The majority of recent housing development in Pasadena has been about getting people into high-density structures near public transportation. Take the Del Mar Gold Line station, for example. If you draw a half-mile circle around the Del Mar station, you’ll see how much new (and pricey) housing has sprouted up within walking distance.
I suggest that Pasadena uses the same logic when it comes to building soccer fields. Let’s put them in neighborhoods where people can walk or bike to them. Let’s make soccer fields accessible to families who may not have a car for every driving-aged person in the house.
The field at the north side of John Muir High School has been used for soccer for a long time. Why not develop that into something permanent? What about other schools? Other sites nearer to where people live?
Taking a relatively pristine natural area, an area contiguous with the Angeles National Forest, and paving it over with a parking lot to serve a soccer field makes no sense. The area is a natural watershed—let’s keep it that way.
Did you know that JPL is a Superfund site? Here’s the web site. They are working with the City of Pasadena to build a treatment plant “to help restore lost water resources to that community and to help remove groundwater chemicals originating at the site of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.” This is yet another reason to keep the Hahamongna watershed free of any further development.
Read more from my compatriots. I’ve tried to include links to the relevant posts:
Altadena Above It All – Cha cha cha!
A Thinking Stomach – Something Precious
East of Allen – Keep It Natural
Finnegan Begin Again – Hahamongna Watershed Park
Mr. Earl’s Musings – Words will not be minced!
My Life with Tommy – Hahamongna: Wisdom & Gift
Pasadena Adjacent – Hahamongna
West Coast Grrlie Blather 
Excellent point, Kelly. Soccer fields at Hahamongna fly in the face of everything Pasadena says it stands for, and this is just one more illustration of that.
Here! Here! (You knew I’d love the title.)
Nicely put. In its literature, Pasadena argues that it is green and community oriented. The soccer fields are in direct opposition to the values Pasadena claims to hold.
If Pasadena would only adhere to their own guidelines, there wouldn’t be a question of turning Hahamongna into athletic fields and all that goes with them. Excellent post!
I brought up this issue to a woman who lives nearby. She knew nothing of what was taking place. She did tell me that she was talking to one of the DWP folks who said that after the rains, one of their guys stuck his hand in the collected storm waters without a glove. Guess what? he experienced burning. He can back up JPL’s activity.
I talked to some of the workers out there. They said if they went into the water without hip boots they got poison ivy. At least that’s what they thought it was.
Fine points. So the question I am most curious about is who wants the fields in Hahamongna?
That question has plagued me, Roberta. People keep asking me and I don’t know the answer. Some say it’s the AYSO. Some say it’s sports equipment companies who are ready to spend the money.
But these are certainly not a democratic majority of citizens, and the parents I’ve talked to of kids in the league don’t want the soccer fields. I haven’t talked to everyone, obviously. And maybe because they know I don’t want the fields they’re not being honest with me. But I think if we took a vote in town we’d find that the population is either overwhelmingly against these fields or they don’t even know what we’re talking about.
Kelly, you are the official smartypants of Pasadeneeeenah. This just in from Chris Holden:::
“The council will discuss Hahamonga and soccer fields on Monday. I would prefer to see the existing passive use of the open space maintained and believe the grant money allocated to the field(s) could be re-allocated to one of the John Muir HS fields, given, the same general service area as Hahamonga.”
I’m thrilled to hear this! Muir has the space; I was just there the other day. Not to mention things like bathroom facilities are already in place. Where did you find this quote? Star-News?
Chris Holden responded via Facebook. 🙂
I’m guessing there’s a good possibility that on Monday night the city council will consider a change to the master plan provisions related to soccer fields.