Tapo on Tap

It’s been called everything from a little Beirut to a ghost town to a cancerous blight in the city’s east end. But this is the year, Simi Valley leaders promise, that Tapo Street will get the attention many say it deserves.

After more than four years of studies, debate and planning, the city has designs, a timetable and more than $850,000 to reinvent a business district that has languished since the 1994 Northridge earthquake and the recession early in this decade.

Combining a program to spruce up a moribund three-quarter-mile section of the street with a campaign to bring in the right mix of businesses, the city is set to begin the first phase of the revitalization project by late this month or early April.

“We need to fix it and the Band-Aid approach just isn’t going to work,” said Councilwoman Barbara Williamson, who has been active in the city’s Tapo Street revitalization initiative.

“That used to be the hub of our community and it’s about time we do something to restore that.”

Although other cities, like Ventura and Fillmore, have adopted ambitious revitalization campaigns for historic downtowns, Simi Valley’s plan is more modest.

The initial work will focus on making physical changes to the street, beginning with the installation of decorative street lamps.

Other plans include extensive landscaping to soften the look of the string of strip malls, remodeling the concrete medians, adding benches and monument gates at the Los Angeles Avenue intersection and repaving.

A bridge will also be built over the Arroyo Simi that will connect the industrial sector of town with Tapo Street merchants, a move city leaders say will give the area an economic boost.

The core of the revitalization program will be a new building on the property that once housed a Sears store, which was irreparably damaged in the Northridge quake.

City officials are negotiating with property owner Lawrence Morse of Beverly Hills to locate a big-name business on the property that would draw customers and feed surrounding businesses.

Tapo Street’s long and colorful history

predates the city of Simi Valley by decades.

In the early 1900s, Tapo Street and Tapo Canyon Road were legs of the same thorough-fare that zigzagged through Simi Valley from the train depot and shops in the southeastern part of town around fields and orchards to the massive ranches in Gillibrand Canyon.

Both legs were lengthened about 40 years ago, which made the two roads run parallel to each other.

After the city’s incorporation in 1969, Tapo Canyon Road became the site for the city government center and got its own freeway exit, choking off most of the traffic to Tapo Street.

Further damage was done when Tapo Canyon Road was extended to Los Angeles Avenue, which took away even more traffic and left the street’s economy reeling.

*

Then came two major blows--the recession of the late 1980s and early ‘90s and the devastating Northridge earthquake in 1994--that almost knocked the life out of Tapo Street.

The Sears outlet was damaged beyond repair with cracked walls, broken windows and a caved-in roof that stood for several years before an arsonist put the building out of its misery and forced Morse to raze it.

Today only a crumbling sign and a large weedy parking lot remain.

“It put a cloud over Tapo Street and has made the area look classically blighted,” Mayor Greg Stratton said. “It’s gotten to a point that if something isn’t done now it’ll all go down the tubes.”

Although Tapo Street had been the city’s most visible example of urban decay for some time, the earthquake prompted city leaders to take a hard look at the area to find ways of restoring its once vibrant commercial activity.

The city hired consultants from the San Luis Obispo-based RRM Design Group to help identify the most serious problems and draw up plans to remedy them.

Those who most need help, such as business owner Amrish Patel of Simi Sam’s Sandwich Shop, are anxious to see those plans completed.

His business is nestled close to the corner of the Century Plaza near the Los Angeles Avenue intersection. Patel said he has watched as neighboring businesses pulled up stakes and left.

Today the building is largely vacant, with “For Lease” signs taped to almost every dust-covered window.

“Bringing people back to the area is what matters,” Patel said. “And what affects our business is the number of stores in the area. . . . You can beautify this street all you want, but what good will it do if there aren’t more stores?”

Victor Reyes has been clipping hair at his Tapo Street barber shop for 28 years and has similar concerns about whether the city’s plans to doll up the street with swaying palms and frilly street lamps will lure the kind of tenants it hopes to.

“There’s only so much the city can do, really, and what they’ve got planned sounds pretty good,” Reyes said. “But there are some other things I think they should do if they really want to make this place successful.”

*

Reyes, a number of other merchants along Tapo Street and some prospective tenants said they would like to see a ramp built off the Ronald Reagan Freeway to increase traffic and potential customers.

Though a new ramp would be expensive and difficult to get, the California Department of Transportation also is considering a request from the city to add signs along the freeway directing traffic to Tapo Street using the Tapo Canyon Road exit.

City officials are confident a revitalized Tapo Street will achieve the result they have in mind--to make the area a pedestrian-friendly destination lined with successful businesses.

“What’s so important about this is that it shows the private sector that the city is committed to seeing Tapo Street become a successful business area,” Mayor Stratton said. “It’s that commitment that’s going to make this work.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

About This Series

“Heart of the City: The Rebirth of Downtown” is an occasional series describing efforts to revitalize the downtown shopping districts in Ventura County’s 10 cities. Today’s installment focuses on Tapo Street in Simi Valley. Future stories will detail renovation plans in other communities.