Architectural Review Balances Economic Growth with Small-Town Ambience

The 21,000 residents of Agoura Hills, California share a common bond. A strong sense of family and community, award-winning school system, year-round fresh air, exceptionally low crime rates, and nearby neighborhood, state, and federal recreational parks. Surrounded by natural open space, Agoura Hills features numerous equestrian, bicycle, and other trails, and the coastline is "a short breeze away."

An area of just under eight square miles, Agoura Hills is strategically located along the Ventura (101) Freeway corridor. Bordering Los Angeles and Ventura counties, Agoura Hills provides easy access to cultural, shopping, and recreational opportunities within the city and in neighboring communities. Downtown Los Angeles and the international airport are within a forty-five minute drive. Several top-rated universities and the home of the world's foremost entertainment industry are right next door.

This city known as the "Gateway to the Santa Monica Mountains," consequently boasts a "natural location for business" "nestled in the foothills" with "surrounding transportation infrastructure supported by major freeway routes, airports, rail lines, and commercial seaports. . . . over 200,000 people living within 10 miles . . . proximity to Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley and west side communities such as Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, and Century City . . . "

However, unless such "offers [of] major metropolitan market opportunities" for business were countered somehow, the circumstances would also "offer" to impinge on the quality of life that attracted business and residents to the city on the freeway corridor. Yet, in the "Gateway to the Santa Monica Mountains," the impetus to form an advisory design review body didn't originate with the City Council or Planning Commission. The suggestion came from local resident with professional insight on how to control runaway development who now serves on his home town's Architectural Review Board.

Incorporated in 1982, Agoura Hills has seen remarkable business sector growth, but effective--and selective--planning, commercial development, and expansions maintained through careful and diligent land use management help assure the delicate balance between the city's small-town, semi-rural attributes and its inherent business qualities, thanks to the efforts of a resident landscape architect and transportation engineer, Gary Roller, who suggested the City Council form an Architectural Review Board.

Having lived in the community for all but six of the previous twenty years, the resident who works for the State Department of Transportation suggested the City Council establish a design review process for responsible growth for the semi-rural community of Agoura Hills. His motivation? "I liked the open spaciousness of the hillsides and the oak trees," he told a local newspaper columnist on a drive along Highway 101 beneath the watchful eye of Ladyface Mountain.

Ladyface Mountain figured in his future: it took just 1-1/2 years to form the advisory board. "We review the aesthetic design of the plans submitted to the city, both in the pre-application review process and the final set of plans," said Roller, the only member remaining from the original three-person panel appointed with architect Mike Browers and engineer Howard Chalifff.

Roller says the current five-member board rarely disagrees on design reviews--no club stores or mega-shopping centers on the horizon. "We are an advisory board only," Roller says. "We recommend that the Planning Commission approve a development subject to conditions we put on it. We put conditions on overall site plans, landscaping, lighting, and any other design features on the site. . . . [and] the Planning Commission and the City Council go with us 90-something percent of the time."

"Our goal is not only quality design for the city, but also making sure that the applicant suceeds in his project." To do this, the Board also draws from a deep well of experience, including designer Carol-Lynn Cambell, architect Albert Croft, landscape architect Jim Larson, and architect Jon Loring. The panel also can help newcomers to the area submit plans that will fit in with the community. "We're also here to help them," Roller says. "We have a written set of design guidelines, a general set of guidelines that the applicant can use."

According to Russell Snyder, media relations spokesperson with the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) District 7 (where Roller is also employed), Agoura Hills residents didn't always have the choice of sharing their professional knowledge of development in the service of the community whose values they want to protect. It took the initiative and effort of a professional who was dedicated to his professional and personal dreams to make a place where other professionals can serve their own community.