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Old Posted Nov 5, 2010, 11:18 PM
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Wink UNIVERSAL CITY | Universal City Development

Quote:
Universal City development plan advances

The city releases its draft environmental impact report on NBC Universal's proposed $3-billion project that would add about 3,000 residences and studio and office space on its property.

By Roger Vincent, Los Angeles Times

November 5, 2010|2:40 p.m.


NBC Universal's ambitious plans for a $3-billion overhaul of Universal City passed a milestone Thursday with the release of the long-awaited city report on how the project might affect neighbors and the surrounding area.

Much of the study, known as a draft environmental impact report focuses on the traffic that would be generated by adding nearly 3,000 residences to the famed studio property in the San Fernando Valley. The plans also call for the construction of additional studios and offices for producing movies and television shows, as well as a hotel, shops and tourist attractions.

The 39,000-page report identified noise and solid waste removal during the construction process as the primary negative effects of the development.

The release of the draft EIR by Los Angeles city planners kicks off a 60-day period for public comment before the report becomes final. Public hearings on the proposed project would begin next year. NBC Universal hopes the hearings lead to approval of the project by 2012, when construction would begin on production and office space.

It would take 15 to 20 years to build out the entire project, said Thomas Smith, senior vice president in charge of real estate on the West Coast for NBC Universal.

The company has worked for nearly four years to reach this stage in the approval process, Smith said. The recession reduced demand for new housing, but it didn't squelch the entertainment company's desire to build one of the largest infill real estate developments in Los Angeles history.

"We're still committed to making it happen," Smith said. "We have to. Our industry is facing a lot of challenges."

NBC Universal's goal, he said, was to get approval of a plan that would allow the company to grow and adapt its business model over the next two decades. For example, most of the studio lot is currently zoned for heavy industrial uses, which stands in the way of much of the owners' plans.

"Iron smelting is OK" under such zoning, Smith said, "but hotels are not allowed."

The 391-acre property located along the 101 Freeway just north of the Cahuenga Pass is ringed by businesses and upscale homes whose residents would never put up with smelting and aren't keen on what might come with new homes and offices either.

"Our principal concern continues to be traffic," said Daniel Savage, president of the local residents group Hollywood Knolls Community Club. "Especially traffic driven by the apartments on the back lot."

NBC Universal's plan calls for 2,937 residential units to be built in low-, mid- and high-rise buildings at the east end of the studio's property. The apartments and condos would be served by neighborhood shops and restaurants. The neighborhood would be reached by a new north-south street running parallel to Barham Boulevard and served by shuttle buses to the subway stop on Lankershim Boulevard.

The street is among $100 million in transit and roadway improvements planned by NBC Universal to accommodate the project. As much as $200 million more in state and federal transportation funding could become available for freeway improvements, Smith said.

Improvements would include a new ramp and a new interchange on the 101 Freeway, which would also be widened. About half the $100 million would be spent on improving traffic flow on nearby streets and intersections, which would have to handle an additional 2,750 car trips each afternoon.

That's similar to the traffic generated by a regional shopping center, said Patrick Gibson, a traffic consultant for NBC Universal. Mitigation measures such as street widening would ease the flow at most intersections, though Lankershim would remain a bottleneck where it is flanked by the subway on one side and an office tower on the other.

One of NBC Universal's traffic mitigation proposals is to operate its own shuttle service to nearby destinations such as Burbank and Hollywood. It would also buy a large articulated bus for the MTA to operate on Ventura Boulevard, a solution economist Nancy D. Sidhu finds inventive.

"We are looking at an absolutely huge project on land inside L.A. County that is currently underutilized," said Sidhu, chief economist at the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp. Infill development makes more sense than building on the fringes of the city, she said.

"We are utilizing land that definitely is on the transportation network and they are proposing some interesting ways to utilize that transportation network more completely," she said.

NBC Universal's first priority is to build more studio space, which is primarily of benefit to NBC, she said, "but the jobs are well-paid."

The project is expected to generate 31,000 construction jobs and 12,000 full- and part-time jobs after completion, NBC Universal said.

Nearby residents will follow NBC Universal's plans closely, said Savage of Hollywood Knolls Community Club, one of about a dozen homeowner groups in the area.

