53.2 F
Laguna Hills
Thursday, Mar 28, 2024
-Advertisement-

Irvine Balks at County’s Plans Near Great Park

Officials with the city of Irvine have expressed concern over massive commercial development plans proposed for a pair of county-owned land sites totaling about 144 acres next to Orange County Great Park.

The Orange County Board of Supervisors has proposed building nearly 1.9 million square feet of office space, 220,000 square feet of retail space, a hotel, and nearly 3,080 apartments on the two sites it owns on opposite sides of the Great Park.

A presentation of the development proposals was submitted to the city last week.

City officials expressed surprise at the size and scope of the proposed developments during a Great Park board meeting last week, saying the county’s proposal ran counter to its prior plans for the land.

“It’s shocking to me,” said Irvine Councilwoman Christina Shea, who also chairs the Great Park board of directors. “It’s so far off the range” of what had been considered before.

City officials expressed concerns on population density and traffic, and noted that the projects could compete with other commercial developments slated for land nearby at Great Park Neighborhoods, which is run by Aliso Viejo-based FivePoint Communities Management Inc.

“It’s a big concern,” Mayor Steven Choi said at the hearing. “I’m shocked (by) the density.”

The office portion of the development is nearly on par with the maximum size of the campus planned for Irvine-based chipmaker Broadcom Corp., which held a groundbreaking event for the first phase of its 72-acre campus last week, Choi noted.

City officials said at the meeting that they would explore legal and other options for halting or scaling back the county’s proposed development.

“They need to work with us,” Shea said.

Choi questioned whether buying the land back from the county was a possibility.

Plans in Works

The county was given ownership of the two land sites as part of the 2003 annexation of the former El Toro Marine base by Irvine.

The larger of the two sites is a roughly 100-acre parcel of largely vacant land with some industrial buildings, just east of the Santa Ana (I-5) Freeway near the Irvine train station.

The county selected Los Angeles-based Lowe Enterprises in 2012 to act as the master developer for the 100-acre site, a portion of which was previously considered as a new site for the Wild Rivers water park.

The county explored a number of uses for the land for nearly five years prior to selecting Lowe as its development partner.

Initial ideas included the tear-down of existing industrial buildings on the site to clear the way to use some of the land for museums, a central library for the county, an office incubator for nonprofits, an extreme sports facility, an RV parking lot and a boarding school.

The county ultimately decided that a bulk of the nonprofit and public sector uses were not viable options for the site.

It also said in 2012 that it had decided to maintain an ownership stake in its land and would be setting up a long-term ground lease for the site rather than selling the land in its entirety.

About 1.9 million square feet of offices, retail space, a 242-room hotel, and about 2,100 residences are now being planned for the 100-acre site, according to filings presented to the city last week.

The development would be roughly the same size as what’s seen at the Park Place complex in Irvine next to the San Diego (405) Freeway, city officials said last week.

A separate 44-acre site that’s mostly open space near Alton Parkway and Irvine Boulevard—near the county’s Musick jail—could hold another 970 high-density multifamily units, according to the filings.

A proposed time frame for any construction moving ahead at either site hasn’t been disclosed.

County officials could not be reached for comment last week.

Marketing materials from Lowe Enterprises suggest groundbreaking could take place next year, if the project is approved.

Environmental impact reports for the two sites are currently under way and should be wrapped up this year, city officials said. The county also will need to rezone the sites to account for the higher-density projects.

The mixed-use project proposed for the county’s land is not directly affiliated with the 3,700-acre Great Park Neighborhoods development project, although some shared infrastructure work would appear necessary.

Want more from the best local business newspaper in the country?

Sign-up for our FREE Daily eNews update to get the latest Orange County news delivered right to your inbox!

Mark Mueller
Mark Mueller
Mark is the Editor-in-Chief of the Orange County Business Journal, one of the premier regional business newspapers in the country. He’s the fifth person to hold the editor’s position in the paper’s long history. He oversees a staff of about 15 people. The OCBJ is considered a must-read for area business executives. The print edition of the paper is the primary source of local news for most of the Business Journal’s subscribers, which includes most of OC’s major corporate and community players. Mark’s been with the paper since 2005, and long served as the real estate reporter for the paper, breaking hundreds of commercial and residential real estate stories. He took on the editor’s position in 2018.
-Advertisement-

Featured Articles

-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-

Related Articles

-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-