The City’s Community Development Department has responded to sign violations which infringe Mission Viejo’s unique and long-standing policy against advertising clutter along commercial corridors. The policy dates back to the formation of the planned community by the Mission Viejo Company. The McDonald’s Restaurant at Alicia and Trabuco, for example, was not allowed to erect the Company’s trademark arches because it would have been adverse to the desired image of the upscale residential community.
Last month Lennar Homes posted maverick banners on the sides of two construction trailers situated on the ridge above the intersection of Jeronimo and Los Alisos. The signs had 5-foot high letters reading “NEW HOMES” (photo above). The signs were removed Friday after City Hall was informed. Lennar’s act occurred even though the City Council last year made code changes specifically to allow Lennar larger street signs and pennants to promote its townhomes. The special political treatment was given despite the project’s excellent natural visibility atop the ridge.
The archless McDonald’s has gone months without flying a flag on its otherwise unsightly cellular antenna flag pole, even though it receives an estimate of over $1,000 monthly rent from the cellular carrier. Recently the Restaurant came back into compliance but is using a flag disproportionately smaller than the one shown in the photo below.
Silverado Plaza erected an illegal shopping center merchant board. For a year the Plaza begged the City to fore-go enforcement so it could plan and erect a new conforming sign. The non-conforming sign 
has been removed without a replacement. Next door Sonic has placed unsightly banners next to the Jeronimo sidewalk (photo).
New Oak Tree sign complies with code
In contrast, a couple blocks down Los Alisos the Oak Tree Village replaced a back-lit plastic sign with an attractive monument. When Jeronimo Plaza installed new signage (lower right of top photo), it erected Mission-style monument signs complementing the MV median signs used at entrances to the City.
Creeping commercial clutter is a difficult problem because politicians quickly learn business interests, not residents, are the primary financing tool for election campaigns. Each time an exception is created, another business has leverage to claim for itself an exception or waiver of the Code. Eventually cities decline aesthetically, like those in North OC and LA County.
The most egregious MV situation involves the Monster drink banners covering three spans of windows at Howies’ Game Shack in the Kaleidoscope. They effectively serve as freeway billboard advertising at the Crown Valley ramps to the I-5 Freeway. The Council knew they were blatantly illegal, but behind Frank Ury the majority specifically directed City Hall not to enforce the code against Howie’s, even though Howie also has a large lighted sign atop the building. Howie’s receives compensation from Monster for the illegal window advertising. The signs remain unenforced over a year later, despite consensus about the tacky appearance.
Council refuses to enforce MV ordinance against Monster sign
Councilman Frank Ury has threatened to liberalize Mission Viejo’s sign code. The next step will be an attempt to create a special sign district to grant cumulative LED or digital signage exceeding the huge casino-like Auto Center freeway sign at the El Toro “Y”. A special district will be proposed to permit such signage for Kaleidoscope. Kaleidoscope’s management initiated the effort at last week’s council meeting, presenting a concept which could potentially devolve the white elephant from tacky to trashy. More about that in the Dispatch soon.
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Grotesque sign violations can be traced to a series of huge marketing fiascoes created by the City of Mission Viejo.
The Kaleidoscope for a dozen years has floundered as an entertainment center, doomed to poor daytime and lunch hour sales by the City Council’s decision in the late 1990s to rezone the large tract north of La Alameda from office to high-density residential.
Besides robbing the center of daytime customers, the City’s lack of marketing sense turned Crown Valley at the Freeway into a rush hour quagmire. Westbound cars are backed up beyond the Crown Valley Freeway entrance. (The apartments add to rush-hour traffic with the grain, while the offices would have created traffic against the grain).
The Kaleidoscope adds a traffic light a very short distance between the light at the mall entrance and the south-bound freeway entrance ramp. I’ve encountered gridlock there so many time I try to avoid the area anytime even near rush hour. That is not what the Kaleidoscope needs.
Dale Sandore of Mission Viejo, with an extensive background in business and retail, had predicted all this would happen when the Kaleidoscope was proposed.
No amount of overpowering signage can save the Kaleidoscope from the City of Mission Viejo blunders.
Likewise no amount of signage will prop up the Lennar town home project, in 2012 going into its third year of trying to sell out in a depressed housing market that some Orange County experts may last into 2015 or later.
Check out all the vacant town homes across from the Irvine Spectrum, which are closer to jobs. Mission Viejo is not a major jobs center. Likewise I noticed major vacancies in newer town home clusters in the Anaheim Stadium area, again a major jobs center.
The City Council rezoned the parcel next to the Target store for the Lennar project from strip commercial, which would have allowed mom and pop stores to benefit from Target traffic.
“Westbound cars are backed up beyond the Crown Valley Freeway entrance. (The apartments add to rush-hour traffic with the grain, while the offices would have created traffic against the grain).”
I’m confused by Allan’s statement; if there were office buildings where the apts are, wouldn’t there still be a back-up going West at rush hour, which is the way to the freeway?
I did not know Monster Drink had a shop of its own in the K-Scope. Ohhhh–they don’t; perhaps this is a revenue opportunity for the city to abort our sign ordinances in all cases if the $$$ are big enough.
Perhaps this area should be declared an ” ordinance free zone” and turn the total building into ” anything goes” as far as signs go. who cares about code enforcement. Frank Ury certainly does not.
Thanks to Patti for the heads-up. I need to explain a little better:
Rush hour congestion occurs both westbound in the a.m. and eastbound in the p.m. on Crown Valley. Apartment residents work outside the city, so they add to the a.m. and p.m. rush hour of commuters from Mission Viejo and the foothill communities.
Office workers live outside the city, so they are entering the city eastbound on Crown Valley in the a.m. and leaving the city westbound in the p.m. They travel in the opposite direction of commuters.
Your question jogged my memory back five or six years ago, when high-density housing was proposed for the entire parcel at Jeronimo and Los Alisos now divided between Lennar and Target.
The City of Mission Viejo Traffic manager agreed with the developer’s contention that changing the zoning from retail to residential would have no effect on traffic because total auto count would be similar for either use.
As with Crown Valley, apartment residents would add to a.m. and p.m. commuter congestion on both streets as they go too and from work. Retail traffic generally would be evening after rush hour and weekends, and would have minimal impact on rush hour congestion.
Readers can decide whether my interpretation or City Hall’s interpretation makes the most sense.
Thanks to local resident calls to Chuck Wilson at city hall, and the Dispatch coverage, the illegal signs by the Lennar homes adjacent to Target have been removed.
The Kaleidoscope’s marketing troubles over a dozen years are typical of entertainment centers that have struggled or failed. The Register reported Jan. 11 that the Anaheim Garden Walk, an entertainment center less than a mile from Disney California Adventure has struggled since opening in 2008 at the onset of the recession.
Like the Kaleidoscope the Garden Walk has undergone declining value and ownership changes. The owners want to reduce retail stores and add more entertainment venues. The Kaleidoscope has done that with Howies and other game centers, and it is still struggling.
Maybe Garden Walk should adopt Mission Viejo Mayor Frank Ury’s solution–slap up some bigger signs to get attention. Maybe something big and tall enough to catch the eye of roller coaster riders.
I think the Kaleidoscope has a couple of other aspects in common with the Anaheim Garden Walk – they are both extemely hard to get in and out of and the parking is horrible.
Tear down the Kaleidoscope and bring back Old Macdonald’s Farm (for those who can remember) and add the Japanese Deer Park to it. At least there would be less traffic and we could use and sell the manure to supplement the now overruns to Tennis Center.