"We have never been a group that categorically said no" to the project, Savage said. "We recognize their right as private property owners to realize their business potential. At the same time, it doesn't give them carte blanche to do so at the expense of their neighbors."

roger.vincent@latimes.com
Source:http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...,2187924.story
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Old Posted Nov 5, 2010, 11:26 PM
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This appears to be a seperate development

Quote:
Still Thinking Big

Thomas Properties moves forward on two large projects while preparing for a leadership change.



Photo by Ringo Chiu

Thomas Properties CEO Jim Thomas at the site of the company’s Universal City development in file photo.
By Richard Clough

Monday, November 1, 2010

Thomas Properties Group Inc. would seem to be in an enviable position as a developer.

While many of its competitors have gone into virtual hibernation, the downtown L.A. company founded by Jim Thomas has several big projects on its plate, including an $800 million office complex in Universal City and a $1 billion office, hotel and retail development at the site of the Wilshire Grand Hotel.

The projects – the latter of which would be the first new office tower in downtown Los Angeles in two decades – would seem to be a fitting way to cap off the career of the man credited for shaping much of downtown’s skyline.

But the multiyear projects also highlight an unsettling fact: At 73, the legendary developer won’t necessarily see them through completion – though Thomas has publicly stated that he doesn’t see the developments as the end to his career.

Though Thomas is not in a hurry to leave, his age has thrown an air of uncertainty into the company’s outlook and prompted the recent promotion of two possible successors to co-chief operating officers.

“I think it’s Jim’s style to want to work as long as he can,” said David Loeb, an analyst with Milwaukee-based Robert W. Baird & Co. Inc. “This company is his baby.”

The issue has been magnified by the sheer scope of the two projects. Assuming financing is secured in a timely manner and the projects proceed on schedule, it will still likely be more than five years – pushing Thomas’ 80th birthday – before they are completed.

Large, costly and complex developments are precarious by nature, but the build-out can be even more difficult when a company loses its top executive, particularly one regarded as the vision and driving force behind a company.

Consider West L.A.-based residential developer KB Home, which pulled out of the condo project at L.A. Live in 2006 after then-Chief Executive Bruce Karatz, a major champion of the development, resigned from the company amid an investigation into the backdating of stock options.

Thomas is cagey about his future, saying he will stay as long as he is enjoying himself, but he acknowledged the uncertainty.

“I could get hit by a bus,” he said, with more than a hint of irony.

Still, if he does leave the company, Thomas maintains that no projects will be imperiled.

“I can’t think of another company that has the depth of key management that has been working together as long as our team has,” he said.

Strong outlook

Even if Thomas were to leave soon, he’d be departing a company that has made it through the worst of times.

Founded in 1996, Thomas Properties made a major splash with a 25-story tower in Sacramento housing the headquarters of the California Environmental Protection Agency. In 2003, the company bought Arco Plaza in downtown Los Angeles, rehabbed it and renamed it City National Plaza.

The company was going strong during the boom, but was highly leveraged. Then the downturn hit: Vacancies rose and asking rents fell, swinging the company into the red. But by refinancing, the company has managed to get through most of its problems and cut debt by one-third to $337 million.

“The biggest challenge the company faced over that time period was how to deal with looming maturities,” Loeb said. “There was a big concern (but) they’ve done a very good job.”

This past month, the company announced that it had successfully refinanced mortgages on a pair of Houston office buildings for $95 million. The company no longer has any debt maturities through next year.

“They’ve really strengthened the balance sheet through these refinancings,” Loeb said.

The company is scheduled to report its third quarter earnings this week, while its $1.5 million second quarter loss was its best showing in two years. Its stock – which surpassed $17 per share in 2007 but fell as low as $1.12 per share early last year – closed Oct. 27 at $3.72.

The financial results seem to leave Thomas Properties in a good position to take on and complete its large projects.

The Metro Universal development would consist of two 24-story office towers and an adjacent studio on top of the Universal City Metro Red Line station. In addition to the 300,000-square-foot project, the company is the master developer on a separate residential town center plan for Universal Studio’s backlot that would add thousands of new housing units over the next 25 years.

Meanwhile, the downtown development, which is being jointly developed by Korean Air and Thomas Properties, is just as ambitious. It would replace the 896-room Wilshire Grand with a 45-story, 560-room luxury hotel topped by 100 condominiums; a 65-story office building; a six-story building between the two towers with space for ballrooms, meeting rooms and restaurants; and a small outdoor plaza.

