Dr. Richard A. (Dick) Nichols

Republican Party Central Committee

Member, District 70

Tel 949-644-7735

Dick@RANichols.info

Dick Nichols is currently trying to put together a list of Questions and Answers about current issues facing Newport Beach. If you have a question for him that is not answered below, please e-mail us and we will try to get it answered, and possibly even post it.

Answered Questions for The Daily Pilot:

1.  Why should voters choose you?

2. How will you make the council more responsive to residents?

3. What steps would you take to improve traffic problems in Corona del Mar? 

Below is the list of issues he has already tackled.

1. General Plan Update        2. Harbor Dredging        3. Borders Committee        4. Greenlight II

5. City Hall                               6. Banning Ranch           7. Eminent Domain:

1.  Why should voters choose you?

     I have a BSSE and a  MS & PhD in ChE with emphasis on Math and Science. My career has been in Aerospace Systems Design and as a Consulting Engineer and Pollution Equipment manufacturer. R.A. Nichols Engineering, RANEng.com, works for the Oil Industry, SCAQMD, CARB, and the EPA. This experience allows me to understand many of the problem areas NB addresses. 

I am a life long conservative Republican.  I am the Greenlight and CRA endorsed, elected incumbent, District 6 Councilman. I’m the only Newport Beach resident elected in June ’06 to the OC Republican Central Committee.   I am respected by constituents and would appreciate your vote for NB Council District 6.

2. How will you make the council more responsive to residents?

    I have worked hard to protect the Quality of Life enjoyed by Newport Beach Residents. From Traffic Safety and Beach Preservation to Plans for a New City Hall; I have worked for common sense solutions.  I have worked hard to have Measures explained, that should be understood by the citizens, before a Council vote is taken. I am against the massive up-zoning in the New General Plan and Voted Against It. I ask you to vote No on “V” Against the General Plan; and, YES on “X”, Greenlight II; For the Right to Vote on new large projects that will change NB,

3. What steps would you take to improve traffic problems in Corona del Mar? 

    It is hard to undo what has evolved over 100 years.  It is safe to say, that we must face the fact that traffic is going to get worse, not better.  Traffic calming is causing PCH to become a parking lot. Unfortunately, making the medians pretty is not going to solve the problem of moving traffic.  During the visioning process, the Architects (AIA) Conference held at Grant Howald Park some years ago, there were many ideas presented.  The most favored by the AIA was removing all commercial from the North side of PCH. The suggestion of a three lane tunnel from MacArthur to Buck Gully was discussed. Most felt the expense was too great, but then they noted, this solution was being implemented in Boston. The concept of optimizing lane width and following best practice of the Highway Traffic Manual seems reasonable in comparison and it meets our mandate to not curtail traffic. Obviously you cannot maximize median garden width and achieve these goals, but; Traffic Gridlock is not Acceptable from either a safety or Circulation standpoint.

Below is the list of issues he has already tackled.

1. General Plan Update:

    The new General Plan is a totally new document. We would suggest that the new document could have been written as a modification of the old. Basically then every owner would know that his property rights have been preserved, unless his property and/or area was specifically addressed and changed.

    Mandatory changes and what triggers their requirements should have been addressed.

    New changes requested by owners that are to be included in the general plan would then be addressed and the reasons and the basis for change delineated.

    Example: Certain areas, i.e. multifamily residential, are now addressed as Units /acre. The zoning of such areas that is present, is it still valid. If not, will new zoning be written, or will this be left to the discretion of the Planning Commission, without supervision of the Council unless a majority vote can be gathered.

    We believe all unchanged property, should continue under present rules; and, changes in zoning should be justified with a separate General Plan change. This would be accomplished

    Best by rejecting the new general plan. To prevent the massive residential zoning grants scheduled in the Airport Area, if the General Plan is approved, you must vote for Greenlight II.

2. Harbor Dredging:

    NB is acting as Harbor Mgr. NB is talking about charges for both dockage and moorings. It seems that NB charging would imply that such locations can be used for such boat services. Accordingly, we feel NB should provide at minimum, the ability for the owner to dredge that local area. At a maximum NB would organize and /or provide the dredging.

    We thought originally, the idea of a working harbor, in which Eel Grass is foreign with no protected rights, is appropriate. For this right, we would in the back bay or other wise, create a Eel Grass planting area. This appears to have problems, as water clarity and shallowness both seem necessary for good Eel Grass growth. Clarity in the back bay goes much better with our idea for a river grass park area which is storm flooded only above the dam, and deeper water below the dam. The deeper water would be subject to tidal flow and although brackish it should have clearer water.

3. Borders Committee:

    Two County territories, the Santa Ana Country Club and South of Mesa want to be annexed into NB. Both areas have good arguments for being annexed to NB, and have voted with vast majorities to reject annexation to Costa Mesa and accept annexation to NB. Since the process was started prior to the changing of the law to allow annexation against the will of the homeowners on areas below 75 acre, we do not believe either /or both areas could be forced to accept Costa Mesa. We believe NB should cooperate, as a willing participant, to accept the parcels.

    Banning Ranch seems to have decided not to apply for any buildable on the lower area behind Newport Shores, but to seek commercial for an adjacent area along PCH. Housing we understand would be up on the bluffs. It appears that if NB is not to demanding this might be accomplished through an annexation of area to NB. If they are not satisfied, Beeco Banning will shop and they have the County, Costa Mesa and NB to play off one another. We do not believe they want to be pushed, as they have oil wells to clean up.

