County Acts to Head Off Calabasas Traffic Snarl

Predicting that the main entrance to exclusive Calabasas Park will soon be strangled by traffic, Los Angeles County moved Thursday to bypass the state and build new freeway access ramps and an overpass there itself.

County supervisors were urged to impose special fees on land developers in the Calabasas area to raise the $5.9 million cost of a six-lane bridge across the Ventura Freeway at Parkway Calabasas and freeway access ramps. Supervisors took the recommendation under submission and said they will decide on Jan. 8 whether to order the assessments.

The assessments would come to $600 for each new house and $1.20 per square foot for each new commercial structure, according to the county proposal. Fees would be required for projects built on lots that have been subdivided since 1979.

The do-it-yourself financing is necessary because the state’s Department of Transportation has no money for the project, according to county Public Works Director Thomas A. Tidemanson.

Caltrans officials said Thursday they will welcome the county’s help.

Transportation studies done by the county warn that traffic on the two-lane Parkway Calabasas freeway crossing will double and then triple over the next eight years.

About 4,000 cars now cross the bridge daily. By 1994, experts predict the volume will top 24,000 cars a day.

At the request of several builders on hand for a Los Angeles hearing on Thursday, board members said they will closely review commercial builders’ share of the assessments before voting, however.

The assessment idea was first proposed two years ago by Calabasas developers, according to county officials.

At that time, builders had filed plans to construct about 2.5 million square feet of new office and light industrial space in the community. In volunteering to chip in, developers had suggested a commercial fee of about 50 cents per square foot.

The county now estimates that more than 3.5 million square feet of commercial space will be assessed. Officials predict that about 2,400 dwellings will face the $600 fee.

The assessment plan was a surprise to Calabasas’ newest residential developer.

John Hurford, project supervisor for a proposed 410-home development north of the freeway on the west side of the Calabasas Grade, said he was unaware that the 823-acre site his firm is purchasing is included in the proposed assessment district’s boundaries.

Because of the traffic problem, his firm will not fight the assessment plan, however, Hurford said.

County officials said that while they have used assessments to pay for local road improvements in the Bouquet Canyon area of the Santa Clarita Valley, they have never taken part in a state highway project.

Supervisor Pete Schabarum said he is concerned that Calabasas assessments could set a precedent with the county paying for work that previously has been financed by Caltrans.

After Thursday’s hearing, Caltrans spokeswoman Pat Reid said such partnerships will be sought in the future by her agency.

“We have a tremendous funding problem,” Reid said. “We see the Calabasas project as a good project. We just can’t pay for it.”

Reid said Caltrans, after studying traffic flow on the bridge, assigned a low priority to funding the Parkway Calabasas project. She said the project ranked below others with more pressing problems, including similar structures at Valley Circle Boulevard in nearby Woodland Hills and at Kanan Road in Agoura Hills.

She said new freeway crossings and accesses have been paid for in Orange County by the Irvine Co. and in the Universal City area by MCA.