Braude Alters Stand, Backs Reseda-Mulholland Link

Los Angeles City Councilman Marvin Braude said Friday that he again favors a proposed extension of Reseda Boulevard to Mulholland Drive, despite opposition by Tarzana residents that led to a fist-swinging brawl last month with Encino supporters of the proposal.

The Tarzana residents complain that the road will result in more traffic through their neighborhood and jeopardize the hillside environment. Encino proponents want it built to drain off traffic from their neighborhoods, which motorists use as a shortcut through the mountains around the San Diego Freeway.

Braude--who in June told homeowners that he would oppose the road after protesters chained themselves to bulldozers to halt the beginning of construction--said in a letter sent to residents Thursday that he has decided that a 1981 city plan requiring the extension as a condition of development in the area “is good public policy today.”

He said the extension will provide a needed additional route to Topanga State Park from the San Fernando Valley and will help firefighters in the event of a brush fire.

The debate over the road extension led to fistfights between residents of Tarzana and Encino at an Aug. 17 meeting in Encino attended by Braude.

Members of Friends of Caballero Canyon, the main group opposing the extension, said late Friday that they had not received the letter and were angry that Braude made the announcement before a meeting scheduled Tuesday with homeowners to discuss the extension.

“We were shocked to learn late this afternoon that the press received a letter from Braude that Braude has rejected our concerns for the environment and parkway in favor of putting through the Reseda expansion,” said Susanne Belcher, a member of the group’s board of directors. “We hope opponents will express their feelings to the councilman regarding the unforgivable rape of our precious air shed and defenseless environment.”

The group’s board of directors will meet Monday night to discuss what to do to oppose the linkup, Belcher said.

Construction of the road was required by the city as a condition on a developer for a permit to construct a 178-home luxury subdivision in Caballero Canyon, where Reseda Boulevard now ends south of Ventura Boulevard in Tarzana.

Belcher said that in addition to leading to more traffic on Reseda Boulevard, the extension could lead to the creation of garbage dumps in Rustic and Sullivan canyons, between Tarzana and Pacific Palisades.

Braude said the city has consistently opposed plans for dumps in the area. “The conclusion I have reached is that there is very little, if any, risk of this possibility,” he wrote.

Madeline DeAntonio, president of the Encino Hillside Traffic Safety Organization, which supports the extension, said Braude’s decision opens the way for improved traffic conditions in the West Valley.

She said the extension would help shift traffic from Hayvenhurst Avenue, used by some commuters as an alternative to the San Diego Freeway, if the portion of Mulholland Drive south of Reseda is eventually paved.

Braude said in the letter that there are no plans to pave the dirt portion of Mulholland.

“The question of paving or not paving Mulholland Drive will be left to another time,” Braude wrote. “However, we cannot defer to a later date the provision of firefighting access to protect hillside homes.”