Calabasas Pressure : Freeway Plan Scaled Down to Save Old Town

Citizens who rallied around the legendary Calabasas hanging tree to fight for the town they call “the Last of the Old West” were urged Wednesday to put away their six-shooters.

State highway planners said they have decided to preserve historic Old Town of Calabasas by scaling down a planned $40-million freeway interchange at the western edge of the San Fernando Valley.

Officials pledged to reduce the width of a road that will connect Calabasas with a multi-bridge overpass at the Valley Circle interchange on the Ventura Freeway, which is scheduled for construction in 2 years.

The redesigned project will preserve Calabasas Road as a two-lane street where it curves past clapboard storefronts, the 144-year-old Leonis Adobe and the ancient oak “hanging” tree--which stood outside a long-vanished jail, but never served as a gallows.

The picturesque 75-year-old business district had been threatened by a state Department of Transportation plan, announced in October. A proposed bridge over the freeway at the Valley Circle interchange would have funneled four lanes of traffic from Ventura Boulevard onto the narrower road in Calabasas.

Protests Flood Office

Angry homeowners and preservation-minded Calabasas businessmen flooded transportation planners’ offices with more than 1,500 cards and letters, demanding that the Ventura Boulevard “flyover” bridge be canceled.

But Caltrans officials threatened to shelve the whole interchange project if they were forced to scrap the Ventura Boulevard connection, warning that it would be a waste of money to build the interchange without it.

Under a compromise reached Wednesday by traffic planners and representatives of state and local politicians, the boulevard crossover will be retained, but it will carry only two lanes of traffic into Calabasas.

“We’re absolutely thrilled to death,” said Leeta Pistone, an aide to Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich. “It will preserve the integrity of Old Town, and yet it will satisfy the needs of motorists.”

The agreement will allow officials to salvage the interchange, which has been on the drawing boards for 20 years and will be the last such project funded by the state, said Elaine Miller, an aide to state Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), who sits on the Senate Transportation Committee and represents part of the area.

‘Seriously Concerned’

“I was seriously concerned that the project was jeopardized,” Miller said.

“Caltrans’ concern was a valid one,” she said, because the state did not want to spend millions of dollars “for something that wouldn’t do the job when built. The protests could have been a fatal blow.”

“I think it will all work out,” said Sheila Holt, who represented state Sen. Ed Davis (R-Valencia) at the meeting. Davis represents part of the area.

Los Angeles city transportation officials--the city will contribute several million dollars to the project--also endorsed the new plan. “I think they were very sensitive to the concerns raised and the letters received,” said Rita Schneir, transportation aide to City Councilwoman Joy Picus.

Caltrans planner Ken Nelson said the revised design will reduce the project’s impact on the El Camino Shopping Center, which would have lost 85 parking spaces under the original plan.

Nelson, the project’s chief engineer, said the scaled-down plan will probably end up saving taxpayers about $6.5 million in construction and right-of-way acquisition costs.

“We think we have a design that will relieve traffic through the year 2010,” Nelson said.

Despite those assurances, some Calabasas leaders remained wary.

“It sounds good right now, but with the huge amount of development coming west of the village, they’ll be coming back and pressuring us to widen Calabasas Road if that crossover is built,” said Bill Bridgers, a leader of the anti-crossover movement.

Barbara Reinike, president of the Calabasas Chamber of Commerce, said her group will closely study the proposal. “We need the interchange improved and want it improved, but we don’t want to destroy Old Calabasas in the process,” she said.

Ray Phillips, president of the Leonis Adobe Assn., said the adobe museum and historical monument his group maintains still may be threatened by a 10-foot-wide, 1,600-foot-long rear easement Caltrans wants for an interchange off-ramp.

“That shocked the hell out of us and still does,” Phillips said. “We still have a few bones to pick with Caltrans.”