Crowds, Traffic, Fun Are In Season Today

So what if it was the day before Memorial Day weekend started? So what if this kicked off Orange County’s summer season? Who cared if Balboa Peninsula cruisers would be driving residents and cops crazy?

None of this mattered to the 200 party-hearty Vacaville High seniors at Balboa Pier on Friday, 440 miles from home, enjoying Day One of grad weekend in Newport Beach. And as 18-year-old Mary Ford put it, this was as fine as a tropical island. “It’s the closest thing to Hawaii,� she said.

From beaches to airports, from Disneyland in Anaheim to water rides in Irvine, Orange County is hosting its annual ground zero celebration for hordes of Memorial Day weekend revelers. The crowd bomb goes off today.

No, these aren’t any lazy, hazy days. Predicted hot sun and cloudless skies over the Memorial Day weekend means “we’re expecting a big crowd,� said Debbie Hutton, a spokeswoman for Wild Rivers amusement park in Irvine. Park faucets will be wide open, she said, gushing more than 4 million gallons of water an hour to flush visitors down flumes and tubes.

But the real thrill for crowd-lovers should come on those wide ribbons of asphalt crisscrossing the county that some rather loosely call freeways.

“The best thing to do if you’re heading out is to have left yesterday,� joked Matt Clark, a California Highway Patrol spokesman in Santa Ana. “The whole world is trying to get away, and those that don’t make it are stuck in traffic.�

Clark advised motorists trying to escape the crush of cars to avoid midday driving and plan for trips early in the morning and late in the evening.

The CHP is serious about drinking and driving, however, Clark said. Extra officers will be out patrolling the Costa Mesa, Santa Ana, San Diego and Riverside freeways this weekend. “We’re out to save lives,� he said.

While the CHP in Orange County won’t be running any sobriety checkpoints this weekend, Clark said officers in Los Angeles County will be.

John Wayne Airport officials reported the usual holiday weekend crowds.

But TWA customer service representative Marty Larsen has seen much worse. “It’s not like Christmas or Thanksgiving,� Larsen reported from the airline’s ticket counter. “Since school here isn’t out yet, it’s not that bad.�

The county’s two largest beach cities will probably take the brunt of the holiday weekend crowds.

In Newport Beach, city police and lifeguards are girding for the onslaught of teen-agers that historically pack the oceanfront from Pacific Coast Highway to the tip of the Balboa Peninsula.

About 120,000 Each Day

“We expect about 120,000 people each day of the weekend,� said Jim Turner, Newport Beach marine safety officer. “It’s like a whole city goes down and parks on the beach.�

Turner pointed out that the weather will dictate whether Newport Beach’s 6 miles of beachfront will be a wall of humanity or not.

There are only 1,100 municipal parking spaces at two lots--both near the city’s two piers.

“On weekends like this, I only come to the beach to work and when the surf’s up,� said Turner, an Irvine resident. “We’re organizing a softball game and going to Grandma’s house.�

As they have done periodically for the past 2 years, Newport Beach police will monitor traffic on the Balboa Peninsula, a perennial teen-age cruising strip, throughout the holiday weekend. They will simply shut down Balboa Boulevard if it “backs up� too much, said Officer Robert Oakley, a Newport Beach Police spokesman.

To forestall that gridlock, 14 extra officers--six from the CHP--have been assigned to operate a checkpoint at 15th Street and Balboa Boulevard, where motorists will only be allowed onto the peninsula if they can demonstrate they are there for business or are going home.

Special Lane

A special lane is kept open for emergency vehicles and residents, who must have a city-issued sticker on their windshield to show that they are among the peninsula’s nearly 6,000 residents.

Responding to pleas from beachfront residents, the City Council Monday night gave final reading to an ordinance that sets an 11 p.m. curfew at all city beaches. It does not become effective, however, until June 21.

“It looks like we’ll have good weather, and so it should be busy,� Oakley said.

Even without the Huntington Beach Pier to stroll and frolic upon, lifeguards along the 8 miles of beaches in that city are expecting huge crowds. About 50,000 people a day are expected throughout the 3-day weekend in the 3.5 miles of city-run beach from Bolsa Chica State Beach south to Beach Boulevard.

“You’ve got to be here by 10 in the morning,� said Huntington Beach Marine Safety Officer Steve Reuters, “because we will be sold out by 11. You won’t get a parking place in the lot after that.�

There are about 2,600 parking spaces between the Huntington Beach Pier and Beach Boulevard, less than last year because the city has banned parking along Pacific Coast Highway in an area in which a bluff-top park is being completed.

Reuters offered a few public safety tips for beach-goers this weekend: Always check with a lifeguard before swimming to learn of any riptides in the area, swim in front of a lifeguard tower so that you are more easily seen if problems arise, and do not enter the waves if you have been drinking alcohol.

“Saltwater and alcohol don’t mix,� Reuters said.

Alcohol is banned on city beaches but permitted on the state-owned beaches in Huntington Beach.

But it’s the spirit of youth that will propel those busloads of Vacaville High seniors through their hectic weekend. Balboa on Friday, then off to Disneyland for the night and then a Santa Catalina tour today, followed by Magic Mountain on Sunday.

And then? Back home to Vacaville, said bus driver Dan Griffin. “They crash out.