Neighbors Fight Proposal for Egg Ranch Site

Trafficanda Egg Ranch practically goes unnoticed among the supermarkets, restaurants, discount stores and residential developments along Sherman Way at Shoup Avenue in West Hills.

The ranch--with its main house shadowed by mature oak trees and egg trucks parked on a gravel driveway--looks like a throwback to a time before the San Fernando Valley’s horse ranches, dairy farms and citrus groves were overlaid with freeways, subdivisions and shopping centers.

Back in 1954, Joe and Marie Trafficanda ran the ranch and clucking chickens laid eggs right before customers’ eyes. Profits from egg sales helped the Trafficandas raise four children, who became equal owners of the property after their parents died. The ranch no longer has chickens, though eggs are still distributed from there after being shipped in from elsewhere.

“The estate has been settled and they have to do something with the property,” said Paul J. Harder, a family advisor. “They are trying to keep it in the family.”

But the younger generation’s plan to build a self-storage facility for household goods at the site has drawn the ire of area homeowners who say they don’t want it in their backyard.

The Trafficandas are seeking a variance to build a 1,200-unit storage facility on a 2.5-acre parcel zoned for agricultural use, though under Los Angeles’ general plan, the property’s zoning designation immediately becomes residential when it is no longer used for agricultural purposes.

“They want to put a commercial building right smack dab in the middle of a residential neighborhood. This is entirely inappropriate,” said Ray Price, a retiree who has lived in the neighborhood for three years.

Family members, however, say the two-story, stucco storage facility with a Spanish tile roof that they hope to build would complement existing apartments, town houses and single-family houses surrounding the ranch.

The Trafficandas hired a traffic consultant and a real estate appraiser to assess the project’s effect on the community, Harder said. Their reports concluded that a self-storage facility would not damage traffic flow or property values.

The project also has letters of support from Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg, the Canoga Park/West Hills Chamber of Commerce and Calvary Church of West Hills, which abuts the egg farm. And nearly 480 residents have signed a petition in its favor.

“Everyone thinks of an ugly building when you say self-storage,” Harder said. “But it’s a gorgeous building that we are trying to build.”

Even so, the Woodland Hills/West Hills Neighborhood Planning Advisory Council on Wednesday unanimously voted not to recommend approval of the Trafficandas’ request for the zoning variance, saying the family had failed to show that property could be developed only commercially.

If the Trafficandas decide to move forward with a variance application request a hearing before the Planning Department’s zoning administrator, the advisory council’s decision would accompany the application. Harder said late Thursday that the family was mulling whether to pursue an application.

After the council’s Wednesday meeting, Hollace “Holly” Wood, who has lived next door to the ranch for 15 years, said: “We are so happy. We were shaking in our shoes for the whole meeting, not knowing what was going to happen.”

Price said he feared his presentation would be overshadowed by the family’s lawyers, consultants and architectural drawings. “They put on the most exquisite presentation I have ever seen.”

City Councilwoman Laura Chick, who created the neighborhood planning advisory councils in her West Valley district six years ago, praised the process and the outcome.

“I am so proud of not just the people who serve on the council, but the residents who got involved,” Chick said. “I am very supportive of their decision.”

Although she was pleased with the vote, Wood said she was not quite ready to claim victory over future development projects.

“The neighborhood is changing,” she said, “but we are still going to fight to keep it nice.”