Big-City Living on Small-Town Scale : Woodland Hills: Residents of Valley community enjoy living close to jobs, shopping and recreation.

In 1949, when Rosemary Woodlock moved to Woodland Hills as a child, there were only about 800 residents in the rural West San Fernando Valley community. Ranches and groves of walnut trees stretched from the steep hills where the Woodlock family lived, to Canoga Park to the north.

Only one traffic signal on Ventura Boulevard at Cahuenga Boulevard delayed drivers making the trip from Woodland Hills to Hollywood.

Woodlock, Southern California project manager for Trust for Public Land, still lives near the top of the mountains, close to an unpaved stretch of Mulholland Drive.

“I love the silence up here,” she said. “It’s heavenly to sit out in the back. A bobcat might wander across the yard. A pair of red-tail hawks nest here every year.

“The darkness at night makes you feel far from the city, yet it only takes six minutes to drive down to Ventura Boulevard.”

Although remnants of the rural ambience remain, today’s Woodland Hills is a far cry from Woodlock’s childhood memories.

Warner Center, a regional business, shopping and residential hub, has replaced the barley fields and walnut groves. Weekday traffic often jams Ventura Boulevard, the Ventura Freeway and adjacent streets.

Woodland Hills, part of the city of Los Angeles, is bounded by Victory Boulevard on the north, Corbin Avenue on the east, Calabasas on the west and Mulholland Drive and the Santa Monica Mountains on the south.

Whether they live in hillside single-family houses or the apartments and condos of Warner Center, residents say that proximity to jobs, shopping and recreation are major pleasures of living there.

“Warner Center has a small-town atmosphere in a big-city climate,” said Kathleen Sterling, publisher of Warner Center News, a biweekly business newspaper.

“You see people biking and walking to work. At noon people put on tennis shoes to take a walk or they cross the street to lunch at nearby restaurants. In the summer, people flock to the concerts in the park.”

Concerts in the park are one of the reasons why Richard Anderson and his wife, Marie, enjoy living in Warner Hills Town Homes, a complex across De Soto Avenue from Warner Center.

Two years ago when Anderson, vice president of finance with Legacy Broadcasting in West Los Angeles, was transferred to California from Connecticut, he and Marie looked at homes from Pasadena to Ventura County. They wanted a house that would go with their traditional furnishings and not require extensive renovation.

“When we found this townhouse in Woodland Hills, I felt we could be very happy here,” Marie Anderson said.

The Andersons have become active in the townhome association, where Marie produces the newsletter and serves as secretary, and Richard acts as treasurer.

“I walk to the post office and to Irvine Ranch Market,” Marie said. “My husband walks to “The Firm”, an exercise club. Many people like to live here if they work in Warner Center because they can avoid the freeway. There is traffic during the week, but on the weekends it is very quiet.”

Until the 1950s, when major high-tech industries began to locate in the West Valley, Woodland Hills was a sleepy country community.

Early in the 20th Century, Brant Rancho, the largest barley and wheat ranch in the area, stretched from the mountains north to Owensmouth, now Canoga Park.

In 1923, Victor Girard, a colorful real estate pioneer, opened the town site of Girard, on the hillside south of Ventura Boulevard. To appeal to prospective buyers, Girard’s company, the Boulevard Land Co., imported and planted more than 120,000 young pepper trees, sycamores, eucalyptuses and pines--trees that later would give the community its name of Woodland Hills.

Girard undertook an aggressive sales campaign aimed at Midwesterners and Easterners who were coming to California to retire. Lots began at $500. Choice properties along Ventura and Topanga boulevards sold for $5,000 to $10,000.

During the Depression of the 1930s, the dream town collapsed amid lawsuits, and many investors, including Girard, abandoned their holdings. Those who remained formed the nucleus of what was to become Woodland Hills.

In the 1930s, Harry Warner of Warner Bros. Pictures began Brant Rancho. An avid thoroughbred horse breeder, he built a large home overlooking his holdings on a hill that became known as Warner Ridge, at the corner of De Soto Avenue and Oxnard Street.

Los Angeles Pierce College, covering 427 acres to the north of Warner Ridge, was started in the late ‘40s as an agricultural campus. Although agriculture is no longer the school’s prime focus, the open acres, barns and farm animals contrast with the sleek high-rise buildings of Warner Center across De Soto.

In the 1950s, the country atmosphere and inexpensive tract homes drew residents who wanted to raise their families away from the city.

“We were drawn to the area because of the country feeling,” said Ernest Zehms, a retired engineer who moved his family to a postwar ranch house in the hills just west of Topanga Canyon Boulevard in 1955.

“When we first lived here, you could see the Basque sheepherders with their flocks of sheep up on the hill,” he said. “There wasn’t a grade school nearby, and my kids had to go over the hill to Woodland Hills Elementary.

“There weren’t many other houses up here. Most of the houses in Woodland Hills were built between 1955 and 1970. Small developers would buy several lots and build the same style house on each lot, possibly reversing the floor plan.”

Farther to the east, at the edge of Tarzana, large custom homes were built on subdivisions carved from private estates.

