Making a Splash

The planning took about 15 years, but the long-delayed restoration of the Hansen Dam Recreation Area is finally complete, ready to open Saturday with a big splash.

Two lakes--one for fishing, the other for swimming--will be inaugurated at the daylong party, which is free to the public and will feature music, food, crafts and visits by area politicians.

“It’s been really exciting in the last three to four weeks to see the water put in [the lakes],” said Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks Supt. James Ward, who oversaw the $15.8-million project for the city. “We’ve been planning this a long time.”

Construction of the lakes, their surrounding shoreline and a 250-car parking lot started in December 1997 and was funded with city, county and federal money.

The renovated site covers 42 acres in the northeast section of the 1,463-acre Hansen Dam Recreation Area, located off Foothill Boulevard east of Osborne Street. The lakes will be open from dawn till dusk every day. An 8-foot chain-link fence that surrounds the lakes will be locked for security when the area closes at night.

No additional park rangers or police officers will patrol the lakes, according to LAPD and park officials. During operating hours a staff of 20 lifeguards, three managers and 13 maintenance workers will be on the premises.

“We don’t anticipate problems,” Ward said. “The park is very safe. I would bring my children there.”

Officials expect several thousand people to use the lakes each weekend day. Combined, the two lakes can accommodate as many as 2,500 people. Fishing and swimming will be free for kids, but adults will pay $1.25 to swim and must have a California fishing license to fish.

Recreation Destination Seen

The oval fishing lake, which is also open to paddle- or rowboats, covers 9 acres and has a maximum depth of 18 feet. Measuring roughly 600 by 550 feet, it is stocked with 300 fish and will be restocked as necessary.

The 1.5-acre swimming lake, which looks more like a big pool, measures 500 by 150 feet and has a maximum depth of 4 1/2 feet of filtered, chlorinated water.

“This marks the official turnaround,” said Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Mission Hills), who promised to restore the area during his initial campaign for Congress in the early 1980s. “Hansen Dam had become a terrible eyesore, a breeding ground for drugs and gangs.”

Berman hopes the area will eventually become what it once was, a bustling recreation destination for families from throughout Los Angeles.

In the 1950s Hansen Dam was among the premier recreation destinations in the Valley, complete with a sandy beach and 120-acre Holiday Lake, which opened in 1949.

But it fell on hard times in the early ‘80s when the lake became filled with silt and debris from nearby Tujunga Wash, and its waters turned to muck. (The new lakes are located high on a bluff to avoid a similar fate.)

Families stopped coming and gangs, drug dealers and transients quickly moved in.

“I want to restore a portion of what once existed with the old Holiday Lake,” Berman said.

‘Spotlight on the Area’

Hansen Dam already has an equestrian center and a sports complex, but local officials hope that the new lakes will spark a revitalization of the area.

Already, city and park officials say, the lakes have drawn the interest of private developers.

In the last month, both the Galaxy professional soccer team and a private company presented proposals to the city in hopes of building state-of-the-art soccer facilities at the recreation area.

One plan calls for a $60-million development that would include a stadium, training center for men’s and women’s national soccer teams and 12 public fields. The other would feature a $10-million training center and 10,000-seat stadium.

In addition, Los Angeles park officials proposed a $25-million renovation of the area that would make it a major sports and recreation facility for the region.

“The lakes finally coming to fruition put a spotlight on the area,” said Steven Soboroff, president of the L.A. Recreation and Parks Commission. “The idea of that happening has sparked a lot of interest.”