The city of Santa Clarita Planning Division released its Environmental Impact Report for the Town Center Specific Plan on Tuesday, kicking off a 45-day comment period for its proposal on what should come of Valencia Town Center, known by many simply as “the mall.”
City officials began outreach last year on the property for a number of reasons, not the least of which was the land’s potential to become something other than what city officials have said is desirable — a balanced, mixed-use project versus a massive housing development.
The TCSP appears to be a compromise of sorts that the city is referring to as “placemaking,” which will include about 2,550 housing units in the 111-acre planning area, and 630,000 square feet of commercial space.
The area’s current zoning for the space calls for anywhere from 18 to 50 residential units per acre, according to a notice of preparation filed on the plan. The specific plan stays within that, according to Jason Crawford, the city’s director of community development, but “contemplates numbers that would work” for that area, based on the traffic studies and other considerations.
On Thursday, the proposed concept for the space was presented in front of about two dozen residents who came to City Hall. The guidelines were shown along with pictures of other areas the city saw as great “placemaking”: The Irvine Spectrum and The Americana in Glendale.
“The purpose of the meeting (Feb. 29) was to talk about the feedback we received in May and then talk about how that feedback is being proposed to be implemented into the plan,” Peterson said.
“What we heard from the community was, there can be the right retailers and the right restaurants, but … if the plan doesn’t create a great place, then we’re missing the mark,” he said, as a way to explain the idea. “The proper utilization of architecture, of sightlines, of great gathering spaces, of monumental architecture, these kinds of things.”
Crawford said the aforementioned places were repeatedly mentioned by the public while the city was studying the issue and hearing from hundreds of residents in the process.
“So we did, we studied them,” Crawford said. “(Those places) do a good job of that. When you are at the Americana or The Spectrum, you feel like you are in a special place,” he said, reflecting the feedback and describing a place where one might not realize they’re right by an Interstate, thanks to “fountains and Ferris wheels and good architecture and a water feature.”
“What it ends up being will really be up to the developer, the builder. We’re basically saying, ‘You have to do something like, fountains or Ferris wheels, or courtyards,’ and then the property owner will develop something that fits that category that they want to do.”
The new TCSP concept map calls for a cluster of retail in the center, similar to what’s there now; however, what’s different is the number of paths through the area, as well as its surroundings, which turns the large parking lot outside of where The Canyon Santa Clarita used to be into a park/event space surrounded by a mixed-use plan for residential and retail, a la downtown Newhall, and a parking structure.
There are also trails cutting through the property, which are surrounded by office and retail, as well as some residential developments. Parking structures are the main suggested replacement for the large open paved lots currently there.
On the other side of the retail cluster, in front of the area now known as Shops at the Patios, the plans include some parking spaces, as well as a hotel and convention center, just north of Valencia Boulevard and east of McBean Parkway.
Centennial, which owns the property, has said it plans to remain quiet on the discussion until it presents to the city of Santa Clarita’s Planning Commission, which is expected to happen in April, according to a recent update from city Planning Manager Patrick Leclair.
“We do feel confident in saying that Valencia Town Center has the potential to become a multi-use, live-work-play destination similar to Hawthorn, Fox Valley and MainPlace that seamlessly and aesthetically combines retail, restaurants, entertainment, luxury living and office space in a single master-planned campus,” according to a previous email from Michael Platt, Centennial’s executive vice president for mixed-use development. City officials, including Crawford, said they’ve been encouraged by the conversations so far.
The property’s owner announced its purchase of the bulk of the land in the TCSP from Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield for about $199 million on Sept. 5.
The city held a number of outreach meetings prior to the plan’s release, and hundreds have stopped by and participated in the outreach.
Now the public can weigh in on the proposal that city staff produced based on public feedback.
The TCSP’s 383-page EIR is available here: tinyurl.com/5exbfr4k.
