Planners to Unveil Visions of the Future

Roughly halfway through redrawing a blueprint for future growth in Los Angeles, urban planners later this month will unveil preliminary designs on how the city could look, move and feel 20 years from now.

In a series of 15 community meetings--four of them in the San Fernando Valley--Los Angeles planners working to update the city’s General Plan will display their ideas and seek suggestions from the public.

The General Plan is the document on which all other land-use policies are based. Some refer to it as a local government’s land-use “constitution” because it dictates in general terms how a city should develop.

In addition to being a long-term vision for growth and development, the General Plan is intended to guide public transit improvements and attempts to address issues such as affordable housing and traffic congestion.

In the case of Los Angeles, the General Plan has not been updated since 1974. Planners have been working to redraw the Los Angeles plan since last year, when they asked for community ideas on how the city should develop.

Those ideas were the basis of the designs to be displayed later this month. Planners will incorporate new public suggestions into any modifications to the plan before they take a final version to city officials later this year.

Local meetings are scheduled for:

* The northwest Valley at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 25 in the third-floor conference room at Kaiser Panorama City, 13652 Cantara St.

* The northeast Valley at 9 a.m. Jan. 29 at the Sunland-Tujunga Municipal Center Auditorium, 7747 Foothill Blvd.

* The southwest Valley at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 8 in the auditorium at Kaiser Woodland Hills, 5601 De Soto Ave.

* The southeast Valley at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 16 in the main auditorium of the Van Nuys/Sherman Oaks Senior Center, 5056 Van Nuys Blvd.