Revised Plan to Revitalize Reseda Greatly Scaled Back

Central Reseda would undergo minor cosmetic surgery, not a full face lift, under the city’s latest plan to guide development and improve the community’s image.

Although the revitalization plan would ban residential development and restrict new building heights to three stories, it would not go nearly as far as a previous proposal in altering the complexion of the business district.

Los Angeles city planners drastically cut the scope of the proposal in response to overwhelming opposition from residents and merchants at hearings in July and August. A public hearing on the new plan will be held Nov. 13 before the Planning Commission reviews it in December.

Under the previous plan, certain types of operations--such as car repair businesses, trade schools, universities and secondhand stores--would have been prohibited from locating or expanding in the area. Future business owners would have been required to set aside property for pedestrian walkways and landscaped courtyards.

The new plan “is not going to do what it could have as long as people resist special design components,” said Davood Solaiman Tehrani, the city planner who helped draw up the previous proposal.

But residents and merchants who complained about the city’s previous proposal say the current one will do more to upgrade the area and draw shoppers without forcing out auto-related businesses or making merchants devote as much of their property to landscaping.

“I admit this plan is watered down, but the other was almost suicidal--it would have turned Reseda into a ghost town,” said Jon Lorenzen, a former City Council candidate and Reseda resident who led opposition to the plan.

The cross-shaped district is roughly bounded by Saticoy Street on the north, Kittridge Street on the south, Wilbur Avenue on the west and Hesperia Avenue on the east.

With the help of three citizens’ groups composed of homeowners and merchants, planners have drawn up a proposal that includes provisions to:

* Require auto-related businesses, which now represent at least 20% of the total commercial use in the area, to get conditional use permits from the city to expand or establish new businesses in most of the district, except for a zone beginning at Amigo Avenue at Sherman Way and extending east to Lindley Avenue. There, most auto-related businesses are prohibited in an effort to encourage pedestrian traffic.

The previous plan prohibited expanding or establishing new auto-related businesses anywhere in the district.

* Prohibit residential development within the district. The previous plan allowed apartments above retail stores to meet city goals in providing affordable housing. But residents and merchants argued that affordable housing exists in residential parts of Reseda and that allowing it in the business district would promote crime.

* Limit building heights to three stories. The height limit represents a compromise between some developers, who argued for a six-story limit incorporated in the previous plan, and homeowners who wanted to restrict buildings near residences to two stories.

* Allow uses that were prohibited under the previous plan, including schools and universities, taxidermists, mattress shops, video rental stores, photo-engraving businesses, secondhand stores and grain elevators. Merchants were alarmed because the previous plan would have forced businesses that wanted to expand to relocate and would discourage others from moving in.

The new plan eliminates two controversial features of the previous proposal: one would have barred on-street parking on Sherman Way and Reseda Boulevard and the other would have set aside property for the creation of landscaped plazas.