Road Extension to Spare Riding Stables for Now : Thousand Oaks: Two Winds will still have to relocate when construction of the 2,350-house Dos Vientos development begins.

A group of Thousand Oaks equestrians fighting to save an 18-year-old riding stable won concessions from the city Friday that will allow the equestrian center to remain open despite new road construction across the property.

After meeting with the horse enthusiasts Friday, city Public Works Director John Clement announced that a two-lane extension of Lynn Road will skirt the stables to allow Two Winds ranch to continue operation without severing its electricity and water lines.

“The extension would bisect the pasture,” he said. “It will not touch the stables or holding pens.”

Horse owners feared that road construction would close part or all of Two Winds, a popular equestrian center on West Potrero Road, said businesswoman Jody Neill, who met with Clement. About 100 to 150 horses, including two of her own, are boarded there, she said.

“The longer that they leave us here the better, because they don’t have anywhere to move us to,” she said.

Horse owners have had a long-running battle with the city to save Two Winds stables, which lie in the path of what will ultimately be a four-lane extension of Lynn Road.

Developers planning the 2,350-house Dos Vientos development have postponed road construction until June, two months after city officials promised area residents it would begin, Clement said.

If the city agrees to finance the road, construction will begin in September. The City Council is scheduled to review plans for the $520,000 road project on April 2.

Under the plan, West Potrero Road would end in a cul-de-sac, and traffic would be rerouted north to Lynn Road. Lynn Road would then be extended to reconnect with West Potrero Road.

The stables will have to be moved when construction begins at the Dos Vientos development.

Neill said supporters are trying to preserve the privately run stable as long as possible because it is one of the few equestrian centers located within riding distance of scenic trails in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area and Point Mugu State Park.

More than six years ago, city officials and developers Courtly Homes and Operating Engineers Pension Trust agreed to find a new location for Two Winds stables. They suggested a four-acre site off Kimber Road, but it was rejected as too small, Neill said.

Four years ago developers designated a 7 1/3-acre parcel on the Dos Vientos property as a possible relocation spot for the stables. But Neill said that site is also too small and lacks water lines. A new site proposed by the developers last year would move the stables to a 70-acre parcel near Camarillo. But that site was criticized as too far away for homeowners who live in Newbury Park.

Because of those conflicts, Neill earlier this week asked the City Council to consider relocating the stables temporarily to an abandoned ranch less than two miles north of Two Winds. The ranch already has water, power and roads leading to it, she said.

Ron Buss, real estate adviser for Operating Engineers Pension Trust in Pasadena, said the ranch site is out of the question because it is a site for a future housing tract.

“From our perspective, it’s not being considered at all,” he said. “It would only be a temporary spot anyway.”

Buss said the developers are studying the 70-acre parcel near Camarillo and a 110-acre parcel north of Dos Vientos as a permanent home for the equestrian center. Developers will probably meet with the equestrians within a month to discuss those options, he said.

“We’re just going to try to make the best site available to them,” he said. “If there’s an objection, we’ll just move them to the 7 1/3-acre site and be done with it.”