Going Postal Takes On A Whole New Meaning

While this postal box is approved by the Postmaster General, this post probably won’t be. 

News has been hitting the street in droves – the US Postal Service intends to build a 350,000 sq ft distribution center in Aliso Viejo (basically a mass warehouse where semis truck in load after load of mail to be sorted and then ship it back out in aforementioned semis).  This has been public information for a while, but the battle is continuing to heat up with no signs of dying.

If you’ve been outside a Target, at any meeting of any sort, all you have to do is mention the word and residents get steamed up like a piping hot bowl of clam chowder!   The City of Aliso Viejo strongly opposes this move (read the documents here).  Announcements have been made at many of the civic, religious and educational meetings I’ve been to recently and petitions fly around like the little paper confetti in Tempe will this Sunday.

The biggest concerns surrounding this distribution center seem to focus on the traffic, environmental issues, and yes, even your real estate would be affected.

Issue 1  Traffic:  The City of Mission Viejo sent this letter to the Postal Service indicating their frustration with not being notified of the project since it will affect the Oso exit of I-5 (which is a pain much of the time without tons of semis exiting there).   It seems that the proposal failed to do any traffic studies about where all the semis or any planned “trip generation factors” to assess how the local area would be affected by this distribution plant.  

The City of Laguna Hills is also addressing this issue out of concern with traffic at the Alicia exit.  Their suggestion, as reported in the OC Register, was to force the semis to use the 73 Tollroad.  My guess (and what I’ve heard on the streets locally) is that while that would help, it won’t entirely stop the problem once the trucks exit 73 they have to go on the side streets we all drive on. 

These semi’s would be driving through many local neighborhoods as well.   Nothing says fun for the kiddos like having Mom yell out the window to “Watch out for the semis!” as you’re riding your bike down the street.

Remember, we’re talking 100 semis a day running 24/7, so if you want to take a drive down Oso (and in other local areas) and the distribution center gets put into place you better get used to looking at this outside your car window:

Issue 2 Environment:  Coming straight from the appeals and petitions put out there, the environmental concerns include:  751 tons of solid waste per year, 6 million watts of electricity the facility would generate and use, ….as well as the impactsof noise, urban runoff, air quality [there will be 100 semis making daily trips to the center], and other significant impacts to the community.

Issue 3 Real Estate:  As if our home values weren’t taking enough of a beating, I can only venture to guess that this wouldn’t help.  When a family is house hunting, the thunderous sound of 100 semis barreling down the street on a given day takesw away from the pristine setting of Laguna Hills, Mission Viejo and Aliso Viejo as “family friendly” communities where OCers can enjoy our beautiful weather.   That is, after they sit through all the traffic from the semi’s backed up on the 5.  In fact there’s enough concern, the local Realtors were notified of this concern as well.  An appeal was made to the Orange County Association of Realtors to oppose the construction of such a facility.   

As you can see, this issue has been dragging out since last fall, but it’s not going away any time soon and it’s of concern for all local residents!  It affects your life, health and potentially home values!  We all want our mail delivered, but at what cost?