Postal Service to Build Gigantic Mail Facility

The U.S. Postal Service has agreed to pay Newhall Land and Farming Co. $26.8 million for 65 acres in the Santa Clarita Valley, where it plans to build a giant mail processing facility to serve northern Los Angeles County, company officials announced Tuesday.

The new facility is scheduled for completion in 1993, said Ron Cook, a Postal Service spokesman. It is being built to relieve an overburdened postal facility in Van Nuys, which serves as the main distribution center for the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys and portions of eastern Ventura County, he said.

With the explosive growth of northern Los Angeles County, the amount of mail in the region has increased 84% in the last 10 years, Cook said. The Van Nuys facility now handles 5 million letters and packages a day, and officials predict that amount will grow 85% by 2005.