City, Orange County
© McCormack's Guides
Zip Codes: 92885, 92886, 92887
Bedroom
city, Upper middle class. Handsome and well-maintained. Built over gentle and
steep hills. Many homes have views of countryside. Population 69,273. www.mccormacks.com
Mix of new
and fairly new and some old, including birthplace of Richard Nixon, who did not
start out with silver spoon in mouth. The late president was born in a
bungalow, about 900 square feet, built by his father. The one-story building
has a tiny second-story loft, where Nixon and brother slept.
Home is
now part of Presidential-Library Museum. Nice place to visit, even if you weren’t
a fan of RN: roses, miniature fruit trees, memorabilia, pool. Must-see for
history buffs; almost a shrine for conservatives. Intellectually, a plus for
Yorba Linda. It calls attention to the larger world and its complexities.
Click for regional or detailed map
Yorba
Linda has one of the lowest crime rates among Orange County cities. Zero
homicides in 2005, one in 2004, zero in 2003, 2002, 2001, one in 2000, one in
1999, zero in 1998 and 1997, one in 1996 and for preceding years, 0, 2, 0, 2,
1. See Crime.
The
Placentia-Yorba Linda school district serves Placentia, Yorba Linda and parts
of Fullerton and Anaheim. Scores are a little difficult to break out but the
elementary and middle schools in Yorba Linda land usually in the 70th to 90th
percentile compared to other public schools in state. Childcare at many of the
schools. See Schools.
In 2002,
the district passed a $102 million bond to renovate and build four schools.
Another elementary school was opened in 2005, a middle school is to open in 2008
in Placentia. www.mccormacks.com
Yorba
Linda doesn't have a high school. It desperately wants one and for years has
been trying to resolve arguments and lawsuits and sort out finances to secure
one. Finally, everything seems in place. The school, budgeted at $100 million,
is to be located at Bastanchury Road and Fairmont Boulevard. Plans call for a
state-of-the-art facility with an enrollment of 2,000. Fingers crossed, the
school authorities say the school should open in 2009.
With this
schedule, attendance boundaries might be redrawn in 2008. For the present, most
Yorba Linda teens attend Esperanza High in Anaheim. The remainder wind up at
Valencia and El Dorado High in Placentia.
Yorba
Linda Friends, a popular church in town, plans to build a high school that
could enroll 1,200 students. Construction might start in 2008.
The state
in 2010 counted 22,103 housing units, of which 17,399 were single detached,
2,395 single attached, 1,998 multiples and 311 mobile homes. Owner-occupied
units outnumber rentals 85 percent to 15, the census reported.
For the
most part, Yorba Linda is built on gentle hills and mesas that rise from the
Santa Ana River. About the middle and at the east end of town, the housing
takes off into steep hills. Many of the steep homes are quite new, some
upscale: built off of a tract design but with nicer touches, for example, slate
or brick facing instead of all stucco, five bedrooms instead of three or four.
Developers call them “executive homes.” www.mccormacks.com
Although
most residents are within a mile or three of a freeway, Yorba Linda comes
across as somewhat secluded. Regional parks border the town on the north and
the west, and on the south, the Santa Ana River and another park pretty much
define the boundaries (although a strip of Anaheim creeps in here).
Yorba
Linda saw development coming and in 1957 incorporated as a city, which gave the
locals control over planning. The city started the 1960s with fewer than 800
homes and apartments. That decade saw the construction of 2,400 residential
units and the town roared through the 1970s with 5,700 more homes, townhouses
and apartments. Then it got even busier: 7,200 residential units in the 1980s.
In the
1990s, which saw the construction of about 3,300 units, the town concentrated
home construction to the east side (Bryant Ranch). Homes and apartments were
built along the flats of Palma Avenue and in the steep hills above Palma.
In the 2000s,
a housing-commercial project, called Vista del Verde, was built in northwest
hills. Master planned. It includes 2,100 homes and a public golf course (18
holes), the third in town. Streets terrace up the hillsides, creating views for
homes. Unusual touch, public art.
Yorba
Linda has two “vistas.” On the west side, the city looks across the long fairly
flat approach to the Pacific. On clear days, you can see Santa Catalina Island
from some points. www.mccormacks.com
About the
center of the city, the Santa Ana Mountains begin their rise. Many residents in
the center and on the east side of Yorba Linda have sweeping views of the river
valley and the Santa Anas.
