Overview
About Town Center
Town Center is the smallest community the city draws, 71 acres and 1.7 percent of Dana Point, wrapped around the one-way couplet of Pacific Coast Highway and Del Prado Avenue. It holds 725 addresses on 16 named streets, 312 of them on Pacific Coast Hwy and 177 on Del Prado Ave. Every acre of it that the zoning layer maps carries a single designation, Town Center Mixed-Use, over 42.4 acres, and 31.1 acres fall under the Dana Point Town Center Plan.
The housing here sits above the shops: the county totals 595 dwelling units on 171 lots, and the parcel record classes 166 of those lots multiple family with no single family lot at all. La Plaza Park is the one city park inside the boundary, 1.55 miles of bikeway run through it, and the tree inventory holds 505 planted street trees of which 205 are Date Palm. Capistrano Unified feeds Richard Henry Dana Elementary for elementary, Marco Forster Middle for middle and Dana Hills High for high.
History
How Town Center was built
Town Center is the commercial heart of Sidney H. Woodruff's 1920s village, the few blocks where Del Prado and Pacific Coast Highway run side by side above the harbor. Woodruff bought about 1,400 acres here in 1926 backed by the Dana Point Syndicate, began selling lots in 1927 and had houses and commercial buildings up in 1928. He was selling a Mediterranean village by the sea, and the stucco and tile buildings that survive along Del Prado and around La Plaza are what that promise actually produced before the Depression ended it.
The street names are the town's oldest piece of marketing. Golden, Violet and the rest of the lantern streets were named in the summer of 1925 and given ornamental lantern posts between about 1927 and 1929, frosted glass with a colored dome on top, run on underground wiring. Governor Young lit roughly 400 of them in 1929. Fifteen of the originals were restored for La Plaza in 1989, and ten replicas were reproduced in 2014 and 2015 for the stretch of Pacific Coast Highway and Del Prado that runs through this district, which is why the modern lights look old.
By the Numbers
Town Center by the numbers
Lifestyle
The Town Center lifestyle
The Town Center Plan counts over 200 retailers and businesses inside the district, from storefronts of 600 square feet up to larger tenants such as the post office.
More than 30,000 commuters use the Pacific Coast Highway and Del Prado couplet daily on the plan's count.
Lookouts were built at Amber Lantern, Violet Lantern and Old Golden Lantern, connecting to scenic bluff trails and to Heritage Park below.
Schools
Schools serving Town Center
Capistrano Unified serves Town Center. 12 interior points spread across the boundary were run through the district's own address locator. Every point returned the same three campuses.
K-5 · 461 students
6-8 · 930 students
9-12 · 1,725 students
FAQs
Common questions about Town Center
How big is Town Center?
Town Center measures 71 acres on the boundary the City of Dana Point publishes, which is 1.7 percent of the 4,143 acres its eight communities cover between them. Inside it the city records 725 addresses and 171 parcels.
How is Town Center zoned?
The city's zoning layer gives 42.4 acres to Town Center Mixed-use. 31.1 acres fall under (TC-MU) Dana Point Town Center Plan on the specific plan layer.
What are the homes in Town Center like?
The parcel record classes 166 multiple family. On the county record the median lot measures 7,209 square feet and the typical home 2,416 square feet of living space.
When was Town Center built?
The county carries a build year for 112 lots inside the boundary, with a median of 1965. The busiest decades are the 1970s with 29 homes, the 1960s with 26 homes and the 1950s with 22 homes.
Which schools serve Town Center?
Capistrano Unified. Its own address locator, run at 12 interior points inside the boundary, returned R.H.Dana PreK-5 at 12 of 12 points for elementary; Marco Forster MS at 12 of 12 points for middle; Dana Hills HS at 12 of 12 points for high.