City Outlines Limits on Sony Studio Redesign

Like the vampire hunter in the Sony Pictures Studios feature film “Dracula,” Culver City is working to take the bite out of Sony’s proposed studio expansion plan.

Last week, the city staff released a sweeping list of conditions that Sony will probably have to accept to win city approval for a massive studio expansion project.

The recommendations, which must be approved by the City Council, are needed to ensure that the community and the most important business in Culver City get along, Community Development Director Mark Winogrond said.

“Sony is the anchor site of one of the anchor industries in the city,” Winogrond said. “If you can mitigate the impacts, it’s (a) fun (industry). It creates jobs. It’s non-polluting. It’s innovative and creative. . . . We tried to come up with a set of conditions which protected the community and kept Sony viable and healthy at the same time.”

Sony Pictures, parent company of TriStar and Columbia Pictures, hopes to consolidate its far-flung media operations into the 44.8-acre studio site in Culver City. The 13-year development plan calls for increasing office space to 2.6 million square feet, up from 1.5 million, by modifying structures or building new ones. The number of people working at the studio at Overland Avenue and Washington Boulevard would triple to 5,804.

Staff recommendations have historically been heavily influential in the types of projects that have won City Council approval, Councilman Steven Gourley said.

Most notably, the list of conditions recommended by the staff prohibit Sony from using helicopters for transportation and limits all but four proposed buildings to a height of 56 feet. The studio had proposed nine buildings over 56 feet, including twin 11-story office towers.

The conditions also reduce proposed retail space by three-fourths and outline traffic mitigation measures.

As restrictive as the conditions may be, Sony spokeswoman Barbara Cline said the company participated in creating them and basically finds them acceptable. Helicopter use, however, is one area Sony and the staff have chosen to “agree to disagree,” she said.

Helicopters are used to quickly shuttle executives and talent at many movie studios, Cline said. The convenience may be the difference in winning or losing top industry people to competing studios.

“It’s a (benefit),” Cline said.

But the city staff opposes the use of helicopters except for emergencies or to install equipment during construction.

“We were not convinced that the need outweighed the impact,” Winogrond said.

Helicopter safety and noise were two of the most hotly debated topics at earlier public hearings. The proposed helipad site is in the northeast corner of the lot, across the street from St. Augustine’s Church. Msgr. Ian E. Holland expressed his concern to the city via letter.

“Because of having church services throughout the day, every day, noise from such a heliport would be very disturbing to the prayerful atmosphere we try to maintain in our church,” he wrote.

Sony will probably choose the 11-story office towers proposed for the Thalberg Building parking lot and two other buildings along Washington Boulevard as the buildings to exceed 56 feet, Cline said. The buildings can be no taller than 113 feet, which is the height of the Filmland Corporate Center building across the street, the conditions say.

Gourley said he will probably oppose any buildings higher than 56 feet. Voters passed a 56-foot height-limit law in 1990, but city leaders disagree on whether it should apply to the studio project.

“Frankly, I think for staff to say they’re applying it except for four buildings means to me they’re not applying it.”

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The list also requires that Sony protect historical landmarks on the lot, spend $25,000 a year on Culver City public schools and participate in a “hire local” program.

The conditions for approval will be fine-tuned as the project winds its way through the city bureaucracy, Winogrond said.

A recent development that may cause some changes is Sony’s possible purchase of the Filmland building on Washington Boulevard.

Sony leases about a third of the 170,000-square-foot, eight-story building. The 20-year lease includes a purchase option, Cline said. Sony plans to take over more of the building after MGM moves to its offices in Santa Monica this spring.

Filmland office space may allow Sony to downscale development on the studio lot, Winogrond said. Also, Madison Avenue, which runs between Filmland and Sony, might be better off closed to through traffic to protect pedestrians and reduce traffic on neighborhood streets.

An advisory committee to the city’s Redevelopment Agency will have a public hearing on the Sony project at 7:30 tonight in City Hall, 4095 Overland Ave.

Planning Commission public hearings are scheduled to begin Jan. 27. The council will hold its own public hearings after the commission approves the project, probably after March.

“We think we’ve resolved the majority of the small issues and adequately focused the large issues so the Planning Commission and City Council will be able to stay focused on the important policy discussions,” Winogrond said.