Overview
About Normandale
Normandale covers 29.5 acres and holds 150 homes on ten streets, with a median lot of 6,907 square feet. The city's zoning layer gives 3.7 acres inside the boundary a medium density residential designation and 2.1 acres open space, and the whole boundary sits in FEMA flood zone X.
The city's pool layer counts 54 backyard pools inside the boundary, 30 spas and 30 solar installations, and no shared pool. That is more than one private pool for every three homes. Normandale is one of only seven Lake Forest communities on this site assigned to Trabuco Hills High, while its elementary school, Lake Forest Elementary, serves eleven of the fifty and Serrano Intermediate is the middle school for thirty-five of the fifty, more than any other campus.
View available homes in NormandaleHistory
How Normandale was built
Normandale sits on what was Rancho Canada de los Alisos, the 10,668 acre grant Governor Juan Bautista Alvarado made to Jose Antonio Serrano in 1842 and Pio Pico enlarged in 1846. Serrano ran cattle here for hides and tallow until the drought that began in 1863 killed the herds.
Dwight Whiting, a Bostonian, bought most of the rancho in 1884 and set out to build an English village he called Aliso City. He brought a rail line through, subdivided the land, and planted olives, grape vines and roughly 400 acres of eucalyptus near Serrano Creek as a lumber crop intended to draw settlers. The soil and the climate defeated him. The eucalyptus grew into a forest instead, and Occidental Petroleum built houses among the trees in the late 1960s while digging two artificial lakes, which is where the city's name came from at incorporation in 1991. The city's build year layer places Normandale itself in the 1980s.
By the Numbers
Normandale by the numbers
Lifestyle
The Normandale lifestyle
Lake Forest keeps 31 parks open from dawn to dusk. The Lake Forest Sports Park and Recreation Center opened in November 2014 on 86 acres, with 57 of them given over to sports fields, and the city runs the largest free skatepark in Orange County at Etnies Skatepark.
Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park holds 1,575 acres of county open space against the north edge of the city, and the city's trail map carries 49 named trails.
Across the whole city the general plan sets 3,756 acres to residential use and 3,065 acres to open space and parks, which is why so much of Lake Forest reads as green from the ridgelines.
Schools
Schools serving Normandale
The City of Lake Forest property record names Lake Forest Elementary for all 163 addresses in Normandale, with Serrano Intermediate for middle school and Trabuco Hills High for high school. There is no split at any level. All three are Saddleback Valley Unified campuses.
9-12 · 2,475 students
7-8 · 868 students
K-6 · 640 students
FAQs
Common questions about Normandale
How big is Normandale?
The community covers 29.5 acres on the city's published boundary and holds 150 homes on 163 parcels across ten streets. The median parcel measures 6,907 square feet.
When was Normandale laid out?
All five subdivision maps inside the boundary were recorded on a single day, December 11, 1987, all drawn by Greiner Engineering of California and signed by Mark S. Anderson. The city's build year layer places 23.9 acres of building footprint in the 1981 to 1990 band.
Which schools serve Normandale?
The city's property record names Lake Forest Elementary, Serrano Intermediate and Trabuco Hills High for all 163 addresses inside the boundary, with no split at any level. Normandale is one of seven Lake Forest communities on this site assigned to Trabuco Hills rather than El Toro High. All three are Saddleback Valley Unified campuses.
Is there a community pool?
No. The city's pool layer records 54 pools inside the boundary and every one is a private backyard pool, alongside 30 spas and 30 solar installations.
Who provides water and fire cover?
Irvine Ranch Water District supplies water, and Orange County Fire Authority Station 54 at 19811 Pauling covers the addresses. Street sweeping runs Friday between 10am and 2pm and the ZIP code is 92630.