Homeowners Rest Easier as Fortified Slope Holds

Studio City homeowners whose neighborhood was ripped apart by a landslide four years ago say they finally have returned stability to their lives by doing the same thing to their hillside.

Residents along three streets are putting the finishing touches on a $1.2-million repair of a slope that damaged eight luxury homes over a quarter-mile area when it collapsed in 1983.

Three houses were demolished by the slide, which undermined a steep ridge along Mountcastle Drive overlooking Universal City.

The three empty hillside “view lots” left behind by the slide have been cleaned up and are for sale to builders willing to give the land a second chance.

Residents of nearby houses that escaped destruction are breathing easier now that the rebuilt hillside has seemingly survived this year’s rainy season intact.

“It’s taken a lot longer to do it than we ever thought, but I think it’s fixed,” said Harold R. Imus, who lives at the base of the hill in a house that was damaged by the advancing slide. “I’m comfortable with the way it has turned out.”

Soil Removed, Holes Drilled

More than 65,000 cubic yards of loose soil were carted away during the repairs as geological engineers graded the hillside into a more gentle slope. Horizontal holes were drilled 150 feet into the hill to serve as underground drains and minimize the threat of landslides.

A network of surface-level, concrete runoff channels also has been installed to keep rainwater from percolating into the ground and lubricating subterranean layers of earth.

The repair job turned out to be an uphill battle for residents living on both sides of the slide.

Homeowners at first tried individually to tame the slide with such things as braces, railroad ties and under-the-house jacks.

Then they set out to jointly construct a 50-foot-high retaining wall along about a thousand feet of the hillside in hopes of keeping four homes along Mountcastle Drive from collapsing.

That scheme was abandoned as too costly as the slide worsened and the city ordered three houses vacated.

The plan to completely rebuild the slope came after homeowners called their insurance companies into the picture. Insurers agreed to pay up to each policy’s liability limit, to a total of about $600,000.

The City of Los Angeles, which had a leaky Mountcastle Drive sewer line that allegedly contributed to the slide, put up another $300,000. And a property owner decided to spend about the same to build a concrete-and-steel bulkhead around a threatened home that had not yet collapsed.

City officials are soon expected to approve the finished work, which required a grading permit, said Ellen Rabin, a spokeswoman for the city’s Public Works Department. All that is left to do is to complete the sprinkler system and landscaping.

The owner of the home above the unusual bulkhead also plans to landscape his 25-foot-high retaining wall.

He is Leroy Crandall, a veteran foundation-engineering specialist and consultant in soil mechanics who built the bulkhead to preserve the 30-year-old house after deciding to buy it from its original occupants.

“It looks like the Schwinestine Castle or something right now,” Crandall said of the encased lot and the 1,200 tons of earth behind its walls. “But we’ve planted a fast-growing material that will cling to the wall and turn it green in a few years.”

Down below, Wrightwood Lane neighbor Arlene Kauchak jokingly calls the bulkhead “Fort Crandall.”

‘A Long Four Years’

But Kauchak, who said she twice watched mud slide into a neighbor’s home, says the rebuilt slope is lovely to behold.

“It’s been a long four years,” she said. “This year we had absolutely no problems from the rains.”

“We sweated out a few years,” said Elizabeth Donley, whose hilltop home of 25 years was one of those destroyed.

Donley’s architect husband, Roy, helped plan the slope repair and has drawn conceptual plans for a hill-hugging replacement house for their now-empty lot. The parcel is for sale and Donley will turn over the plans to the buyer, she said.

Wayne Hisey, a real estate agent who lived on Mountcastle Drive for eight years before his home was demolished, said he hopes to sell his now-vacant lot, which has 146 feet of frontage, for $300,000.

“There aren’t many buildable lots left in Studio City,” he said.