Tag: san-fernando-valley

A Piece of Valley History

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

According to today’s Daily News, the current operators of the Sportsmen’s Lodge Restaurant and Banquet Hall in Studio City have been unable to come to an arrangement with the new owners of the land, and thus they will close on December 31. The separately run Sportsmen’s Lodge Hotel will remain open. Correction: Sportsmen’s Lodge is staying open. But it isn’t. But it is.

Anyone who has lived in the San Fernando Valley for a while will have attended at least one B’nai Mitzvah or Wedding reception at the lodge. Most of us aren’t old enough to remember fishing there. Still, it has been in the valley forever, operating for 63 years under the current owners, and opened originally in 1914. Folks hearing the news are probably believing it will be torn down, but reading through the lines, I think the reality is not that bad.

The new owners want to do some redevelopment. While they do they planning, they wanted to extend a month to month lease, which would impact the current operation as a banquet facility. The current owner, Richard Weintraub (who bought the property for $51M in 2007) has said he’d like to retain its historic feel while remaking the Sportsmen’s Lodge into upscale restaurants and retail stores. He also wants to upgrade the hotel with mid- to high-end rooms. There are no specific plans, but they have indicated that the Sportsmen’s name will stay forever, and so will the feeling of the property. In particular, he indicated there will be a strong gesture to continue the ponds and the swans.

Should it stay? Should it go? Are we beyond that history of the valley?

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Well, that was exciting…

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

This morning, as our vanpool was toodling to work, going down Hayvenhurst between Chatsworth and Devonshire… we suddenly had a car going like a bat out of hell run the red light perpendicular to us (i.e., crossing right in front of us just as we were about to enter the intersection). Our driver slammed on the brakes so we wouldn’t get hit. The car that ran the light was immediately followed about about 10-14 LAPD cars, all going superfast, some with lights, only one with sirens (ETA: turned on as that police car hit the intersection).

We were lucky. Had we been just a little faster through the interchange there would have been fatalities. I can’t find any details about this chase on the news yet. Quite an exciting way to start the morning.

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I’m Sure One Comedian Isn’t Laughing Today

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

Today’s Los Angeles Times has a followup article on the sale of the Oakey Estate. I wrote about this back in January. The Oakey Estate is one of the last vestiges of “Old Hollywood” left in the Valley. Located near Devonshire and Reseda, behind the Chevrolet Dealership, the 11-acre estate was originally the home of Barbara Stanwyck, who later sold it to comedian Jack Oakey and his wife Virginia. This was the era of the big estates in the valley; just down Devonshire to the west, at Oso and Devonshire, was the estate of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.

Anyway, Virginia Oakey died in 1994, donating the land to USC. Just recently, they sold it to a developer (but of course), who was going to develop the land but preserve the manor house. Los Angeles negotiated a complex deal last year involving Greystone/Lennar Homes with plans to acquire Oakridge from USC in which the city would drop its landmark status for the open land behind the Oakie house, allowing Greystone/Lennar Homes to build 28 homes on the south and west sides of the property–and Greystone/Lennar would sell the Oakie home to the city for $1 million.

But that developer’s plans fell through, and now Westlake Village-based Trimark Pacific Homes is acquiring the land. Trimark claims to be unaware of the previous agreement to sell the Oakie residence to the city, and they now plans to have a professional appraisal done before announcing the structure’s selling price. This will likely cost the city more $$$. USC does support the city’s effort to preserve the home.

Why am I so interested in this? Well, it’s near my backyard. It’s actually closer to ixixlix‘s backyard, being about 1 block away as the crow flies. Adding this subdivision will add to the surface traffic in the area, which is already poor (and likely to become worse as a nearby DeadMarket is transformed into a Kohls). Also, being a history nut, I am sad whenever we lose a piece of valley history. It would be lovely if the city had acquired the whole spread, and people could get a little chance to see what the valley was like in the 1940s and 1950s, before the subdivisions hit. We lack a truly great park in the valley (O’Melveny doesn’t count).

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Wanna Go Shopping?

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

[As I’ll soon be tied up in an all day meeting, an observation on the news whilst the tea cools…]

Do you know where one of Southern California’s largest shopping centers will soon be? If you guessed the San Fernando Valley, you’re right!

