The Ladera Ranch plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
34° on Nov. 17, 1958, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1921. Next is 37° in 1938.
Ladera Ranch’s center stands about 540 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 250 ft to 900 ft, a difference of 650 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Santiago Peak, about 5,660 ft, 11 miles north-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Miocene marine rocks (sandstone, mudstone), from the Oligocene to Pliocene, 2.6 to 34 million years old.
The section below crosses 8 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 5×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sandstone, mudstone. Age: Oligocene to Pliocene, 2.6 to 34 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Coarse-detrital. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Argillite. Age: Paleozoic to Late Jurassic, 145 to 542 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Coarse-detrital. Age: Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Mudstone, sandstone. Age: Paleocene to Oligocene, 23 to 66 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Sandstone, conglomerate. Age: Middle Eocene to Early Miocene, 16 to 48 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 2 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Ladera Ranch reaches the Pacific Ocean by way of Horno Creek and San Juan Creek: about 7 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Ladera Ranch; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Ladera Ranch has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 74° in September; winter nights fall to about 50° in January. About 9 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Ladera Ranch normally reaches 69° and falls to 55°. The record high is 81°, in 1940; the record low 39°, in 1938. The most rain on this date, 1.11 in, fell in 1944.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1921 at Newport Beach Harbor, 14 miles west, 530 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.