The company recently submitted its environmental impact report for the downtown project and expects it to be approved early next year. Thomas said Korean Air is “in a hurry-up mode” and would like to get started as soon as possible.

The developers could phase in different portions of the project, including building the hotel first. Thomas said it could open as soon as 2016.

Succession issue

Over the past 36 years – including more than a decade partnered with Robert Maguire – Thomas has had a hand in developing more than 5 million square feet of downtown’s most recognizable buildings, including the Library Tower and the Gas Co. Tower.

“He’s a visionary,” said Carol Schatz, chief executive of the Central City Association, who has known Thomas for 20 years. “A lot of people didn’t see the potential for downtown, but he did.”

So there remains the issue of who will run the company after Thomas leaves. And the executives in line to succeed him would have some big shoes to fill.

Currently, there are two executives who have the inside line. John Sischo and Paul Rutter, who had each worked with Thomas and his companies for more than two decades, were promoted in June from executive vice presidents to the newly created positions of co-chief operating officers.

Sischo, with a background in real estate investment banking, joined the company as chief financial officer in 1998. Rutter, a real estate attorney by trade, became Thomas Properties’ general counsel in 2008.

Rutter said the board wants to see how the two perform in their new roles before deciding how to proceed, but that no commitments have been made to either executive. Though Rutter has no knowledge about when Thomas could step down, he noted that the chief executive, for the first time in memory, took a lengthy vacation this year without constantly checking in with the office.

If Thomas does resign his post, Rutter believes the projects will survive, but admitted the effects could be felt later.

“Those are projects that really transcend one person, however he is important,” he said. “He was the one that was critical in getting those projects in the door initially. (His resignation) would probably have most impact in terms of our ability to get new development opportunities.”


FACTS ABOUT: Thomas Properties Group Inc.

Business: Real estate development and investment

Headquarters: Los Angeles

CEO: Jim Thomas

Market Cap: $132 million

Dividend Yield: N/A

P/E: N/A
Source: http://www.labusinessjournal.com/new...-thinking-big/
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  #3  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2010, 9:42 AM
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^sounds promising! Now let's see some renders
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Old Posted Nov 8, 2010, 2:50 PM
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Renderings.
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Old Posted Nov 9, 2010, 8:34 PM
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Renderings (for project mentioned in first post)

Found them on Curbed: http://la.curbed.com/archives/2010/1...hp#draft-eir-1

Barham Boulevard - South









Existing and proposed uses





New roads and entrances are pictured





Hollywood Knolls





Forest Lawn Drive - West





Here's the DEIR: http://cityplanning.lacity.org/eir/N...EIR/index.html
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Old Posted Dec 16, 2010, 5:55 AM
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Quote:
Traffic Expert Answers Questions About Universal Expansion Plan

Pat Gibson wrote the traffic sections of the draft environmental impact report on the Universal City Evolution project. He helps readers through the specifics of the report.


By Fred Topel | December 13, 2010


In 2006, NBC Universal introduced their plan for the NBC Universal Evolution. This expansion plan would overhaul the studio facilities with cutting-edge equipment, add 2,900 homes for new residents, new attractions to the theme park and more business and park space in the complex.

On Monday at 4 p.m. at the Universal Hilton, citizens can speak at a public hearing to express their concerns about the Evolution project. They also have until Feb. 4 to e-mail or write in questions, to which Universal can respond after that period. Some community groups and individuals fear that the new construction would create unbearable traffic hassles. Even with Universal's proposed improvements to intersections and freeway ramps, which Universal would pay for, and a shuttle service to and from the new complex, Studio City and Toluca Lake neighborhood councils fear there's no way to prevent congestion for a project of this magnitude.

A Draft Environmental Impact Report came out in November. At 39,000 pages, most community groups have not had time to cover the entire document and prepare a response. Pat Gibson, president of Gibson Transportation Consulting, wrote the sections of the DEIR pertaining to the traffic issue. He spoke with Patch by phone on Dec. 10 to answer questions about the project and provide help with the DEIR for citizens interested in commenting on Monday, or just looking for help with the document.

PATCH: What parts of your report specifically address the traffic impacts of the Evolution project?

