Despite a stinging defeat before the California Coastal Commission, Orange County toll road officials licked their wounds Thursday and began weighing options for building their six-lane highway through one of the state's most popular parks.
Following 12 hours of public testimony and debate Wednesday, commissioners decided 8 to 2 that building the Foothill South tollway through San Onofre State Beach would violate environmental laws that regulate development along 1,100 miles of California coastline.
"The news was disappointing," said Lance MacLean, a board chairman for the Transportation Corridor Agencies, which has spent years and tens of millions of dollars planning the Foothill South.
The toll road agency is expected to appeal the commission's decision to the federal government today, though it may ultimately decide to change the route of the highway instead.
Meanwhile, tollway opponents were heartened by the commission's decision. They said the vote preserves the integrity of the California Coastal Act and sends a signal to private and government interests hoping to use state parkland for projects.
The State Parks Foundation estimates that there are 110 active or proposed uses by private and public interests that threaten 72 state parks. They include small takings of parkland by private property owners, as well as casinos, dairies, desalination plants, utility lines, municipal streets and the Foothill South toll road.
"It was a shining day for the commission," said Dan Silver, executive director of the Endangered Habitats League. "Not only did they do the right thing intuitively by keeping a highway out of a park, they did the right thing on a legal level. Otherwise, they would have blown a hole in the Coastal Act."
Estimated to cost at least $875 million to build, the Foothill South would have run 16 miles from Oso Parkway in Rancho Santa Margarita to Interstate 5 at Basilone Road south of San Clemente -- a final link in Orange County's network of toll roads.
The highway would have cut through the northern half of San Onofre and pass over the Trestles marine estuary, which is a nature preserve. About 320 of the park's 2,100 acres would have be taken for the road.
The parkland is home to several endangered species and contains an unspoiled stretch of San Mateo Creek, the 161-space San Mateo Campground and archaeological sites, such as the Juaneno Indian village of Panhe. The nearby beach is famous for two surf spots, Trestles and Old Man's.
