“We’re trying to make progress on the project,” he said. “I think it’s just part and parcel of making progress. Having the land available . . . is simply the next step.”
The zoning that applies to the property allows up to two residential units, but the developer has applied for a conditional-use permit to build five units, county planning officials said.
Residents who live on the street, a small eddy off Montrose Avenue that dead-ends at a cul-de-sac, staunchly opposed the project last year when it was presented to the Crescenta Valley Town Council’s land use committee.
The council echoed residents’ concerns that the project would overcrowd the area and eliminate an important historic resource when it sent a letter to the Los Angeles County Regional Planning Department in opposition to the requested conditional-use permit. A Planning Department hearing has not yet been scheduled for the permit.
And almost a year after the project went before the council, the same group of residents is on edge again over the pending demolition of the existing home.
“I don’t want a five-unit apartment building, first of all; and secondly, I was recently in Boston, and the houses that they call new are from the 1700s, the old ones are from the 1600s, and here it’s like we bulldoze everything that has character and build stucco, ugly things,” Glenada Avenue resident Gary Gibson said.
While Labins has said the architectural stylings of the project are modeled after Craftsman homes, critics have argued the plans are a hollow homage to the regional tradition.