GIBSON: We have a transportation improvement program as part of the mitigation program that spends $100 million on transportation improvements. That's about, in round numbers, $45 million for roadways and traffic signals and turn lanes and automobile oriented solutions. It's about $45 million in transit improvements and it's $10 million in improvements related to the freeway but that $10 million is really going to be used to make three different freeway improvements, shovel-ready improvements if you will. Caltrans hopes to take that $10 million dollars and attract $200-300 million with that plan.

PATCH: What pages specifically deal with traffic concerns?

GIBSON: Actually chapter five of the report explains the mitigation program so they really want to look at if they have the documents, volume 8 chapter 5 is the detailed transportation mitigation program so they can see exactly what's proposed. It starts on page 187 of the traffic report.

PATCH: Where did you analyze the traffic impacts?

GIBSON: Our study area covered 50 square miles. We went from the north side of Burbank to the south side of west Hollywood and we went from 405 on the west to interstate 5 on the east. So we looked at 168 intersections within that 50-mile study area and we looked at 30 different freeway segments. So it was a very comprehensive and very large study.

PATCH: How do you respond to concerns that the construction itself, even to improve intersections, will block a congested area even worse?

GIBSON: Well, I think to some extent they're right. Every time we do construction, there is disruption. For each of those construction projects, we have to prepare a traffic management plan to reduce the impacts from the effects of each construction project as much as we possibly can. We will leave lanes open during peak hours and we will work at off peak hours. We may work at night if we're not close to homes. We'll do everything we can to avoid adding to congestion.

PATCH: Would the mitigation projects start at Universal City and expand out, or work back and forth?

GIBSON: It will be a combination of both of those. In the EIR we have a phasing program that assumes a certain progression of development of the parcel and a long with that development, we have four different phases of roadway improvements and transit improvements. The way the report is written and the way the city has recommended that it be accomplished, is that we can't build the second phase of our development for example until all the improvements in the first phase are in place and done. So our project is really conditioned on developing the transportation infrastructure before we get the trips actually generated by that piece of development.

PATCH: What exactly would the noticeable improvement be if an individual intersection were expanded in lanes or reworked?

GIBSON: For each intersection, we have to look at how the intersection is going to perform in the year 2030 and we have to look at how it's going to perform with or without the project. We have to add enough improvement that the intersection is going to perform as well as or better than it performed even without the project there. We had impacts that the city considers to be large enough to be called significant. We had significant impacts on 88 intersections out of the 168 that we studied, but we're promising to do improvements at 139 intersections. So we're actually improving more intersections than we had significant impacts on. We have reduced our impact to less than significant at all but nine of those 168 intersections. Those nine, the six of the nine operate at acceptable level of service. Six of the nine, even with our traffic added, are still going to operate fine even in the year 2030. Two of those are along Cahuenga where the neighbors don't really want us to improve intersections because they're afraid it's going to attract more traffic to that corridor. There's really only one intersection we can't widen as much as we'd like because there are buildings or subway portals on all four corridors. How are the streets going to operate? They're actually going to operate better after our project and $100 million worth of improvement than without our project at all but three intersections.

PATCH: Which three intersections won't you be touching?

GIBSON: Lankershim/Universal Hollywood Drive, Cahuenga/Moorpark, Cahuenga/Valley Springs.

PATCH: Lankershim/Universal Hollywood Drive is where Campo De Cahuenga is. Are you leaving that alone out of sensitivity to its historical significance?

GIBSON: We are making improvements there but because of the limitation of the building, we're not making enough improvement to totally mitigate the project impact. So we're going to add a little bit to the congestion of that area. We're not widening into that site because it is a historical site.

PATCH: In your opinion, why is that Universal City area so congested now?

GIBSON: There are two reasons why that particular intersection is congested now. One is that we have a tremendous number of pedestrians crossing Lankershim from the subway to the Universal Studios shuttle that takes people up the hill to the theme park, to the studio tours. In the future, we're doing two things that will improve that. One, Metro is going to build finally its pedestrian overpass over that intersection. So pedestrians will be able to take an escalator up and go across Lankershim without having to go across the crosswalk. Secondly, we will be changing the equipment we use for the Universal shuttle so that shuttle can take people all the way to the transit station and people won't have to get dropped off on the east side of Lankershim and have to walk across the street. We are going to dramatically decrease the number of pedestrians across that street. That will really help traffic move so we'll make it much more convenient and much safer for pedestrians too.

