Miramar measure falls by lopsided margin

By: DAVE DOWNEY - Staff Writer | Wednesday, November 8, 2006 2:30 AM PST ∞

NORTH COUNTY ---- Proposition A, the measure to put San Diego County's next international airport at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station, was headed for a resounding defeat in Tuesday's election with 62 percent of voters opposing the plan to seek 3,000 of the base's 23,000 acres for an airport and 38 percent supporting it.

The nearly two-to-one margin was based on results from 1,245 precincts out of a total of 2,211, according to the San Diego County Registrar of Voters.

As of 1:15 a.m. today, those unofficial results showed 241,232 votes against the proposition and 146,060 votes in favor.

"I think that the voters of San Diego County have put a dose of reality into the issue of using Miramar for an airport," said Bruce Boland, retired Navy rear admiral and chairman of No on Prop. A, the opposition group. "And Miramar has been vindicated. People understand its importance to the community."

With 12,500 employees, Miramar pumps about $500 million a year into the regional economy.

Assuming that the margin holds, Boland said, the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority ---- the agency that placed the measure on the ballot --- should start from scratch an evaluation of the region's future air travel demand and take a hard look at whether Lindbergh Field can fill the bill.

"We need to look at what our needs are and start off without the assumption that we need a new airport," he said.

Joe Craver, chairman of the airport authority board, said the campaign for a Miramar airport was crippled by the opposition's successful attempt to paint the measure as a vote against the Marines in a time of war, and a move to kick them off the base.

"They hit the patriotic button," Craver said. "That was never the intent of the airport authority. That's not really what the ballot language says. The ballot language says, Let's share the 23,000 acres at Miramar."

Craver said the pro-Miramar effort also suffered from a lack of support from high-profile federal, state and local officials from the region.

"We were basically all by ourselves," he said.

However, Craver said, the people have spoken. "We have said all along that we will respect the will of the voters," he said.

Craver stopped short, though, of ruling out another effort to put an airport at Miramar, saying that will be up to the majority of the airport board members.

John Chalker, downtown San Diego businessman and founder of the Alliance in Support of Airport Progress, which supported the measure, said the vote in his opinion does not end the quest for a Miramar airport, but instead puts it on the shelf for awhile.

"We're not discouraged, believe it or not, by tonight's outcome," Chalker said.

Citing the Coronado Bridge, San Diego Convention Center and the baseball Padres' Petco Park, he said the region has a long history of voting multiple times on major public works projects before they become reality. Chalker suggested a similar scenario is likely for Miramar.

"This problem is going to continue to return until a viable airport solution is found," Chalker said.

However, former state Sen. Steve Peace, the architect of the airport authority, said this election is the final say on the county's future airport and the agency has no more authority under state law to study sites and take a choice to voters. Peace said over the weekend that a "no" vote settles the question of whether Miramar should be pursued, and says residents want Lindbergh to be their airport for the foreseeable future.

"If that's what the people want, they're going to have to answer to their children and grandchildren," Craver said, saying Lindbergh cannot, under any expansion plan, accommodate the area's future needs.

The airport board has been saying that Lindbergh's single runway could bog down as early as next decade, and for sure by the 2020s, triggering lengthy flight delays and spiking ticket prices. The agency notes the number of passengers has been growing rapidly. It reached 17 million last year and is increasing much faster than the pace of population growth. Officials expect 30 million people a year will want to fly out of San Diego by 2030, but Lindbergh will max out at 25 million passengers.

UC San Diego economics professor Richard Carson disputes that point. He suggests the more important statistic is takeoffs and landings, which has remained flat in the 200,000- to 220,000-per-year range for a decade. By switching out bigger planes for smaller ones and moving private planes to other county airports, he suggests Lindbergh's usefulness can be extended for decades.

Others have suggested capacity could be added by nixing the nighttime restriction on takeoffs between 11:30 p.m. and 6:30 a.m.

The authority maintains those types of measures would help little, buying a few years at best. As for the number of takeoffs and landings, the total is beginning to rise now and agency officials say it will still reach 260,000 a year ---- Lindbergh's maximum capacity ---- during the next two decades.

With 661 acres and one runway, Lindbergh is smaller than other airports serving markets San Diego County's size, such as Tampa and Oakland.

This is not the first time, however, officials have warned Lindbergh is too small to serve the region in the future. Earlier warnings triggered dozens of site searches over the last four decades.

This most recent search began in 2001 with the San Diego of Association of Governments and Port of San Diego, which used to operate the airport. Then state lawmakers created the airport authority to take over Lindbergh and the search. Between the three agencies, $17 million has been spent on the site search.

The search culminated in the airport board's 7-2 June vote to name Miramar its preferred site. Citing its central location in metro San Diego, the majority insisted the base is the best place to build a modern, large airport with twin parallel runways a mile apart that can accommodate simultaneous takeoffs and landings.

But the Marines stressed that giving up any part of the base for an airport would interfere with their mission. Military brass repeatedly stated that Miramar was not available, nor likely to become available.

Contact staff writer Dave Downey at (760) 740-5442 or ddowney@nctimes.com.

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