Northridge Vision 2025

Horses Across the San Fernando Valley, a public art project developed by the Museum of the San Fernando Valley, has had the first successful placement of one of its painted horses, funded by the Northridge South Neighborhood Council, at the corner of Reseda and Rayen, in Northridge Village.HATV’s public art installations of painted fiberglass horses in various locales across the valley is intended to raise awareness of the historical, cultural & artistic heritage of the San Fernando Valley. >Like the decorative cows in Chicago, angels in LA for the city bicentennial, or pigs in Seattle, the first life-size horse painted by local artist Ingrid Elburg, member of the museum’s Public Art Initiative, has been placed in an idyllic garden corral setting in front of Stereo1, at 8901 Reseda Blvd. The soft opening on Sunday, March 19 th was celebrated with Champaign and cupcakes, lots of toasts and a special visit from some of our local fireman, shiny red firetruck and al...

Spring brings a number of new milestones to our neighborhood.   First and foremost is the creation of our very own 501.c3, the Northridge Beautification Foundation, which has been created to help support the many necessary fund raising and grant opportunities available to Northridge Sparkle, the 501c3’s parent organization.   It will now be much easier to fund raise and set aside monies to better support the many activities of Northridge Sparkle and other local groups. The second phase in our homeless work/training project began at the end of February.   As you may recall, the first eight-week program found 10 of the original 15 homeless volunteers finding employment and housing by the end of the eight weeks.   The second phase will involve 10 volunteers and will be for six weeks, with the same intention of finding jobs and housing for the participants by the end of the six-week program.   Many thanks to Don Larson, Northridge Sparkle, the San Fernando V...

Among the new projects coming to the Reseda Great Street Corridor is a one at the corner of Nordhoff and Darby Avenue, directly across from the Northridge Public Library.   The development will be adjacent to CSUN west side parking lots, theater and music buildings and the Valley Performing Arts Center. The project consists of a new 5-story mixed-use complex, comprised of approximately 156,016 square feet of floor area consisting of 146 residential apartment units with 129 market rate and 17 affordable units. The development also includes 2,000 square feet of ground floor retail with space for two small café or coffee shop footprints of approximately 1,000 square feet each, with room for outdoor dining. The project also includes 222 automobile parking spaces (213 residential and 9 commercial) provided on the ground floor and one level of subterranean parking.    There are also 169 bicycle parking spaces (161 residential and 8 commercia...

Whether it was new building projects, or infrastructure improvements, or good old fashioned volunteer elbow power, 2016 was a good year for Northridge and creative and sustainable development. The second-annual Matador Day of Service found approximately 400 CSUN students and volunteers taking to the streets on Sept. 10 in a school-wide effort to clean the campus and neighboring communities.   Matador volunteers spread out around campus and the surrounding community after gathering at Bayramian Lawn.   The event, which was designed to clean up campus and the neighboring Northridge community, was a huge success and much bigger than in 2015, said co-event organizer Don Larson. A new design for the Parthenia and Reseda median area, including the installation of a new illuminated flag pole, has been in development since early fall.   The median will be landscaped with drought-tolerant plants, improving its appearance and saving w...

The mixed use project at 8350 Reseda Blvd, the site of the old Cadillac dealership, is in its final planning stages.   At nearly three and a half acres, the project will see the aging car dealership and its outbuildings be replaced by commercial retail, rental units and small lot subdivision town homes.    The project will include 10, 300 square ft. of retail, 61 town homes and 79 rental units.   The town homes are comprised of one and two bedroom plans, some units with loft spaces as well.   The rental space is a mix of two bedrooms and 2.5 baths units, as well as three bedroom and three bath plans.   The retail element, fronting Reseda Blvd, is designed with a series of open plaza spaces, intended for outdoor dining.   The ultimate design of the project was of particular interest to Council District 12 and to the Northridge Vision 2025 group. It was important that a project of this scale be a positive addition to the street, by not ove...

On a Sunday morning in late October a group of Northridge neighbors, academics and local office holders presented at the 2016 California Conference of the American Planning Association, held in Pasadena at the Pasadena Conference Center, on the unique collaboration among disparate groups that has led to the first of the Los Angeles Great Streets, Reseda Blvd in Northridge. Represented by three Urban Studies and Planning faculty, Zeynep Toker, Craig Olwert and Allessandro Rigolon, who submitted the Northridge Great Street experience to the list of conference panel discussions for 2106, the panel posed the following question, “how could the success of the Reseda Great Street be duplicated in other parts of the city, both urban and suburban?” Underlining the question is a unique collaboration among diverse stakeholders which has created the ingredients leading to Reseda Boulevard's designation as one of Los Angeles' Great Streets, the first Great Street, and which has subs...