Developers try to calm residents’ fears

The future of Huntington Beach should include higher-density “city centers” connected by rebuilt streets more friendly for walking, biking and public transportation, consultants told city officials this week. City Council and Planning Commission members met together this week for the unveiling of plans that could shape parts of Huntington Beach for decades to come.

After nearly two years of planning and studying, along with numerous hearings to gauge public opinion, consultants presented a draft of the Beach/Edinger Corridor Specific Plan on Monday to a joint session of planning commissioners.

The plan picks out a couple of zones for higher density than the city has seen before: the area between Goldenwest College and the Bella Terra shopping center, where retail-and-apartment developments like the Ripcurl and Village at Bella Terra are on the drawing board; and to a lesser extent the intersection of Beach Boulevard and Main Street near Five Points Plaza.

Along Beach Boulevard north of Ellis Avenue, apartments and small “neighborhood centers” at major crossroads would slowly replace aging strip malls as they became less financially viable, said Michael Freedman of the consulting firm Freedman, Tung and Bottomley, which spearheaded the plan. The plan won’t force development, just encourage it, he said.

“The specific plan is only there to answer that if change voluntarily occurs, what does the community want?” he said.

But some residents said they worried about a denser north Huntington Beach, whether for crime, traffic, air quality or just the character of their city. At the regular City Council meeting that followed the presentation, north Huntington Beach resident Robert Sternberg said he didn’t see why the city needed a new kind of neighborhood there.

“I oppose your collective agenda for hyperdensity in north Huntington Beach,” he said. “Traffic will be far worse, and the overall quality of life will be diminished. I happen to disagree with those who say the north end of Huntington Beach is tired and run down.”

There are ways in the plan to prevent overbuilt monstrosities, Freedman said. For example, any development on a block so large it becomes a “superblock” is required to have new public streets through it, cutting it down to size, he said.

Also, if the city keeps strict control of the size, shape and quality of the buildings, it can leave the number of units inside up to the free market, Freedman said.

“We don’t recommend you worry so much about density as about scale,” he said. “If you make the building envelope controlled by us — how massed it is, how many parked cars, how set back — you don’t need to control density.”

The plan also aims to promote car dealerships on northern Beach Boulevard. In addition, anyone who significantly builds or rebuilds on Beach Boulevard or Edinger Avenue would be responsible to improve and beautify the street nearby, both for appearance and to help traffic.

Council members and planning commissioners had questions about how to control density, or why parks or public transportation weren’t written into the plan. But some seemed impressed by its sheer level of detail.

“You’ve done an outstanding job,” Commissioner John Scandura said. “This is a very ambitious undertaking.”

The plan still has to go through the Planning Commission for an environmental impact report. To see the current draft of the plan, go to www.ci.huntington-beach.ca.us/announcements/beach_edinger.cfm.

MICHAEL ALEXANDER may be reached at (714) 966-4618 or at [email protected].