Supervisor Praises Monorail : Transportation: Mike Antonovich seeks support for the plan in a letter to 25,000 households along the proposed Ventura Freeway route.

Led by Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, supporters of a proposal to build a monorail over the Ventura Freeway have launched a mail campaign to generate support among the monorail’s prospective neighbors.

In a letter sent a week ago to about 25,000 households along the freeway route in the San Fernando Valley, Antonovich extolled the monorail’s virtues and asked residents to fill out pre-printed cards expressing support for the proposal and mail them to him.

The proposed line would run between Woodland Hills and Universal City, where passengers could transfer to the Metro Rail link with downtown.

The $9,000 mailing cost was paid for by the Citizens Committee for Monorail, said committee Co-Chairman William J. Korek. Antonovich, a member of the county Transportation Commission, hopes he will receive an outpouring of cards he can show to other commission members as evidence of local support for the monorail, Korek said.

The mail campaign is the latest volley in the long, heated debate over the proposed project. But it won’t be the last.

Leaders of several groups representing homeowners from Studio City to Woodland Hills plan to meet tonight to discuss the monorail and strategies for countering the Antonovich mailer. The meeting is sponsored by the Coalition of Freeway Residents, a group that has been strongly opposed to the monorail proposal, said Gerald A. Silver, president of the coalition.

Silver accused Antonovich of using the letter to deceive residents by minimizing the monorail’s negative effects while promoting its benefits.

“It paints a rosy picture and it’s not realistic,” Silver said.

Dawson Oppenheimer, Antonovich’s spokesman, shrugged off Silver’s criticism. “What do you expect an opponent of monorail to say?” he said.

In the letter, Antonovich describes monorail as “pollution-free, noiseless, aesthetically pleasing” and “the most cost-effective use of our precious transportation dollars.”

Silver and other monorail opponents say the rail project would create noise, traffic congestion around rail stops and a visual blight that will reduce property values along the project route. He supports a rail line that would run mostly underground and parallel to Burbank and Chandler boulevards from North Hollywood to Woodland Hills.

An environmental report released last month said the monorail project would cost about $2.6 billion, compared to $3 billion for the Burbank-Chandler subway alternative.

Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., questioned Antonovich’s motives in sending the letter, saying he believes Antonovich is pressing for the monorail because it is linked to a plan to build a high-speed train from Los Angeles International Airport to Palmdale Airport.

The Transportation Commission has asked companies interested in building the LAX-to-Palmdale line to bid on the monorail project as well. The bids are due in September.

Antonovich’s district includes Palmdale, but since supervisorial districts were redrawn in 1990 he no longer represents the Ventura Freeway corridor in the San Fernando Valley.

“He has an agenda that has nothing to do with what is good for the Valley,” Close said. He argued that Antonovich is encouraging the Valley monorail as a boost for the Palmdale rail link that would benefit his constituents there.

Oppenheimer said Antonovich supports the monorail alternative because it is cheaper and could be built more quickly than the subway.

The Transportation Commission’s planning committee will meet Aug. 12 to discuss the environmental report. The entire commission will then meet Aug. 26 to take up the monorail report.