Mailbag: Call CdM sports complex what it is, a stadium

The Newport-Mesa Unified School District wants to build a sports stadium with 1,000 seats, a synthetic turf field and a new track at Corona del Mar High School. An augmentation includes 1,500 stadium-style seats, field lights, a press box, snack bars and team rooms.

This stadium would be in the middle of a calm residential community of more than 1,500 homes and would cause huge problems for the residents. I’m thinking of added traffic, parking and safety issues, excessive noise and blinding lights.

The school district initially called this a “stadium project,” but after residents in the surrounding neighborhood opposed the stadium, the district characterized the project as a “sports complex” and then recently a “field renovations project.”

All to make it sound less threatening and to obscure the fact that the district wants to build a stadium. No changes were made to the project itself, only the characterization of it. It is very disappointing that the school district is playing a game of semantics and can’t be more forthright.

Ronald Madaras

Newport Beach

*

What good is high-speed rail project?

I was totally flabbergasted by “Commentary: High-speed rail will meet needs” from March 30.

It was written by Michelle Boehm, Southern California regional director of the California High Speed Rail Authority. She’s endorsing the project to protect her job and salary.

You can fly to San Francisco faster than you can travel on a 200-mph train that stops here and there en route. Even recognizing the problems and delays in air travel, it will beat the train every time.

How does Boehm propose to finance the project? :

•$300 million from cap-and-trade proceeds.

•33% of future cap-and-trade proceeds.

•$3.3 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Grant funds.

•$6 billion to $12 billion in capital from the private sector.

All of it paid for with other people’s money.

The high-speed rail project will not “meet needs.” It will leave the statewide transportation problem unresolved.

Douglas M. Wood

Newport Beach