Long Struggle Ends in Opening of Public Park : Wilson Canyon: Valley’s newest parkland was once intended for housing. Putting deal together took years.

After nearly seven years of complicated negotiations, the San Fernando Valley’s newest public park opened Friday on 255 acres of hilly, rugged, stream-laced land once slated for residential development.

The Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy paid $3.9 million for the site in Wilson Canyon, situated just north of Olive View-UCLA Medical Center.

“Wilson Canyon is now a public parkland forever,” said Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar), who led a seven-year effort to acquire the land from Pasadena developers Cantwell-Anderson Inc. and several other property owners.

The deal marks the first conservancy acquisition of parkland wholly in the Valley. The purchase was funded by Proposition A park funds approved by county voters in 1992.

“It’s been a long struggle,” Joseph T. Edmiston, conservancy director, said. “The first thing I’m going to do is go out there with a sledgehammer and knock down all the ‘Private Property’ and ‘No Trespassing’ signs. That’s a favorite ritual of mine in instances like these.”

Although it has been privately owned for a long period, the oak-filled canyon has been used heavily by equestrians, nature lovers and hikers over the years. The area is an important link to the Rim of the Valley trail network, which includes more than 100 miles of recreational trails that snake across the Santa Monica, San Gabriel, Santa Susana, Simi and Verdugo mountain ranges.

“Beginning right now, people can go use that land legally, without fear of trespassing,” Edmiston said.

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Trails leading into Wilson Canyon are now accessible only by foot through an open field west of the medical center. Conservancy officials said work will begin soon on a road leading from Olive View Drive up into the canyon, where it will connect with a county access road. A small parking lot will be built nearby, and riding and hiking trails will be extended and identified with signs.

The establishment of the park, which does not yet have an official name, caps years of effort by Katz, local equestrian groups and environmentalists, all of whom contested a 500-house development proposed for the site in 1987. The opposition ultimately led Cantwell-Anderson to negotiate the sale to the conservancy.

Years passed as both sides haggled over the price of the canyon.

In 1990, an agreement to purchase the land for $6.6 million fell through because adequate funds were not available, officials said.

A slow economy and depressed housing market then pushed down the value of the land in a more recent appraisal to $3.9 million, which the conservancy and Cantwell-Anderson agreed upon as a price in December. But negotiations over rights of way and maintenance of county debris basins on the property dragged on until Friday, when title finally was transferred.

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Peter Postlmayer, project director for Cantwell-Anderson, said his company is pleased with the outcome of the negotiations. “Sylmar will benefit by having this in their area,” he said. “It’s a major piece of land, next to Stetson Ranch,” in the heart of an equestrian area.

Cindy Blazer, chairwoman of the Committee to Save Wilson Canyon, said the park is a boon to residents of the entire northeast Valley.

“The concept is that you need linkages of open space, a trail system that surrounds the entire Valley, for wildlife to be able to migrate and to survive,” Blazer said. “Right now, it’s not exactly possible to hike trails around the Rim of the Valley, but we’re getting closer. This is a major addition.”

The Wilson Canyon deal comes on the heels of the conservancy’s announcement last week of a $4.9-million purchase of more than 3,000 acres southwest of Santa Clarita, the largest single acquisition of acreage in the conservancy’s history.