<i> Cruise </i> Control

For generations, a rumbling ritual of courtship has been performed every weekend in the San Fernando Valley, transforming dull strips of asphalt into enchanted avenues of adolescent amore .

Shortly after sunset, young men roll out their four-wheeled finery before an admiring audience, flexing their hydraulic muscles and inviting a few young women to join them in the customized interiors of these hand-polished vehicles.

These are the Latino cruisers--or lowriders--a subculture built on hydraulic lifts, thousand-dollar wheel rims and a simple philosophy handed down from generation to generation.

“Girls like cars and guys like girls, that’s why we’re here,” said Leo Rodriguez, 24, of North Hollywood, one of hundreds of cruisers who occasionally roam Sepulveda and Laurel Canyon boulevards in Mission Hills.

From Sun Valley to North Hollywood, each cruising strip in the Valley has its own history, adherents and codes of conduct. While some Valley roadways draw drag racers, it is the slow-circling parade of steel on wheels that has lured generations of the Lopez family to Sepulveda Boulevard and “The Canyon,” as Laurel Canyon Boulevard in Mission Hills is sometimes called.

“The Canyon used to be farmland when I was little,” said Margaret Lopez, 54, of Pacoima. “We used to cruise it and the Mission in a ’55 Chevy. We had boyfriends, but we used to go anyway. It’s been going on for years--from generation to generation. But it’s changed so much.”

In the past, cruisers drove Detroit’s finest, men wore zoot suits and car radios blared Big Band medleys. During the ‘70s, cruisers tuned into disco, hydraulic lifts were only $200 and El Caminos ruled the roadway.

Today, Japanese roadsters compete for the street with American models, compact-disc players generate oldies music and the latest fashion rave for women is baggy pants over bodysuits.

The current social climate suits Lopez’s daughter, 19-year-old Deanna, just fine. A former gang member, Deanna Lopez turned to cruising as a social outlet when Latino gangs in the Valley signed a peace treaty last year.

Deanna now spends Sunday nights honking her horn at cute guys in her ivory 1985 Cadillac, which she sometimes loads up with nine girlfriends.

“Before, we used to hang around in Paxton Park, drink and get high,” she said. “Sometimes we would go fight in other people’s neighborhoods. Since there’s been this gang treaty, we go cruising and stay out of trouble. It’s like exciting, meeting other people.”

Most Latino cruisers are dedicated not to gangs, but to car clubs.

Ranging from high school students with afternoon jobs to white-collar workers, club members from as far away as Santa Monica roll the valued vehicles out of their garages each weekend for the drive to the Valley. Often it is the only time of the week the prized possessions leave home.

Cruising clubs range from Colors of Success, for truck owners only, to Neu Exposure, which features lowriders of the four- and three-wheeled variety, including the 66-inch Schwinn tricycle owned by Peps Noguera of North Hollywood.

“This is what I’m doing with all the money I save,” said Peps, 17, who sometimes works at Magic Mountain to earn the cash to customize his tricycle--a $1,500 investment so far.

When he isn’t working to pay for improvements, Peps is polishing his treasure at home. Like many cruisers, he will not hit the streets until the last speck of dirt is wiped from the chrome fender.

“I take it apart and polish every little piece,” Peps said. “It takes two to three hours.”

Lately, however, cruisers have encountered an even greater threat than grime--neighborhood opposition. Since August, concerns about cruiser noise and vandalism have prompted police to gate off La Rinda Plaza in Mission Hills, a popular cruising hangout.

To adapt, cruisers have switched their gathering hours in Mission Hills or migrated to other secret hangouts. But there will be no end of the road for cruising.

Said Anita Smith, 20, of Pacoima: “It’s like our second home.”