Council OKs Permits for Offices Near Future Rail Depot : Chatsworth: The three-story building would be the second commercial complex next to a station for commuter trains. Some predict the area will be the ‘town center.’

The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved land-use permits for construction of a three-story, 200,000-square-foot office complex next to the proposed Chatsworth commuter rail station, adding a second commercial center to the transportation hub envisioned by city and county planners.

The proposed development would be built on a 4.4-acre site owned by developer George Moss on the west side of the Southern Pacific railroad tracks at Devonshire Boulevard, between Owensmouth and Canoga avenues.

There is now a storage facility there.

East of the tracks is the vacant 13-acre parcel where city and county transit officials plan to construct the commuter train station and another commercial-retail project of about 110,000 to 140,000 square feet.

“It’s quite possible this could become a community hub of sorts,” said Councilman Hal Bernson, who represents the area and supports both the train station and the Moss project.

The council unanimously adopted without debate a report recommending the zoning change and plan amendment needed for the Moss project to proceed.

No private citizens spoke on the issue.

A final council vote on the zoning change is scheduled for next week.

Last month, the council voted to put up $5 million of the $17 million Southern Pacific wants for the site.

The city and the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission plan to build a station there to serve the commuter trains that the commission wants to run between Moorpark and downtown Los Angeles over Southern Pacific tracks.

In approving the expenditure, the council agreed to pursue the possibility of recouping the cost by leasing the publicly owned land around the station to a commercial developer.

Susan Amerikaner, a member of a citizens panel appointed by Bernson to review the train station plans, said her hope is that the Moss project and train station might become the kernel for a Chatsworth “town center” with a Western-style station as a key element.

Despite concerns about its effects on traffic, an office complex development would “enhance the neighborhood more than the lumberyard” that Southern Pacific once planned to install on the site, Amerikaner said.

Bernson helped kill the lumberyard plan last year after several hundred neighbors protested.

Amerikaner was a leader of the protesters.

But growth critic Walter Prince, a Chatsworth resident who ran for the council against Bernson in April’s primary election, said the two developments may end up producing more traffic headaches for the community than the aborted lumberyard.

The proposed lumberyard would have produced 70 trips per day by huge trucks.

City transportation officials estimate that the Moss project alone will generate 3,500 trips per day by commuters, shoppers and office workers.