PATCH: How would the proposed new shuttle service lighten the traffic load on the streets?

GIBSON: As part of the project, we are going to add and operate three shuttle bus lines. One that will take people from the residential project over to Citywalk and studio tours and onto the red line station. We'll have another shuttle route that goes up Olive to downtown Burbank and to Metro link and to the Burbank area. And a third that will connect the project down Cahuenga to Hollywood and the west side of Hollywood. All three of those shuttles will be free to anybody that works or lives or is destined for Citywalk or the studio tours. We believe that those three shuttle busses which are going to cost about a million dollars a year [total] to operate, those three shuttles will reduce traffic. We've taken credit for about 12 percent or so automobile trip reduction based on other locations in California. We think it will actually be more than that but we've only taken credit for a 12 percent reduction in automobile trips because of those three shuttles. There is a graphic in the report that shows the alignment of those, and there's a discussion of those three shuttles in that same chapter 5.

PATCH: One of the major specific plans is an alternative to Barham Blvd. Where would that run and how would it take congestion away from Barham?

GIBSON: We're developing a new four lane divided road through the residential portion of the development that will begin at Forest Lawn and Barham. It will go all the way down to the Buddy Holly drive near the Universal Studios Boulevard overpass. So people in our development or people from the outside who are coming down Forest Lawn will be able to use that new four lane divided roadway parallel to Barham to get to Northbound and Southbound US 101. It is an alternate route for traffic that's currently on Barham but more importantly it's a route that all of the project traffic can take to get to 134 or get to 101 without having to use Barham.

PATCH: Until that's ready, how will the construction of it impact traffic?

GIBSON: Actually, that's constructed over what's now empty land so that's not going to affect traffic on Barham at all. [Details are also in Chapter 5 of the DEIR]

PATCH: What questions do you expect to get from people at Monday's meeting?

GIBSON: I expect them to be the questions that you've just asked. What's the phasing of this, when are some of these improvements going to be built and who pays for these improvements? I think many people don't understand that if you highlight a project or call out a project as mitigation in your EIR, that means the project is responsible for paying for that improvement. So the $100 million and the 139 intersections worth of improvement and the $45 million dollars in transit improvements, those will be paid by Universal as part of the development of this master plan.

PATCH: Are you confident the answers to those questions will be satisfying to some of the protesters?

GIBSON: Not really. Realistically, this is a big project. There are certainly going to be people that are going to be concerned about traffic and transportation and its impact. As you can tell from the 39,000 pages, it's a very detailed and a very comprehensive approach to how to handle transportation in this area. The Los Angeles Department of Transportation, Caltrans, the City of Burbank, L.A. County Department of Public Works, we've had a lot of people reviewing this on the public sector side and those folks are all satisfied that this is a very comprehensive set of solutions to transportation. Will it satisfy everybody? Probably not.

PATCH: What do you expect this process to take moving forward from the meeting, once people can voice their concerns?

GIBSON: We've spent a lot of time talking to neighborhood groups, some of whom are in support of the project and some of whom are very worried about the project. I think when we've had a chance to sit down and explain all the pieces of it and how the mitigation has to occur before the development occurs and how we're really limited in the amount of development we can do until those improvements are in, I think most people have been very satisfied at the comprehensive nature and at the safeguards that have been put into the plan to really protect the folks that live in that area. I'm not suggesting that everybody has carried us out on their shoulders but by and large people have been appreciative of the work that's gone into it and the safeguards that are in there to protect the neighbors.

Source: http://studiocity.patch.com/articles...expansion-plan
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Old Posted May 3, 2012, 5:22 AM
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really late, but i just wanted to update this project

i know really late update, but still an update:

Quote:
Supe Asks NBCU to Drop Housing at Universal City Development

Thursday, February 2, 2012, by Adrian Glick Kudler

County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky is the latest in a long line of people to raise objections to NBCUniversal's big Evolution Plan, which would bring housing, studio, and transit overhauls to Universal City. He wrote a letter to Universal Studios President Ron Meyer this week saying "l am asking you to reconsider that portion of your plan that involves developing nearly 3,000 housing units on a portion of Universal's back lot." . . .READ MORE
Source:http://la.curbed.com/archives/2012/0...evelopment.php
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