopGolf facility, which would be the first venue of its type for the indoor-outdoor entertainment center in OC.
Typical TopGolf venues can run upward of 10 acres. Its Ontario location, which opened 2 years ago on county-owned land, is located on 14 acres and is said to have brought 400 jobs to the area.
