June 13, 2002

Guest Columnist

Let’s read the fine print on Hahamongna

By Mary E. Barrie

The Hahamongna Watershed Park Master Plan and the draft Master Environmental Impact Report for the Arroyo Seco have not elicited much interest in La Canada Flintridge, perhaps because not enough of us have been reading the fine print.

Of particular interest are Pasadena’s plans for a new 1200 space parking garage on the west side of the basin immediately adjacent to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  Despite its location, the Master Plan proposes that this be a shared-use facility open to the public when not in use by JPL.  The public would access the garage through a new road to be cut through park property owned by the Metropolitan Water District.

Why Pasadena presumes JPL would want a public access garage next door open to any terrorist truck bomber is a mystery.  Why would JPL want a new road open to the public through what is now property with controlled access protecting its southern flank?  JPL has been extremely security conscious since September 11.  There is new perimeter fencing and much enhanced perimeter lighting.  The popular JPL Open House was cancelled this spring and some community groups are no longer meeting on the JPL campus.  Why would Pasadena think the residents of La Canada Flintridge want a public access garage next to JPL when hundreds of children go to school nearby at La Canada High School, the Child Educational Center, St. Francis High School, Crestview Preparatory School and the Hillside Learning Center?

The parking garage proposal also raises traffic issues.  The Master Plan acknowledges that JPL employee access to the new garage will be from Oak Grove Drive through the JPL Campus and from the eastside via the JPL bridge.  As residents of La Canada Flintridge, we should be asking how much additional traffic is this going to mean on Foothill Boulevard and around the high school.  Remember these approximately 1200 cars now park on the east side of the basin and access is through Altadena and Pasadena.  The plan proposes a slip lane off of Oak Grove Drive into the park but specifically describes this as only for park users so increased congestion on Oak Grove Drive during rush hour seems inevitable.

Buried deep within the verbiage of the draft MEIR Technical Reports is another possibility for La Canada Flintridge residents to consider.  There is a brief reference to an Assessment of Travel Demand Strategies for the Central Arroyo Seco Master Plan Area (in common parlance – the Rose Bowl).  The assessment “included a comparison between the existing shuttle route and an alternate route utilizing Mountain Street/Seco Street and reviewed the integration of off-site parking within the Upper Arroyo Seco (i.e. within the Hahamongna Watershed Park)…”  It seems plausible that Hahamongna might be considered for Rose Bowl offsite parking.  After all, why not get all those cars and their attendant environmental impacts as far out of Pasadena as possible and still be within the city limits?  It would explain the need for a public access garage on the west side of the park.  Park users certainly don’t need a 1200 space parking garage when there will already be 390 parking spaces available on the west side.  Why else would a new road need to be cut through MWD land when there is already emergency vehicle access to the park perimeter road at  Oak Grove Field?

Even if there are no immediate plans for offsite Rose Bowl parking in Hahamongna, we in La Canada Flintridge should insist that the MEIR detail how much additional air pollution, noise and traffic congestion our city would be subjected to if such use were to occur.  It would be naïve of us to think that a 1200 space public access parking garage would not be considered in the future for Rose Bowl parking given that one of the stated goals of the Central Arroyo Master Plan is “to minimize on-site event parking by encouraging use of designated off-site parking...”

If you would like to learn more, copies of the Hahamongna Master Plan and Volume 1 of the draft MEIR are available online at www.ci.pasadena.ca.us/arroyoSeco.asp.   The Technical Reports volume of the MEIR is not available online but is at Pasadena City Libraries.  A comment meeting on the draft MEIR is tentatively scheduled to be held at 6:00 P.M. on June 25 at the Victory Park Center/Gymnasium.  The changes proposed for Hahamongna will have a greater impact on La Canada Flintridge than on most of Pasadena so let’s make sure our voices are heard in the planning process.

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Marry E. Barrie is president of the La Cañada Flintridge Trails Counail and chair of the city’s Ad Hoc Trails Committee.  Because of her interst in trails, she has been a dedicated, if unofficial, participant in the Hahamongna Master Plan process.