Griffith after the ashes

Tucked away amid the ash-covered slopes of Griffith Park, a tiny, eccentric garden clings to life like a green island on the land.

Some garden-hungry park-goer claimed this real estate several months ago, bringing two well-used lawn chairs and planting a personalized mix of cactus, crown of thorns and green-spiked iris. City officials helped provide water to the patch and, at the request of the 93-year-old gardener, added a concrete bench left over from the 1984 Olympics.

The small plot escaped the fire that burned nearly a quarter of the park last month. But as officials plan for restoration, tough questions are arising about the very nature of a park that, like the megalopolis around it, is an eclectic, even messy hodge-podge of needs, desires and identities.

Should this be a people’s park where Angelenos can surreptitiously plant nonnative iris amid the sage scrub? Is it a refuge for hikers, golfers, tai chi devotees and equestrians? Should it have more room for soccer players, softball teams and picnickers?

Or should one of the nation’s largest urban parks evolve even more into a nature preserve, protected from people so that native wildlife and plants can thrive?

It’s a increasingly political debate that has profound implications for both the park and the city, where a dearth of parkland and recreation space has made the hills and canyons of Griffith Park a refuge for thousands each weekend, including many low-income families with few other open-space options.

Some conservationists and scientists look at burned hills and see a blank slate, a golden opportunity to restore much of the park’s rugged interior to its once-wild state.

Backers of that idea believe the fire did so much damage in part because nonnative species spread haphazardly for decades as visitors tracked in exotic mustard, planted eucalyptus and carved their own trails up Mt. Hollywood. Even the bird sanctuary was shaded by redwoods and other trees not normally found in Los Angeles.

Now, they envision a resurgence of native chaparral, with plants such as toyon, laurel sumac and blue-flowering lupine luring back back a wealth of wildlife.

“Oh, God, you’d have an incredible diversity of birds,” said Garry George, executive director of Los Angeles Audubon. “You’d have many species of western wood warbler, flycatchers, vireos, all sorts of birds coming through.”

Others fear that too much emphasis on chaparral could strip Griffith Park of its distinctive, crazy-quilt feel -- eucalyptus from Australia, ice plant from Madagascar, the pocket parks.

The debate doesn’t just involve plants.

Some argue that a park-poor city like Los Angeles cannot afford to entirely turn over the park to nature. After all, its peaks, canyons and flatlands account for 26% of the city’s 15,700 acres of parkland.

“Griffith Park is at a pivotal place,” said Councilman Ed Reyes, who thinks it’s time for the park to better serve lowerincome youths who live a short bike ride away in areas such as Lincoln Heights.

“I know it’s going to raise a lot of fireworks,” he added, “because people there now really treasure their sense of isolation and exclusivity.”

Park as safety valve

The man who created this sprawling park in 1896 viewed it as a venue to relieve the pressures of urban life.

“Public parks are a safety valve of great cities,” wrote wealthy mining expert Col. Griffith J. Griffith, who envisioned a park “for the rank and file of the plain people.” He gave the city 3,000 acres of his ranch, which then sat amid undeveloped land a mile north of the city, on the far eastern slopes of the Santa Monica Mountains. Since then, a growing constellation of city landmarks -- the zoo, Griffith Observatory, the Autry museum complex and the Greek Theatre -- have made it a city centerpiece.

Even before the fire, this promised to be a pivotal year for Griffith Park.

City officials unveiled a master plan two years ago that included many new features at the park, including two aerial trams and parking garages. Backers saw the plan as a way to make the park more accessible. But many groups attacked it, arguing that the park’s rustic character would be threatened. The city is waiting for a new version being drafted by a panel of community groups.

“Griffith wanted it to be left in its most natural state,” said Marva-Lea Kornblatt of Burbank’s Rancho Equestrian District, where residents can ride their horses straight into the park.

In June, the city will also begin studying what residents throughout the city need and want in their parks.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said there is a “delicate balancing act” surrounding the park, but promised, “Whatever we do here we’re going to do with community consensus.”