“People up here like their privacy,” said Rosalind Zane, an audiologist who lives in a six-bedroom contemporary home built in 1965 on a wooded acre, originally part of Forest Hills Estate.

“It’s like the end of the world,” said her husband, Martin Zane, a plastic surgeon who practices in Encino.

“Almost everyone up here has a pool, and some have tennis courts. We moved here because it’s a very isolated area, but only a short distance from Ventura Boulevard, where our son and daughter could take public transportation to school.”

“Even though we’re secluded, you can see the mountains and the expanse of the Valley when it’s clear,” he added.

While the amenities make Woodland Hills an attractive area for both homeowners and renters, the desirability carries a high price tag.

“You can tack on at least $25,000 to a property if it’s in Woodland Hills, and even more in the hills, depending on condition,” says Laura Lee, an agent in Jon Douglas’ Woodland Hills office.

Lee said that prices for townhomes and condos in or near Warner Center begin at about $175,000. Townhomes with several bedrooms, more than one level of living space, fireplaces and patios in lush landscaping begin at $200,000.

To the north, adjacent to Canoga Park, the typical three-bedroom, two-bath family home built in the late 1950s will cost $250,000 or more. In Carleton Terrace, an area located between Pierce College and the Ventura Freeway, houses built in the 1960s cost from $350,000 to $425,000.

Warner Center apartment complexes with fountains, streams and luxuriant foliage rent from $950 for a two-bedroom unit to $1,200 for three bedrooms.

“Woodland Hills south of the boulevard is an extremely varied area. You will find mini-castles in “Westchester County”--a gated community--large custom homes in the hills, as well as tract and smaller custom homes,” Rosalind Zane said.

Prices south of Ventura Boulevard reflect the housing diversity.

Alan Flint of Formost Realty/Woodland Hills, says custom houses west of Topanga Canyon Boulevard are priced from $250,000 up.

In the Girard tract, the oldest residential section of Woodland Hills, which extends from Serrania Street on the east to Topanga Canyon Boulevard on the west and from Dumetz south to Mulholland Drive, lots can be quite small, and were originally designed for cabins. Here prices are erratic, starting around $250,000 and going up to $650,000.

Near Tarzana, prices for large custom homes are high--$750,000 and up.

Scant open space remains for new construction, and plans for these areas have provoked bitter disputes between homeowners and builders.

In January, several hundred residents trooped to City Hall to a City Council hearing that determined the zoning for Warner Ridge.

Warner Ridge Associates, a joint venture of the Spound Corp. of Century City and Johnson Wax, proposed building an 810,000-square-foot office complex, including seven office buildings, a restaurant and parking structure.

The Woodland Hills Homeowners’ Assn., representing about 600 households, persuaded Councilwoman Joy Picus to back a proposal to zone the property RS, a designation they say will allow more than 100 single-family homes. The group vows that commercial development will not cross De Soto Avenue.

“We support responsible development that must be consistent with the general plan,” said Bob Gross, president of the homeowners’ group.

Warner Ridge Associates disputes the new zoning and has filed a lawsuit against the city. “The zoning action has left us with no feasible use for the property,” said Jack Spound, president of Spound Corp.

The homeowners group also is fighting to retain the rustic atmosphere of the Girard Tract, where some streets are narrow and unpaved. An ordinance adopted in 1989 requires that new homes have frontage on a paved road at least 20 feet wide from the new house to the nearest intersecting highway . The builder of the new home is required to bear the cost of widening and paving an unimproved road.

The ordinance also restricts the height and size of new houses on a small lots.

“Inappropriately large houses on lots that were designed for cabins attract a large number of cars, some of which are stored on the street,” Woodlock said.

“Traffic and speeding are problems on the narrow and winding roads. Some of the newer residents don’t seem to care about the environment. They tear out the old walnut and oak trees. This violates the Girard Tract Ordinance.”

Andrew Railla, a developer and framing contractor who wants to build a house on a lot he owns in Girard Tract, is frustrated by the strict regulations.

“My plans, permits and construction loan have all been on hold for four months,” he said. “I started to remove scrub oak bushes, but then we were stopped by Building and Safety who said they made a mistake when they issued my permit. I can appeal, but that means loss of my time and money.”

The problems of the hillside dwellers seem far away for those who live on the flats in Warner Center.

Ann B. Schmitt, a public relations consultant who represents the Woodland Hills Chamber of Commerce as well as many other local businesses, recently moved to a Warner Center apartment to be close to her business.

“The apartment I rent is just a block and a half from my office,” she said. “It is like an island, a sanctuary. There are rocks, waterfalls and lush landscaping. The living room has vaulted ceilings and a wood-burning fireplace.

“Last weekend, when I stopped at Irvine Ranch Market, I ran into a couple of my clients. It’s like living in a small town without sacrificing the amenities of the city.”

AT A GLANCE

Population 1990 estimate: 81,178 1980-90 change: 14.8%

Median age: 36.3 years

Annual income Per capita: 24,015 Median household: 59,392

Household distribution Less than $15,000: 8.2% $15,000 - $30,000: 11.4% $30,000 - $50,000: 20.6% $50,000 - $75,000: 26.2% $75,000 + 32.7%