Agua Dulce Airfield Hopes to Land Good Offers

Nestled among rolling hills and horse ranches, the Agua Dulce Air Park is a lonesome place these days.

Hours may elapse between takeoffs and landings, and only about 30 planes are housed there.

A few years ago, 100 planes were kept at the airport. Pilots would fuel their planes and grab a bite at the airport coffee shop, which turned a modest profit.

Now, the coffee shop is closed and the fueling tank has been removed, forcing pilots to fill up elsewhere. The airport still earns about $200,000 in income annually, but most of it comes from film production companies, not hangar space rentals or the $5 landing fees.

The airfield, used 37 days last year for filming, has had a role in movies ranging from “Mouse Hunt” to the Steven Seagal thriller “Fire Down Below.”

But a new chapter in the airport’s history seems about to be written. The owners, brothers Jim and John Annin, have listed the 100-acre airport and 90 acres of surrounding undeveloped land for $3.3 million.

The property could be attractive to a variety of buyers--a pilot who has always wanted to own an airport, someone who wants to develop a “fly-in” community next to the airport or perhaps a developer who would prefer to do away with the landing strip and devote the land to housing.

“It depends on who buys it. If he wants an airport, it’s a unique opportunity,” said Jim Annin. “Once it’s gone, it’s gone. There won’t be another [new] airport in L.A. County.”

So far, 29 people have called, three of whom say they will be writing offers, according to real estate agent Geoffrey Lands of Bel Air Realty in Santa Monica.

Annin’s father, Douglas, a valve manufacturer, and two other businessmen built the airport in 1958, when there was scarcely a home in sight. Jim Annin isn’t sure why his father established the airport, although he said it is possible he intended to develop a fly-in residential community.

When Douglas Annin died in 1963, his sons inherited the property. From 1968 to 1978, the airport was leased to the city of Los Angeles, which used it to house firefighting planes and as an emergency landing field.

In the mid-1980s, the county Aviation Division, county Airport Commission and private pilots’ groups waged a campaign to expand the airport, although most residents were strongly opposed. The debate continued until 1995, when the county held an advisory election revealing that two-thirds of the locals didn’t want a county purchase. The county then abandoned its plan to buy 70 acres of the property for use as a general aviation airport.

Vic Crowe, treasurer of the Agua Dulce Airport Assn., said the local water wells make the property desirable for housing, but what will eventually be built is anyone’s guess.

“That’s the big question,” said Crowe. As long as the airport remains, “we have no problem with a housing development.”

Under the “community standards district” adopted for Agua Dulce, homes must be on at least 2 1/4 acres. So the airport owner could develop about 40 houses on land around the airport or 84 by removing the runway.

But it would be “extremely improbable” for any developer to try to squeeze more than the allowed number of houses onto the property, said Jim Duzick, president of the Agua Dulce Town Council.

“I think the community would leave their homes in droves to come to a meeting to express their opinion,” Duzick said. “The community does embrace the community standards district and will defend it.”

Of course, the actual airfield offers a rare long stretch of flat, easy-to-develop land in the rugged mountainous community. But Jo Anne Darcy, senior field deputy for Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, said she doubts a developer could win approval for a higher-density project.

“The property has the strongest source of water in the area. Even so, [developers] would have a hard time getting through the town council if they tried to build a massive tract.”

Those in the entertainment industry are waiting to see what happens. If the airport closes, it “would definitely have an impact,” said Michael Bobenko, senior vice president of operations for the Entertainment Industry Development Corp., which coordinates filming permits in the city of Los Angeles and unincorporated Los Angeles County. “It’s out in the country, with a clean landscape and low hills. I’m sure we don’t have a lot of areas like that left.”

The airport has been on the market four times before, but now Jim Annin, who runs the airport and owns rental property, hopes there will be a buyer because it’s time for him “to move on to other things.”

If he had his choice, he’d like the new owner to keep the airport operating and build homes around it.

“It would be a real shame if it went away,” Annin said.