The Daily News is reporting how Westfield of Borg has announced their plans to unite the Westfield Prominade and the Westfield Topanga malls with a $750 million outdoor retail complex called The Village in Warner Center. The village, which will be build on land currently containing a dead theatre, dead restaurants, a dead miniature golf course, and soon to be dead businesses, will include a 300-room, four-star hotel, 150 condominiums and apartments, offices, and 550,000 square feet of shops and restaurants. At 3.8 million ft2, the three-mall complex will be larger than South Coast Plaza in Orange County and Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance. Construction is expected to start in two years. When finished, The Village could draw 10 million visitors a year – in addition to the 15 million who visit Topanga each year and the 9 million who stop by the Promenade. Officials believe the new mall will create 2,500 temporary construction jobs and 7,500 permanent jobs, plus $6 million in sales tax revenue.

The article includes some conceptual drawings as well as a locator map.

I predict parking in that area will be a mess, however, even though the new project will include 4,100 parking spaces above and below ground. It is still unknown how the two malls will be connected, transit-wise. I’ll note there’s also another “big box” complex not that far away.

Who will be in this mall? Westfield has indicated that there will be no department stores; tenants will include restaurants and national chains that don’t depend on department stores for consumer traffic. It will be one of the few outdoor malls in the valley… and it will be in Woodland Hills, one of the hottest parts of the valley.

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The Valley Rules!

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

Today, the California Distinguished Schools in LA Unified were announced. The winners? According to the Los Angeles Times:

George K. Porter Middle/Gifted Magnet
Harbor Teacher Preparation Academy
High Tech High (on the campus of Birmingham High)
Nobel Middle/Nobel Math Science Technology Magnet
Robert Milliken Middle School & Performing Arts Magnet
Valley Alternative Magnet

Five out of the six schools are in the San Fernando Valley, and my daughter’s school is one of them!

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Gaming and History

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

Yesterday was the first Southern California Games Day in what seems like forever (actually, since June, as I missed the August day). It was also the first one at the new location, the Tujunga Elks lodge. It was a cold day (especially for Los Angeles) — temperatures were in the low 40s, with a freeze or near-freeze overnight. That didn’t bother me, but it did bother some folks. Still, we had over 100 people there, and it was quite fun.

Alas, my Machiavelli game didn’t happen–I didn’t get enough players. I also kept trying to scare up a game of Goa so I could help ixixlix figure it out, but I missed the one Goa game played (but evidently there are some useful references and errata on the Geek). I did, however, play quite a few games. I got in two plays of a new game, On The Underground, that was quite fun. In this game, you’re bulding raillines in the London Underground and transporting passengers. I also played Ticket To Ride (1910 Mega Rules), quite a few hands of Category 5, Ace of Aces (flying the Handy Rotary against a Powerhouse, I came close to shooting down Patrick’s Kraut before he flew away… it was a draw in our flying machines battle, but the rotary head-to-head was close — I had near fatal damage when I shot the Kraut down). I also got in a good game of Vegas Showdown. I didn’t get in some of my usuals: 10 Days didn’t come out, nor did Traumfabrik. All in all, it was a good day: I was gaming from 10:00 AM until around 9:00 PM. I did come home with a headache, which is thankfully now gone–I think the headache was due to a little smoke residue from the lodge (that’s common in older Fraternal order lodges).

The location of the new Games Day is interesting. It is a few doors down from Bolton Hall–more properly, the Bolton Hall Museum, being named after Mr. Bolton Hall. This is a fascinating rock building I visited many years ago, and was the center of a one-time utopian community founded in the area by the Little Landers. There’s lots of history in the valley… if you just know where to look.

And speaking of Valley History: The valleyobserved blog has an interesting article on the 11-acre Oakie Estate (click here for a picture–Devonshire is the road on the right side of the picture). This is the large piece of seemingly undeveloped property just W of the Chevy dealership on Devonshire Blvd, near Reseda. It is not that far from ixixlix‘s house. It was originally the home of Barbara Stanwyck, and was a shared ranch with Zeppo Marx. Stanwyck later sold it to Jack Oakie, a comic actor. This property has remained undeveloped, despite all the building going on around it, for years. Oakie’s widow lived in the house, and after she died in 1994, the land was donated to USC. It appears that USC has just sold the land to a developer (yet another reason to not like USC), who will be turning it into 29 homes, although hopefully keeping the manor house as a community center.

News of the development was mentioned in a column by Dennis McCarthy, where he talked about the Oakie Scholarship at USC, and the fact that many kids being awarded the scholarship have no idea who Oakie was. As a result of the benefactor trust discovering that, now every potential scholarship recipient now must watch at least one Jack Oakie film and write a synopsis or critique of the movie. By the way, this is also true for the Oakie Scholarship at San Francisco State.

