‘Berm-Front View’ Is Just Not the Same

“I think it’s awful,” John Uffelman says. I could see his point. Life is tough all over but nowhere as tough as it is this winter for residents on Seashore Drive in Newport Beach. The 29-year-old Uffelman doesn’t even live on the street, which happens to be a beachfront address, but he grew up in this town--a ways down on 27th Street--and feels the residents’ pain.

This may be a good time to tell our cyberspace readers in places like Michigan and North Dakota that I’m talking to Uffelman as he’s sitting on a beach chair in late November, barefoot and shirtless, reading a book on traveling in Latin America, while his dog lazes at his feet. It’s early on a Friday afternoon and we’re maybe a couple hundred feet from the Pacific Ocean. Oh, yeah, and it’s real sunny and the temperature is pushing 70.

Now, back to our sad story. If you’re lucky enough to be able to live or come to the beach in Southern California, the one thing no one can take away is the ocean. If you can just make your way to the sand, you can stare at “the water” to your heart’s content.

But now this.

The source of Uffelman’s annoyance is a sand and dirt wall some 100 feet or so in front of him--directly in his line of sight to water’s edge. In fact, from about 54th Street down to the Newport Pier, it’s virtually impossible for anyone to see the coastline from their Seashore Drive patio--unless they happen to own a pair of stilts or live on the second floor. To people who live here or pay big rents up to $3,000 a month, the inability to grasp the full panorama of the Pacific is not something to take lightly.

All of which the city of Newport Beach found out as angry residents have protested this local version of the Berlin Wall. It went up a few weeks ago and until very recently had been as high as seven to eight feet.

Residents’ complaints forced the city to shrink it by about half, but the wall is still an effective partition.

Uffelman says he cruises down to the beach three or four times a week from neighboring Costa Mesa, either to surf or read. It’s a definite bummer to look at a wall. A person brings a chair and book to the beach to look at the water and soak up the relaxing vibe it sends back at you. “The only nice part about it,” Uffelman says of the wall, “is that it keeps the police and lifeguards [on the other side of it] from being able to see my dog.”

Why would the city do such a hideous thing? Well, it seems officials have this crazy notion about protecting these million-dollar homes from getting buffeted by the El Nino-related storms predicted for the winter. The city probably thought everyone would appreciate the idea of erecting a buffer.

I talked to several people on the beach Friday. Most didn’t like the berm but for different reasons. Property owner Barbara Tolman says the city put it up way too soon. Neither did it notify owners far enough in advance, she says, so they could tell renters about the, uh, slight adjustment in the aesthetics. Now, Tolman says, at least one angry tenant wants a significant discount in the $2,000-a-month rent.

It can’t be said that everyone hates the wall. Margaret Wynne, who bought her property near 37th Street in 1982, looked at me funny when I talked about the “sacred and mystical” power of being able to gaze at the shore. Maybe that’s because the last time El Nino visited--not long after she moved in--it left water half an inch from her back door.

“I’m all for it,” she says of the wall. “I’m disappointed they brought it down a few feet. I live here because of the view, but I know the power of the sea. I don’t underestimate it. Here in Newport Beach, life is so easy and there’s so much money to throw around, people think nothing bad is ever going to happen here. Well, hello.”

Some people are philosophical about the wall, like 10-year resident Sarah Kibushim, who lives farther up the coast around 49th Street. “It’s not the same,” she says with a sigh, about the restricted ocean view. “I don’t like it [the wall], but I can see the reason for it--if we need it. If we need it, fine.”

That gets us into a whole ugly area we don’t want to explore--what if no El Nino? What if this earthen monstrosity sits there all winter and El Nino never shows up?

Like I said, life’s tough. Used to be, a guy like Uffelman could come down to the beach in November and let his thoughts drift as he looked unimpeded across the blue Pacific. Not this winter. “You take looking at the shoreline for granted, don’t you?” I say to him.

He nods. “Unfortunately,” he says, “now I have to walk 100 feet to see the ocean.”

I write down what he says, then look up at him.

Yes, he was smiling, the way good-looking guys with year-round tans in Southern California always seem to smile.

It was a smile that let me know he’s fully aware of just how awful life can get out here. I wonder if they understand that in Bismarck and Grand Rapids.

Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by calling (714) 966-7821, by writing to him at The Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or by e-mail at [email protected].