3 Protesters Arrested at Playa Vista Site

Three people protesting the development of the Playa Vista project near Marina Del Rey chained themselves to a bulldozer Tuesday at the project site. The trio was arrested on suspicion of trespassing by Los Angeles police and will be arraigned next month.

Playa Vista is a massive coastal development project, best known because it is the planned home of Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks studio.

It took nearly two hours for Los Angeles Fire Department employees, using a hacksaw, to cut the protesters free from the pipes and the bulldozer, said Tom Francis, one of those arrested.

“I’m really concerned about what they have planned for that site, and I’m disgusted by the land-use policies on the Westside of Los Angeles,” said Francis, an auto mechanic from Santa Monica.

Several months ago, another protester was arrested after chaining herself to a bulldozer at Playa Vista. Environmentalists who are opposed to the Playa Vista project also disrupted the opening of Steven Spielberg’s movie “Twister.”

The protesters argue that the development would destroy one of the last remaining wetlands in Southern California. Maguire Thomas, developer of Playa Vista--which will include other production studios and office space in addition to DreamWorks--has agreed to restore 270 acres of wetlands on the property.

Doug Gardner of Maguire Thomas said the bulldozer chainings are illegal, a waste of public money--and are getting the protesters absolutely nowhere.

Francis said that he and other environmentalists simply want to speak to Spielberg and to tell him what they consider to be the real story about the destruction that Playa Vista will cause.