No-Parking Bomb : Tempers Flare Over Temporary Tow-Away Zones for Pierce College Fireworks Show

The fireworks are likely to start long before dark today when the west San Fernando Valley’s only pyrotechnics show is staged at Pierce College.

At 4 p.m., to be exact.

That’s when a 7 1/2-hour parking ban will be imposed on public streets that offer the best free viewing positions for the annual pay-to-see fireworks show being put on at the college by the Woodland Hills Chamber of Commerce.

Families who show up to claim a vantage point on streets on three sides of the 400-acre campus will discover a fleet of tow trucks standing by to carry away their cars if they stop. Parking is normally prohibited on the street on the remaining side of the campus.

The crackdown was prompted by chamber officials, who say they have been deluged with complaints that onlookers have jammed neighboring streets during past fireworks shows.

Leaders of the business group say they plan to take up the parking slack by increasing their on-campus parking facilities by 29% tonight--for motorists willing to pay $4 per car. Tickets to the Pierce College stadium where the show will be held will cost another $8 for adults and $6 for children and senior citizens.

The parking controls have angered some residents who live in a hillside neighborhood overlooking the college stadium. Their grumbling caused Los Angeles city officials Monday to partially lift the parking ban along the residential street closest to the campus.

Those upset by the parking prohibition said it would affect guests coming to their own Fourth of July parties--where the chamber’s fireworks show is the evening’s finale.

“Citizens called in and complained,” said Officer Tom Lindsey of the Los Angeles Police Department, who will help coordinate today’s traffic enforcement in the vicinity of the stadium. “Some of the no-parking signs were taken down. It’s still up in the air in some places.”

Signs along Aetna Street and Oxnard Street were removed, but barricades will be erected this afternoon to keep away all but residents and their guests, officials said. A total parking ban remains in effect along parts of Kelvin Avenue, Exhibit Place and Exhibit Court.

Oxnard Street resident Larry Mascari, who is expecting 75 people at his annual Fourth of July party, said he was relieved that no restrictions will be imposed on his street.

“I’ve never had any problems, except that the street outside is gridlocked and a few people toss trash out,” Mascari said. “But it doesn’t bother me. I get a free fireworks show out of it and I love it.”

Exhibit Place resident Nada Senger said she cut her party’s 30-person guest list down to 12 because of the parking ban. “I can park three cars in my driveway and three at the neighbors across the street, who have said we can use their driveway,” Senger said.

“My son was a little disgusted. He said he’ll go somewhere else for the Fourth.”

Senger said spectators who jammed her street last year double-parked, set up chairs on the sidewalk and occasionally set off their own noisy fireworks.

City officials said the double-parking caused them to agree to this year’s crackdown, mapped out in a meeting attended by representatives of the Chamber of Commerce, Police Department and City Councilwoman Joy Picus.

“Victory Boulevard was a parking lot. A few people would stop at traffic lights and then get out of their car to look at the fireworks, and in five or 10 minutes the entire street was a parking lot,” Lindsey said.

Stacking Cars

Chamber officials--who expect 15,000 at tonight’s show--said they hope to cram as many as 7,000 cars into Pierce College’s 5,000 parking spaces by strictly controlling entry points and by “stacking” cars in close rows.

Picus stressed Monday that she did not order the parking prohibition. “I can certainly understand that banning the free parking would irritate people. It did not originate with me,” she said. “I don’t choose to take the blame.”

Picus field aide Kirt Anderson said there were complaints last July about spectators picnicking on residents’ front yards and people trespassing through rear yards to look at the fireworks.

He said police agreed to the parking ban as a way of keeping streets open for fire trucks and ambulances.