As for today’s agenda: cleaning the house, and then 13 at the Mark Taper Forum.

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It All Depends on Your Point of View

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

Today, both the Los Angeles Times and the Daily News (once known as the “Valley Green Sheet”) are reporting on the census recently released of the San Fernando Valley. The difference in perspective is interesting.

The Los Angeles Times headline screams: “Findings show residents make more, spend more on housing and endure longer commutes than most.” Just the thing that would make the San Fernando Valley, a major source of tax revenue for the city, seem a desirable place to live. Could it be that if more folks had pride in the valley, secession efforts from the city might actually succeed, and the city wouldn’t be able to bleed the valley dry? Nah.

The Daily News, on the other hand, is the typical valley booster: “”America’s suburb” is as economically vibrant and ethnically diverse as the heart of Los Angeles”. “The average Valley family is older, better educated and earns nearly $12,000 more annually than a family in another part of Los Angeles” Boy, that makes me want to live there.

By the way, this isn’t the first time there’s been such a variety of headlines. With the recent UCLA whomping of USC (woo hoo!), there was another, as noted by the Native Intelligence blog. The morning after the UCLA victory, the LA Times had a headline of “This USC story ends without a title.” UCLA’s victory isn’t even mentioned until the fourth paragraph of the story. The Daily News? “Bruined” with a big picture of UCLA trouncing Troy’s ass, and a subhead, below the fold, of “UCLA denies Trojans title game.” As the blog said: “It doesn’t take an advisory panel to figure out which front page is going to end up in more scrapbooks and picture frames for years to come.” Again, this is an example of the Times supporting downtown and the money, and the Daily News supporting the Valley and the Westside.

So, what else did this census report say about the valley?

  • The typical mortgage in the Valley hovers in the $2,000-a-month range, about even with the rest of the city. That mortgage is likely to account for about 35% of a household’s income in both the Valley and the remainder of Los Angeles.
  • 13% of Valley residents earned wages below the federal poverty level last year, compared with 20% citywide.
  • Nearly 42% of Valley residents are foreign-born, compared with 41.2% of city residents.
  • A language other than English is spoken in 59% of Valley homes. That’s the case in about 61% of all Los Angeles city homes.
  • More than 72,000 households have incomes under $15,000.
  • Of the Valley’s foreign-born residents, 264,000 were from Asian countries and 374,000 from Latin American countries.
  • The median home price in the region was found to be $524,800, higher than that in the city, county and state.
  • The median household income in the Valley was estimated at $51,700, compared with $53,600 statewide and $46,200 nationwide.
  • Valley residents spent an average of 29 minutes commuting to work, compared with a statewide average of 27 minutes and a national average of 25 minutes.
  • More than 107,000 residents have graduate or professional degrees and an additional 227,000 have bachelor’s degrees.

The Daily News article tended to compare the results with Los Angeles. The LA Times article compared the results with California and the rest of the Nation, not the rest of Los Angeles. Hmmmm…. The full details of the census are available on Congressman Brad Sherman’s website (and we should congratulate Brad… he just got married).

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In Praise of Used Book Stores

Posted onAuthorcahwyguy

Today’s ValleyNews has a wonderful article written by Jerry Blaz about the closing of The Bookie Joint in Reseda, the “Last hardcover used book store west of 405” (located at 7248 Reseda Blvd in Reseda). I do recommend that folk read Jerry’s article on the closing: it talks about his run in with celebrities looking for used books; what books have gone in and out; and the effects of the 1994 Earthquake. This article was also cited on valleyobserved and la_observed). I should note that I’ve known Jerry for ages. I think he’s been on Mail.Liberal-Judaism since its inception 16 years ago providing a very strong liberal Jewish voice, at times very stridant against Orthodoxy, but at times very spiritual as well. He’s also a regular at the YMCA, where he is in a Tai Chi class with my wife.

I do dispute his claim of being the last used bookstore W of the 405, as I know there is another used bookstore in the back of the shopping center at Devonshire and Mason. There is also supposedly one on Lassen as well. There had been one in North Hills, but it is temporarily closed due to a fire at the cleaners next door to it.

I love used bookstores: I can often find good books on the history of Los Angeles or California. When we go to the Pasadena Playhouse, we often stop by Cliffs Books (as well as the wonderful independent bookstore Vromans). Stores such as this must be encouraged; we have lost far too many of them. I’ll need to coordinate to visit Jerry before he closes his doors and retires for good.

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