Wither the Headlands?
If you are one of those folks who climb barbed wire, ignore No
Trespassing signs, tolerate dog droppings, co-exist with transients
withstand prickly weeds that scratch through jeans, and live in Dana
Point, you probably know about the most spectacular piece of dirt in
Southern California: The Dana Point Headlands.
Otherwise you don't - unless you've heard about the Headlands or seen
it from afar. Very far. Because besides occupying 121 acres of
blufftop coastland in Dana Point, the Headlands is also just about
impossible to visit. "It could be the most beautiful spot in Dana Point, but its not now," said Mike Rodarte, firefighter and resident of Dana Point. "Most of it is closed off, behind barbed wire. The only people using it now are transients and teenagers who like to build fires and leave trash, and dogs, who like to leave things even more unpleasant all over the trails."
The Headlands is located north of Dana Point Harbor, the land above
and below the spectacular cliffs. Surrounded on all sides by houses,
restaurants, parking lots, nurseries, a harbor, roads, and other
outposts of urban living, the Headlands sits behind barbed wire,
unused and unavailable; a prisoner of its own reputation.
New owners want to turn more than half of this property into parks
and public open space. New plans are attracting support from unusual
quarters. "Let us make walking on the Headlands by the year 2000 come
true," planning commissioner Bob Nichols told the Dana Point Sentinel. (*)
But first the new owners have to convince a wary city council to go
ahead with their plans for custom homes, a European-style spa, and
small-scale retail development that will in effect, pay for what could
be -- in truth as well as fantasy -- the nicest public spot in
Southern California.
That's the way it used to be, at least according to Henry Dana when
he first sailed into the harbor more than 100 years ago, even though,
from the beginning, the Headlands were a center of commerce. In a story
that has long since passed into the lore of Dana Point, sailors would
anchor their ships, and row ashore with manufactured goods from
eastern ports of call. Scaling the cliffs, they traded for cow hides,
slinging them over the side of the bluff to their shipmates on the
beach, hundreds of feet below.
Today, its not unusual for the scavenging dogs who litter the
Headlands to find bones from the makeshift slaughterhouses that were
the first popular uses of the Headlands. By the 1920's, Americans were
getting their leather in a more orderly fashion and the Headlands
found another patron: Sid Woodruff. Woodruff "discovered" the Headlands fresh from a business triumph in Los Angeles called Hollywoodland. It wasn't long after the "land" fell away from the sign on his hillside development that he turned his sights to Dana Point, carving up the Headlands into 285 lots for a planned residential community.
And there it sat. As Dana Point grew with man-made harbors, roads,
cliffside hotels, piers, and condos surrounding the Headlands, plans
for developing the Headlands came and went. By 1994, the Dana Point
Headlands had descended into such a badlands of "weeds, beer cans,
sofas, and trash," Martha Poinise and her husband told the city
council, that she and other residents were literally begging the city
council to do something with the land, even if it meant approving
plans for 370 homes and a 400-room hotel. Which is what the council
did. Voters made quick work of those plans - along with parks, trails,
vistas, and open space -- with a referendum that overturned the
council's action.
"People wanted more open space and fewer homes," said resident Tim McMahon. "They weren't too crazy about a hotel on the beach either." So there it sits today. Most people in Dana Point are familiar with the Headlands as a political issue - the people who live on the bluffs next to the Headlands, including a member of the city council, made sure of that. But only those adept at scaling barbed wire or sheer cliff faces have experienced the thrill of the Headlands, and what could be public land there.
The new owners, Master Plan Development sled by Sanford Edward, have
developed a plan they will complement a city-approved plan passed
earlier this year called Alternative A.
"We agree with the spirit and intent of Alternative A," said Edward.
"Which is less density, more open space, better use of the beach, and
revenue to the city. But we can do better than Alternative A. Our plan
features more public open space, larger lots, and a European-style spa
away from the beach, overlooking the harbor, as opposed to the city's
plan for a larger hotel structure on the beach."
Edward's plans call for less density and more public open space than
the previous owner's plans. It also has more public open space than
the city's plans - which call for 70 acres of open space, with fewer
than five acres open to the public.
"We can do better than that," said Edward. "Once the local political
and business leaders learn about how we are going to increase public
open space, increase the size of residential lots, and turn the city's
plans of a hotel on the beach into a smaller, European-style spa
overlooking the harbor, we think people will be pretty happy. This is
after all, exactly what most people said they wanted during the
referendum that overturned the last plan. And it will finally open the
Headlands to the people of Dana Point."
This summer, the new owners will be asking the City Council to revisit
their plans for the Headlands. Some folks are afraid of re-opening a
can of worms; others say a hotel has no place on the beach anyway, and
open space is not really open space if the public is not allowed to
use it.
Many of those who opposed the previous owners plans are taking a wait
and see - if not positive -- attitude toward Edward's new plans for
the Headlands. The Los Angeles Times - the company owned by the
company that owns the company that used to own part of the Headlands,
whew! -- said news of new owners and smaller-scale development drew
"immediate praise from at least one local (Anti-Headlands) activist. "
"If he is going to downsize, that would be a benefit to the city,"
said Geoffrey Lachner, chairman for the Committee to Save the
Headlands, told the Times.
And they would know. |
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