After hours of discussion, the Laguna Niguel City Council voted 3–2 to approve a development project, which will be located below a former landslide site, during a special meeting Dec. 5, with councilors Rischi Paul Sharma and Fred Minagar opposing.
The Cove at El Niguel will consist of 22 townhomes off of Crown Valley Parkway below a slope built with landfill to fortify the area after the 1998 Via Estoril landslide destroyed several homes.
Despite being geotechnically approved, the developer reduced original plans from 38 to 22 units, and suggested the 2.2 acres of slope be deemed undevelopable open land, following concerns from some residents, who live near the land in question, and the Niguel Summit homeowners association about the slope’s stability.
The project was originally approved by the city planning commission in September. However, the homeowners association appealed the decision, causing the city council to intervene.
Patrick Nunez, a representative of the homeowners association, said there is no evidence of an imminent second landslide but presented an analysis by a geotechnical firm the city hired, which revealed what’s known as a “slope creep”—a gradual downward displacement of soil—of a quarter of an inch per year.
“If we get a significant rainstorm, that could get a lot worse,” Nunez said during the meeting.
He claimed a proposed retaining wall to hold back the hillside would be ineffective because the slopes’ current movement of soil is occurring below where such a wall would be built.
“My husband and I walk on [a street above the slope] every day and, as a result, we observe the slope movement on a regular basis,” one Niguel Summit resident said during the meeting. “Deep gaps form between the sidewalk we walk on and the hill due to the creeping and settling of the earth. The more rain we have the deeper those holes are.”
A representative of the developer who conducted a report on the issue said no instability was found.
“It would take 1,200 years before that slope would reach those buildings,” he said.
The man-made hill—created with 275,000 tons of landfill—was created in the mid-1980s for the Niguel Summit community, which consists of 1,400 homes. The homes were constructed above a 41-unit condominium development called Crown Cove, which was razed after the landslide to repair the fallen slope.
Two Niguel Summit homes slid into five of the Crown Cove condos on March 19, 1998, destroying both the homes and the condos. Two-dozen people were evacuated but no one was injured.
It is believed heavy rains beginning in December 1997 may have triggered the collapse.
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