Burbank Officials Seek to Preserve Family Areas

Preserving the character of single-family neighborhoods in Burbank in the face of growing population and commercial development is the focus of a report to be unveiled this week by Burbank officials.

The plan would limit the amount of land available for commercial development and restrict the height of buildings near residential neighborhoods.

To accommodate the estimated 0.25% annual growth in the city’s population over the next 20 years, the plan would increase the density in all neighborhoods zoned for apartment houses or in selected neighborhoods of this type.

The complex plan is called the Land Use Element of the city’s General Plan. It encompasses all of Burbank’s 17.1 square miles and will be available for public scrutiny and comment at a hearing scheduled for Thursday in the auditorium at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, 1900 North 6th St., Burbank.

After the hearing, the comments will be incorporated in a final draft that will be presented to the city’s Planning Board later this year. If the plan is approved, officials hope to submit it to the Burbank City Council for adoption by January, said acting City Planner Rick E. Pruetuz.

Representatives from neighborhood groups and the city’s Board of Realtors and Chamber of Commerce said last week they would have to study the plan at greater length before commenting.

Since 1955, state law has required a periodic update of the city’s Land Use Element, and city officials have been developing a revision since 1981, Pruetuz said. But the planners were spurred by a public outcry late last year for a citywide moratorium on major development.

Residents have long feared that such development would infringe on their neighborhoods. Officials have acknowledged that planning was inadequate in the past, and that unrestricted development could produce traffic gridlock and overcrowding, particularly in the city’s Media District, home to several major studios.

Even though the moratorium did not win the approval of the City Council, “we got a clear message that controlled growth should be the watchword for the city,” Pruetuz said.

However, the existing draft does not include a specific plan for the one-square-mile Media District because officials are still conducting traffic studies on it, Pruetuz said.

Instead, the plan addresses general land-use patterns and related parking concerns for Burbank’s 17.1 square miles during the next 20 years, as well as ways to create a compatible and functional relationship among residential, industrial and commercial development.

Pruetuz said no major changes in land-use patterns are anticipated during the next 20 years, and that no radical changes in residential and industrial zones are being proposed, although “certain commercial and residential areas will be more intensely used.”

Only 10 acres of the city’s 3,000 acres now zoned as single-family residential are being zoned for higher density, Pruetuz said.

Among other highlights, the plan calls for:

All new apartment and condominium buildings, as well as commercial and industrial developments, to provide sufficient off-street parking.

Revised height limits on new buildings to protect single-family neighborhoods from “inappropriately tall structures.” A developer planning a building over 35 feet tall near a residential area would have to obtain a conditional-use permit from the city.

Separating single-family residential neighborhoods from multifamily residential, commercial and industrial buildings by a distance of 20 feet.

Establishment of a land-use category to maintain the equestrian nature of the Rancho residential area of Burbank near Griffith Park. Although the area is zoned for single-family residential and single-family residential with horses, some of the area is also zoned for light industrial use.

The establishment of a hillside zone restricting development in all privately owned mountain land in the Verdugo Mountains in the northwestern portion of the city.