These days, local law enforcement officials are keeping closer tabs than usual on attendees of the weekly South OC Cars and Coffee event, according to San Clemente Police Services Capt. Jay Christian.
In an interview on Monday, April 15, with San Clemente Times, Christian detailed the local branches of the California Highway Patrol and Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s efforts to curtail reckless driving related to traffic exiting the recurring car meet. The new enforcement campaign has been ongoing since March 16, a Saturday in which the two agencies combined to laser in on the Outlets at San Clemente, which sees hundreds of varying cars on display and many more people who come to look.
“The CHP Capistrano Area and OCSD San Clemente station get inundated with calls for service relating to vehicles traveling at high rates of speed to include reckless driving and racing, each Saturday, as vehicles travel to and from the San Clemente Area for the event,” CHP Capistrano wrote in a March 25 Facebook post. “As a result of the dangerous driving, the CHP Capistrano Area has investigated several traffic crashes relating to the event.”
CHP added that spectators who gather on overpasses to video cars leaving the event have also caused traffic safety issues.
Local law enforcement has long been aware of the popular car meet – it has been promoted as the world’s biggest weekly car meet featuring hundreds of vehicles on display – that Christian described as a typically peaceful event. San Clemente Police Services also has a solid relationship with the Outlets management team, which has welcomed South OC Cars and Coffee, he continued, and Outlets management has been vocal about asking for additional police presence when necessary.
Further, management meets consistently with Cars and Coffee organization personnel to review event operations, according to Cars and Coffee co-founder James Wehr. Wehr also said Cars and Coffee receives complaints directly through social media, but mostly through Outlets personnel.
Cars and Coffee has taken a “firm stance” as an organization that hosts calm and peaceful events for people to socialize and look at interesting cars, according to Wehr.
“We want people to behave (as safely) inside the property as they do on the outside,” he said. “We ask that people are quiet and respectful, and that's all that we can hope they can do outside the property as well.”
Christian added that the community at large isn’t hesitant to voice their own concerns about event attendees who choose to participate in “exhibitions of speed,” either.
“We get complaints regarding that type of behavior, loud exhausts, speeding and sometimes street racing,” he said. “So, typically, the complaints from the community kind of come in waves, but from time to time, they do come in a little bit more (often) than normal.”
Another recent upswing prompted Christian to reach out to Capt. Brad Palmer of CHP Capistrano, advising Palmer of drivers approaching the Avenida Vista Hermosa and Avenida Pico on-ramps to the Interstate 5 freeway shortly after the conclusion of Cars and Coffee events.
Christian also volunteered San Clemente Police Services’ assistance regarding the safety of pedestrians heading toward those same areas and potential speeding and street racing not only from Vista Hermosa to the on-ramp but on the freeway as well.
The communication between the two law enforcement leaders coincided with CHP Capistrano’s plans to respond to increased calls regarding freeway racing and collisions, according to Christian. On March 16, the Police Services personnel joined with OCSD’s regional traffic office to monitor the Outlets area.
“(The goal was to) work together to not only enforce, but also provide a presence of marked enforcement cars in hopes of educating the public, provide that presence to deter some of that illegal activity, and also enforce the laws related to those illegal activities,” said Christian.
The enforcement campaign resulted in 232 traffic citations, 21 verbal warnings, seven impounds, two pursuits of reckless drivers and two arrests, according to CHP. Christian added that OCSD personnel were involved in issuing 93 citations.
“We issued citations (for) anything from pedestrians in the roadway to speeding, modified exhausts, stop sign violations, red light violations, (and) using handheld cellular devices,” he said. “(It was) basic speed law, so kind of the whole gamut of what you see in a vehicle code violation-type situation.”
Christian described the initial campaign as “very successful,” adding that although he hasn’t received many complaints since, law enforcement will continue to monitor the situation. There are plans to conduct similar operations as the weather warms up, he added.
According to Wehr, the Cars and Coffee events have 32 posted signs that encourage attendees not to burn out their cars, rev their engines, or speed, and to exit quietly and safely.
“I think it's our job to promote safe driving not only on the property but also outside of the Outlets property and on the freeways in the city of San Clemente,” Wehr said. “I think, given the influence that we have, we should use it to try and make sure that people understand that they need to be driving safely if they want to be going to car events.”
He also mentioned the dramatic increase of volunteers, many of them Marines from Camp Pendleton, that Cars and Coffee has brought in to help improve its events.
“It's been a great help to making South OC Cars and Coffee a quieter and more calm event,” he said.