Reprieve for MCA Rail Plan Urged : Red Line: The entertainment firm would have until March 10 to garner funds to move a station closer to CityWalk.

County transportation planners recommended Tuesday that entertainment giant MCA be given one more month to come up with funding sources for relocating a planned Red Line station closer to its CityWalk attraction.

But if the company--whose executives traveled to Washington last week to brief federal lawmakers on the issue--fails to secure the necessary funds by March 10, Los Angeles County transportation officials should go ahead with the current site on Lankershim Boulevard, planners said.

“Because this is starting to accrue costs because of the delay, we have to fish or cut bait by March,” said Judith Wilson, Metropolitan Transportation Authority staff analyst.

MCA received a 30-day reprieve last month and was to present a funding proposal to the transit authority’s planning and programming committee Thursday. The committee will now consider the issue of another reprieve.

Transportation analysts recommended another month’s grace period for the multimedia concern because “we have reason to believe they’ve been working very hard to find new revenue,” Wilson said.

MCA executives briefed Wilson’s office on their efforts Tuesday. “We haven’t identified any specific (funding) sources at this point,” MCA spokeswoman Christine Hanson said, noting that the purpose of last week’s trip to Washington was to bring congressional and Clinton Administration officials up to speed on the issue.

But “we’re going to move forward again with the MTA collaboratively in the next few weeks,” she said.

The transit authority has estimated that moving the Universal City Metro Rail station to a site beneath the Hollywood Freeway, near Cahuenga Boulevard, would cost an extra $41 million and postpone the planned July, 2000, opening by 21 months.

Even waiting until next month for a decision on a final station site could cost the transit authority $520,000 in other contract delays, according to the report.

MCA representatives have disputed the authority’s projections but acknowledge that their proposal would incur increased costs and a delay of some kind.

However, they contend that a relocation onto their Universal Studios lot would result in greater ridership, especially by tourists and residents bound for CityWalk.