Category: Irvine

Mayor Larry Agran’s vision to make Irvine the greenest city in America builds on decades of leadership. His early efforts helped establish Irvine’s renowned park system — now ranked No. 1 in California and No. 2 in the entire nation — and launched a goal to plant 500,000 trees citywide.

To help reach that goal, the City has launched two new programs giving residents opportunities to grow Irvine’s urban forest.

On August 11th, hundreds of cyclists, walkers, and four-legged companions crossed the I-5 Freeway as the new Jeffrey Open Space Trail (JOST) Bicycle & Pedestrian Bridge officially opened.

Made possible in part by $14.5 million in state funding, the bridge represents another step toward Irvine’s vision of an interconnected trail system that could eventually stretch from the Pacific Ocean to the Santa Ana Mountains and Cleveland National Forest.

On November 3rd, Irvine voters will head to the polls to elect the City’s Mayor.

In the coming weeks, Irvine Community News & Views will provide more detailed information regarding the leading candidates running for Mayor and City Council.

The Irvine City Council has approved a five-year agreement with Innovation Baseball Partners (IBP) to bring a professional baseball team to the Great Park Championship Baseball Stadium beginning next summer.

Community organizations and local teams, including the OC Riptide summer collegiate baseball team, will continue to have access to the stadium.

Irvine Mayor Larry Agran joined more than 150 UCI Health team members and community leaders to celebrate the ribbon-cutting of the new UCI Health – Irvine Rehabilitation Hospital.

The new 52-bed, 70,000-square-foot freestanding rehabilitation hospital will provide specialized care for patients recovering from stroke, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, severe burns, polytrauma, amputations and other complex conditions.

Improvements are currently underway at the William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Center.

The Woollett Aquatics Center and nearby facilities will remain open throughout construction, which is expected to be completed in spring 2028.

What would you do if a major disaster struck and help wasn’t immediately available?

In a City that spans 66 square miles, emergency services may be delayed or overwhelmed in a catastrophic disaster — for example, a major earthquake — leaving residents to care for themselves and their neighbors. CERT training helps bridge that gap by teaching participants how to be more self-reliant and prepared to safely navigate the days and weeks following a large-scale event.

This summer, thousands of Irvine residents attended the free events hosted by the City — including CicloIrvine, a community swim lesson, art exhibits at the Great Park, a community event featuring the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team, the City’s Homecoming Dance, five outdoor concerts at Hicks Canyon Community Park, four movies under the stars at Mike Ward Community Park, the Studio Arts Festival, and a community bike ride.

Residents also showed up in force to support a variety of community projects — harvesting fruits & vegetables for our local food banks, participating in the City’s mobility summit, donating items for local military families, dropping off supplies at the Irvine Animal Care Center, honoring our City’s veterans, and attending the one-year anniversary celebration of our new Irvine Public Library System.

The City of Irvine is partnering with SensoRy AI to deploy an advanced wildfire detection network throughout the Irvine Open Space Preserve, helping firefighters to detect ignitions in their earliest stages and to respond before fires spread.

The low-cost, infrastructure-free system is designed for remote, high-risk areas and complements existing wildfire camera networks by covering gaps they cannot.