Appeal of Trancas Park Plans to Go to the Council

• Amount of Grading Raises Hackles

BY BILL KOENEKER

When Malibu West homeowners found out how much grading was required for the proposed Trancas Canyon Park, an informal carefully crafted “deal” came undone and a fight was on with City Hall.
The Malibu City Council will hold a public hearing on Feb. 23, when west Malibu critics will urge the council to overturn the planning commission’s approval of the permits and entitlements for the construction of a seven-acre public park on a 13.5 acre site along Trancas Canyon Road.
The planning panelists had approved the park, which includes a multi-use sports practice field, a dog park, a tot lot, parking space for 64 cars and 128,000 cubic yards of grading.
There are actually two appeals and several appellants. Teresa Campeau and Clara Thie filed the first appeal. The second appeal was filed by John Norvet, Mark Davis and Robert Belvin.
Both sets of appellants have criticized the grading approved for the northern ridge of the park where the dog park, tot lot and picnic area are proposed to be sited because that area has to be “significantly altered by extreme cuts into steep slopes, and the playing field has to be filled and elevated 10 to 13 feet.”
The appellants are asking the city council to consider alternatives that avoid development of the upper ridge and prevent so much landform alteration.
Another complaint of the appellants is their concern that so much grading, in a known geologically sensitive area, might create the potential for “seismic related ground failure, including liquefaction and landslides, given the huge amount of fill that has already been dumped on the site—80 feet deep in spots.”
Another complaint of the appellants deals with the problems of a dog park in a residential area. They say noise coming from a dog park precludes it from being so close to Malibu West and no dog park should be allowed.
Appellants also felt that the concerns of many critics were ignored by the commission.