The
topography plays some pleasant tricks. On maps and from a distance, Fairmont
Avenue seems to rise up, up, ever up. Rise it does but then it dips into hidden
valleys with large homes and horse ranchettes before it rises again. Fairmont
Avenue divides the city in housing styles: to the west, the old town and the
first suburbs, to the east, the new suburbia.
When you
drive the west side of Yorba Linda, the old section, you will see here and
there a small house, a little faded, maybe in need of paint. But even here
almost all the housing falls into middle to upper middle-class.
Developers
and the city’s planners, probably from the beginning of the city’s modern
period, made a clear decision to move in the strata of middle-plus.
In the
1960s, this might be defined as ranch or colonial; see the two-story homes around
Brooklyn Street. In the 1990s, the dominant upper-middle style all over the
county seems to be two-story pink stucco with a tile roof. Inside these homes,
you’ll often find four bedrooms, large kitchens, 2.5 bathrooms, three-car
garages and those little “big” touches such as walk-in closets. The older homes
will often have larger lots than the newer ones, especially when the new
housing is in the hills. www.mccormacks.com
Some homes
near the downtown are horse ranches. Horse and bicycle trails meander through
the town.
In Yorba
Linda, the lawns are mowed, the shrubs trimmed, the landscaping often more
accomplished than found in other towns. Trees line many of streets and blossom,
seasonally, with flowers (crepe myrtles). Median strips are planted with yellow
flowers.
City has
set up tax districts to fund landscaping and requires homeowner associations to
do their part. Unexpected touches: some corn and strawberry fields, small
groves of orange trees. Downtown spruced up: benches, decorative streetlights,
brick crosswalks.
Town
library, Nixon library, bowling alley, 27 parks, including a sports parks,
performing arts center, community center, community gym, equestrian center.
Many horse trails. Community college. Usual kid activities: baseball, soccer,
football, etc. Adult sports leagues. Civic light opera.
On
weekends, many people bike or stroll the trails along the Santa Ana River. Yorba
Linda, on its north and east side, borders a large state park that rambles over
the rugged Chino hills. www.mccormacks.como:p>
Neighborhood
shops, plazas and large discount stores. Home Depot, Borders Books, Costco,
office park, Kaiser medical offices in Savi Ranch section on Weir Canyon
Road.
Yorba
Linda showcases the conveniences of modern suburbia. The supermarkets stock
sushi and wines that range from $7 to $150. Starbucks and rivals will load you
with exotic coffees, espressos, lattes and mochas. Fast-food restaurants abound
but if you want haute cuisine, the drive is short.
Toll
highway to Irvine speeds the commute for many. Other freeway improvements have
made the drive to Riverside and San Bernardino counties easier. Imperial
Highway, one the main roads through Yorba Linda, was widened and in parts
converted into an expressway. Trains to Riverside County and other parts of
Orange.
Yorba
Linda sits on the Orange County border, an important commute point. Over the
last 25 years, development has exploded in the two counties east of Yorba Linda
— San Bernardino and Riverside. This has greatly increased the traffic on
Highway 91, the main freeway serving Yorba Linda. In response, many
improvements, including toll lanes, have been made to this road.
While
Yorba Linda suffers, it does not suffer remotely as much as the people who have
keep slogging onward and onward on Highway 91. With Yorba Linda, it pays to
become acquainted with the half dozen parkways or arterials that run through
the town. When the freeway jams, the parkways can save your sanity. www.mccormacks.com
• Nixon
library recently replicated the White House East Room and doubled the size of
the library. Another addition, the White House in Miniature, a model that in
detail shows every room in the White House.
• Yorba
Linda and Anaheim are building a berm to dampen train noise between the
Imperial Highway and Weir Canyon Road.
• Permits
taken at city hall show that many residents are building a second story to their
homes.
• Boys and
Girls Club starting after-school programs at Yorba Middle School. Local Rotary
put up $50,000 for the project. The Boys and Girls run a similar program at
Paine Elementary.
• In 2005,
despite opposition, the city council approved a town center that would bring in
homes, shops, restaurants and a high-end supermarket. Many residents were not
sold on the project and in 2006 they passed a referendum that requires the city
to get voter approval for certain zoning and planning changes. www.mccormacks.com
• In its
early life, Yorba Linda was “dry” — no booze sold, a reflection of the
town's Quaker heritage. Over recent decades, a few restaurants began serving
wine and liquor and of course the supermarkets sell both.
Chamber of
commerce (714) 993-9537.
City web
site: www.ci.yorba-linda.ca.us
