Council to Decide the Battle of Sylvan Fryman Canyon

Seen from an overlook on Mulholland Drive, Fryman Canyon appears as a small island of green amid a vast sprawl of single-family homes and asphalt streets. But the solitude that can be found in the steep ravine belies its location in the heart of a crowded city.

The contradiction helps explain why this narrow slice of land has become the focus of an unusually heated battle between developer Fred Sahadi, who plans to build 26 luxury homes in Fryman Canyon, and neighboring residents, who want it preserved in its natural state.

The Los Angeles City Council is scheduled to vote today on whether half of the canyon’s 63 acres should be declared a city landmark, a designation that could halt construction for a year and lower the value of the land.

Sahadi argues that the land is not worthy of cultural-historic monument status because there is nothing that distinguishes it from other undeveloped land in the Santa Monica Mountains.

“I think all the Santa Monica Mountains are special,” the San Jose-based developer said. “I believe it with every ounce of everything in me. It’s an incredibly beautiful mountain range, but putting 26 more homes on 63 acres does not in any way defile the land or compromise the beauty.”

Canyon users counter that the tiny ravine has a long history of offering easy refuge from the chaos of urban life, and thus qualifies for cultural landmark status.

“What makes it so nice is that you feel like you are out of the city completely,” said Eric McFadden, 34, an attorney who lives in Laurel Canyon and jogs on the wooded trail every day.

While the debate over Fryman Canyon has engaged a predictable cast of developers, residents, environmentalists and politicians, the land itself offers important testimony--both for and against its preservation.

It takes 30 minutes to walk down the canyon from the Mulholland overlook to the housing tract nestled below. Hikers follow a wooded, zig-zagging trail down the steep side of the hill, then go through a narrow poison oak-filled gully to a dark forest.

The deep, sheltered ravine is packed with a wide variety of plant life, and early morning joggers say they encounter deer, coyotes, rattlesnakes, squirrels, rabbits and lizards along the trail.

“It’s the only place in the whole big city where you feel close to nature,” said Abbie Jaye, 30, of Sherman Oaks, who brings her two dogs to the canyon every day.

The San Fernando Valley below the canyon is blocked from view by California walnut trees and expansive bushes as high as 12 feet. The growth forms a protective canopy, sheltering hikers from the sun; in other places, the trees cluster so tightly that they seem to form a natural wall.

Yet, reminders of the city are never far away. Ten minutes down the canyon trail, a stream intersects. There, six cars are half-buried in dirt and leaves, decaying and covered with graffiti.

Authorities say the rusting vehicles--some so badly deteriorated that their original colors cannot be determined--were probably stolen, stripped for parts, then pushed into the canyon from Mulholland. Beer bottles, cups and auto parts litter the spot.

The ravine also acts as an echo chamber, amplifying sounds from the residential neighborhood below and construction projects above. On a recent morning, the canyon reverberated with the sounds of a bulldozer, a gardener’s leaf-blower, a crying child and the drone of an ascending airplane.

Intermingled with the urban noise, though, the astute listener can discern bird calls, the rustle of leaves in the wind, even the gurgle of water trickling over rocks.

In an effort to save their haven, canyon users have waged a fierce campaign in the boardrooms of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and the chambers of City Hall. In May, a coalition of environmentalists and area residents persuaded the Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Commission to declare half the site a city cultural monument, a designation which the City Council is scheduled to consider today.

Since then, Sahadi has said he would sell the property for a park. A week ago, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy voted to offer $8.7 million to purchase it.

But Sahadi estimates that the land--in Studio City just west of Laurel Canyon--is worth about $13.7 million, forcing city officials to scurry to locate funds to supplement the conservancy’s offer for the prime real estate. As of late Monday, they still were looking for a source of the extra $5 million.

“Let them pay for it if they want it,” Sahadi said.

“It’s pure economics. We’ve spent a whole lot of money earning the right to develop it.”

If Sahadi is allowed to build, his houses will occupy about half the canyon toward the bottom and will not effect the hiking trail. The houses, however, would interfere with one of the ravine’s most popular features--a sliver of a brook that cuts down through the canyon.

The hiker who wants to follow the noise of the brook must branch off the trail and follow a narrow little gully, which leads down to the bottom of the canyon to the oak forest--and houses--below.

The brook seems to carry barely as much as a garden hose at full volume. But slated for destruction by the housing project, the brook has become the subject of intense debate.

Environmentalists say the water is a perennial stream--a permanent stream that is protected state law--and have appealed to the state Department of Fish and Game to save it. Sahadi says the highly touted “stream” is merely runoff from the residential neighborhoods above the canyon.

As water slides down the stair-like rock formations and settles in stagnant pools, it is difficult to tell whether it springs from the earth or is backwash from a swimming pool. What is obvious is that the water nourishes lots of trees and plants. And bugs.

It is difficult climb down the gully, which is about 10 feet wide at some points but narrows to less than three feet at others.

Even while heat and smog suffocate the San Fernando Valley, the gully--shaded by ash, oak, and Sycamore trees--is cool. The air smells sweet and fresh, like the air inside a plant-filled greenhouse.

Finally, the walls of the gully flatten out and the stream abruptly disappears underground, where it nurtures a dark grove of century-old oak trees.

Alan Teel, one of the members of the Urban Wilderness Coalition, the group that has taken the lead in trying to protect the canyon, fears that even if the canyon survives, the quiet of the land could be destroyed by new waves of visitors.

“One of the best parts about it now is that you can really not run into anyone there,” Teel said. “But if our dreams our realized, from the publicity it will get, a lot more people will start to go.”