    Coyote Landfill is a sophisticated, high vacuum >10 psid, recovery operation of landfill gas, which ultimately produces significant electricity using commercial generating equipment. The landfill is quite deep, up to 175’ and the area suffers landform collapse, possibly from the heavy vacuum. These holes must be filled and a clay layer restored for the gas collection system to operate correctly. The amount of gas recovered, is about half as much as its peak for which the system was designed, and the remaining profitable life of the system may be as little as 5 years. The Irvine Co. has a very professional company running the system and we understand the county repairs the cave-ins. The Irvine Co. has dedicated maybe 30% of the shallow end acreage to environmental uses and they felt that if the area was used for a golf course it would be a City type course. NB may want to control the area to prevent Irvine from using it, but that the area has considerable liability and little profit potential seems probable.

4. Greenlight II:

    Greenlight II, Measure X, was developed by Greenlight, as NB set zoning in the new General Plan so high that in many areas NB wiped out the usefulness of Greenlight I. Greenlight I applied only to new development over and above the properties pre-project zoning rights. Greenlight II says since you may have been given much higher zoning rights, a large growth approval amendment can only practically be tied to growth over present growth to be useful.

5. City Hall:

    City Hall must be evaluated on the basis of Function, Location, and Cost.

    Function -The present location is next to a fire station which should also be upgraded. Most of the present area around the present fire station is used for parking. It is argued by the Chief that it is important that the Fire Station have enough room for a truck to do a U turn on the narrow length of the property. This allows them to be able to pull through the truck garage to position the truck so it can go out perpendicular to the service street. These large turning and dual staging areas prior to entering or leaving the garage use much more space than present stations have. Typically these areas are used for convenient car parking. Also present stations are situated where a public way may be used for turn-in and /or the trucks are backed into position in the firehouse. Such configurations, which can lead to improved firehouse design, have been rejected. The result is the new city hall configuration on its present location needs a tall high rise parking tower close to city hall where it is much more visibly and prominent

City Hall, in many larger cities, is split-up and fire and police administration are not located in the main police and or fire station. We would note that our main police and fire stations are located in Fashion Island and our emergency service center is located in the police station.

    In our present City Hall many building and public works inspectors, and similar employees use city cars and are out in the field most of the day. Their work cars are parked in the City Hall lot overnight. Under the circumstances we question why these employees are even stationed at City Hall.

With this background we looked at Location and Cost.

    Location- Newport Blvd Present -Primarily we considered traffic and road access. Newport Freeway and Blvd is a mess and NB has not asked Meas. M folks to consider under-grounding the freeway so that you might have single lane on and off ramps at 19th, 17th and 15th. Measure M folks were interested but NB and Costa Mesa folks are not. Additionally Costa Mesa does not want to consider a 19th street Santa Ana river bridge. Consequently, West PCH and Mariners mile traffic congestion is further expected to deteriorate. Finally the present City Hall site is within blocks of the Newport Englewood fault, a major earthquake fault zone that caused Hoag to build their entire new hospital wing on rollers. The present City Hall Site is about 5’ above sea level. This means underground facilities require special considerations. Additionally a Tsunami is a real possibility. Finally we will need to rent a facility to move into during construction, estimated to be for 2 years and cost as much as $2,000,000.

    Location 1 - Above The Library -We looked around and felt the site above the library should be considered as a trade-off. The site has never gotten off the ground as a real park (with recreation equipment and ball fields and is presently considered as a probable weed park). It is located outside the Coastal Zone, and although it is zoned open space it has also been considered for the Corona del Mar Post Office, a museum and elderly housing. The site is located between two major north south streets Avocado, 6 lanes with little traffic and MacArthur. It is located near major East / West streets PCH and San Joaquin Hills Road; the latter has excess capacity. Further, Ferralon, parallels San Miguel in the Newport Center and can be extended along the top of the property to MacArthur. With a free right turn and a stop light left turn at this intersection coming from Newport Center, you should never have a light sequencing problem; and, the traffic problem at San Miguel and MacArthur could be solved. Although the subdivision, Harbor View Hills South, adjacent MacArthur, has moved the street over, restricted MacArthur to 4 lanes, and put a site plane restriction on the site for structure height, the site can still be built without variance. Such road and site plane restrictions are unprecedented in NB, but, we believe these restrictions are only ordinances, passed by majority Council Vote. Such ordinances can be reversed by the same majority Council vote needed to build on any site. Additionally, W.P.(Bill) Ficker, AIA has shown that there is plenty of room for City Hall on the site and a Parking Structure could be built for joint Library use at the same level and location as the parking lot proposed for the present park. Finally, the Irvine Co does not object.

    Location 2 – Police or Fire Location, Newport Center - It is proposed to build a new Police station between MacArthur and Avocado north of San Miguel. We wonder why this site is perfectly fine and the site below Ferralon so bad. The upper site is hard to hide from MacArthur, is right at the major traffic intersection San Miguel and Avocado and we will have to pay property costs. Once the Police Station is moved, we could tear down the Police Station at Civic Center and Jamboree and build a new high rise City Hall and Parking Structure, The view of the Ocean is lost, the Major artery is singly Jamboree rather than bounded by both N/S and close E/W streets, Additionally we need to find out what the Irvine Co thinks.

    Summary City Hall – We believe above the Library is a Far superior site to any brought up so far. We do not think the present location is appropriate for a new city hall.

6. Banning Ranch:

We covered this in the border’s Committee. It appears that Banning Ranch are quite reasonable and are willing to work with us. It appears that we need to allow Banning Ranch

time. We also need to remember that Banning Ranch has property rights and some options.

7. Eminent Domain:

We do not support eminent domain and we support the Measure W

We believe the rezoning the General Plan does and the zoning modification that the General Plan shows are a form of Eminent Domain. In as much as the General Plan changes present zoning, we believe we should turn down the present General plan.

Dick Nichols is currently trying to put together a list of Questions and Answers about current issues facing

Newport Beach.

If you have a question for him, please e-mail us and we will try to get it answered, and possibly even post it.