Santa Fe Plans to Start Development of Large Chatsworth Tract

One of the largest undeveloped tracts in the San Fernando Valley, 60 acres in Chatsworth used mainly for strawberry farming, will sprout buildings soon if its owner can carry out plans to develop it.

The owner is Santa Fe Pacific Realty Corp., formed from the partial merger of the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific railroads. Its stated intention is to begin developing the land now and finish within five or six years.

Although the company’s plans for the property aren’t yet firm, Brian Weber, its director of development, said he has hopes of building a shopping center on part of it and an office and industrial complex on the rest.

But a shopping center would require Los Angeles City Council approval, since the land is zoned for light manufacturing. Such council action seems unlikely.

Bernson’s View

“I would oppose any type of commercial retail operation,” said Councilman Hal Bernson, whose district includes the Chatsworth property. The council usually defers to the district councilman in such cases, so a variance would need Bernson’s support.

Prefers Industrial Use

Bernson said he wants the land to remain industrial because it would produce jobs for the district. And Al Landini, a planner in the Van Nuys office of the Los Angeles Planning Department, said there are several other factors that make retail development a bad idea, including lack of freeway access and the city’s shortage of well-located industrial land.

The land is bounded roughly by Plummer Street on the north, Prairie Street on the south and Winnetka Avenue on the west. It continues east across Oakdale Avenue to the Limekiln Canyon Wash, a drainage ditch, and also extends south between Oakdale and Nordhoff Place to where the two streets meet.

The property is what is left of a 143-acre parcel stretching to Corbin Avenue that is already more than half-covered with industrial and office buildings. Some of those buildings are west of Oakdale, in fact, giving the undeveloped property an irregular shape.

Departure for Company

But all the existing buildings were built by developers who leased or purchased the land from the Southern Pacific Industrial Development, which owned it until its real estate operations were merged with those of the Santa Fe in December, 1983.

Now, in a departure from past practice, Santa Fe Pacific wants to act as developer itself, Weber said. Santa Fe Pacific has already made several “build-to-suit” proposals to potential customers, and a sign offering to build facilities on the land will be posted there shortly, Weber said.

The city’s master plan for the neighborhood calls for the land to remain industrial but it does permit up to 50% of the development to be used for offices associated with manufacturing on the site, Landini said.

Handful of Shops

The city planner said the law also would allow a few retail businesses to serve people working in the surrounding area. So a mixture of light manufacturing, offices and a handful of shops and restaurants is likely for the parcel, he said.

Acknowledging Bernson’s opposition to commercial development, Weber said he planned to meet with the councilman and try to persuade him to change his mind. And, if that doesn’t work, he said, “we’ll proceed with industrial development.”

That would probably make the land less valuable. Seth Dudley, who heads the Valley office of Julien J. Studley Inc., a national real estate firm, said the Santa Fe property would be worth more if it was developed with up-scale stores and restaurants, which would appeal to the many affluent homeowners in the neighborhood.

Restaurants Nearby

Nearby Corbin and Tampa avenues are crowded with shops and restaurants, but Dudley noted that most of the latter are fast-food or lower-end eateries.

Dudley said that, if the property is developed according to existing zoning, it would be worth about $10 a square foot, which translates to $435,600 an acre or about $26 million in all. If it could be developed with all offices, or an office-commercial mix, the figure would be 20% to 40% higher, he said.

Santa Fe and Southern Pacific have merged all of their operations except their railroads, whose proposed merger awaits approval from the Interstate Commerce Commission, according to Robert Hoppe, a Southern Pacific spokesman.