Before the fire, the hilly interior contained huge swaths of native habitat -- despite the eucalyptus, Canary Island pines and other motley plantings at popular spots such as Dante’s View and Captain’s Roost. Hikers have planted their own trees around the park. Dante’s View was a hilltop retreat of nonnative trees planted over the last 50 years by park users.

There is widespread agreement that the fire offers opportunity, but there is disagreement about what kind.

“The fire did what no one could afford to do in this environment, to just be clearing the fire hazard, the invasive species, the buildup of fuel,” said Andy Lipkis, founder of the nonprofit group TreePeople, which is working with the city on its Million Tree campaign.

Left alone, the burn area would rejuvenate naturally with native plants, predict scientists who specialize in post-fire ecology (some nonnative plants might return, too). But a drought spreading into next year could strain the natural cycle.

Despite the push by environmentalists to let nature take its course, city officials said they plan to do selective reseeding and tree replanting as part of a $50-million recovery plan -- particularly on hillsides judged to be a mudslide risk. Councilman Tom LaBonge, who represents the park, said he would not be opposed to the planting of nonnative trees at some of the preserves along hiking trails.

Councilman Reyes said officials should be thinking about ways to make the park more accessible to residents from around the city, not just the affluent ones who live in the foothills around the park.

“Right now,” he said, “the knee-jerk reaction has been more, ‘This is mine, I want to keep it.... I paid my million, $2 million, $3 million for my house. I paid for this.’ ”

He suggested moving more quickly on a Los Angeles River bike trail leading directly into the park, making it easier for children to get in. Another idea suggested by some: Better linking of mass transit lines -- bus and maybe eventually rail -- to the park.

Raul Macias, founder of the Anahuak Youth Soccer Assn., sees firsthand the effects of active, competitive sports and fresh air on the more than 2,000 boys and girls in the league. He envisions a park that fosters more activity -- perhaps with climbing walls and tree bridges -- and ways to draw city youths and whole families into nature.

“The kids forgot how to play in the trees, run in the grass,” he said. “I want green areas, where you can tell a kid, ‘Look, this is a pine, this is a cypress.’

“It’s a perfect time right now. This opportunity will never happen right again, to keep our families in the park.”

Closure a sore point

As if to illustrate Col. Griffith’s description of the park as a pressure valve, some residents are lobbying to be allowed back into the shut-off interior.

Park managers warn that the fire dangerously eroded hiking trails, undermined boulders and weakened trees. Dry soil is slipping down onto roadbeds. On the popular Fern Canyon Trail, familiar to generations of city schoolchildren, canyon stairs are sliding into a gully crossed by the skeletal remains of a wooden footbridge.

Parks General Manager Jon Kirk Mukri told a packed audience at a public meeting last week that he was “taking it slow and safe” and that the unburned sections of the park could be reopened within two to three weeks.

That’s not soon enough for some. Glendale resident Bob Star stomped out midway through the meeting, complaining that the Mukri was being too cautious.

“I’m a hiker, and I don’t like being kept out of the park,” Star yelled outside the hall. “They’ve got the whole damn place shut down.”

Equestrians from Burbank complained that their park access remained closed while other stables near Hollywood had already been allowed to ride on select trails. And when Bob and Elaine Robak, a couple in their mid-50s, rode their bicycles into the park last week, a locked gate barred them from a trail leading uphill.

“Just open it up if the fire is over with,” Elaine Robak said plaintively. “Just let us in.”

Amid the passionate debate, the natural rhythms are already returning to Griffith Park. Albert Torres, chief ranger for the parks department, says birds are keeping to their spring migration schedule, with the hooded oriole and black-and-white Phainopepla arriving from the south the week of the fire. Although some birds lost nests in the fire, others took shelter in unburned chaparral nearby.

Only 10 nights after the fire, Torres spotted his first seasonal glow worm. It was in the burn area, which delighted him. “It was a hopeful sign,” he said.

In the tiny patch of iris and cactus, a bag of Scotts cactus mix sits neatly under the Olympic bench, waiting for the surreptitious gardener to return.

deborah.schoch@latimes.com

ashraf.khalil@latimes.com