SHERMAN OAKS : Denial of Antenna Proposal Backed

A city zoning panel Tuesday backed a zoning official’s decision denying a cellular phone company permission to install several antennas in the back yard of a house in a Sherman Oaks neighborhood.

The Los Angeles Board of Zoning Appeals rejected an appeal by Santa Barbara-based AirTouch Cellular to overturn the Dec. 29 formal ruling of Associate Zoning Administrator William E. Lillenberg. Lillenberg refused to grant the firm a conditional use permit to install an antenna complex on property just east of the San Diego Freeway, about a half-mile south of the freeway’s intersection with Sepulveda Boulevard.

The board said the antenna cluster did not belong in a residential area and noted that the city’s General Plan called for residential zones to be protected from incursions by incompatible buildings and structures, according to Lillenberg, who attended the hearing.

The cellular telephone company wanted to install six panel-shaped antennas, each about four feet tall and a foot wide, that would stand 10 feet high when mounted on poles. The proposed facility also included a 2-foot-high antenna and a 4-inch-wide dish-shaped antenna. Another fixture, a pole-mounted microwave dish that would have been 13 feet high, was withdrawn from the proposed project by AirTouch.

AirTouch officials said the antenna installation would improve phone service for its customers, and had proposed landscaping to improve the cluster’s appearance. They also said other, nearby areas were not suitable from a geological standpoint, according to Lillenberg.

Several local residents spoke in opposition to the proposed project, saying it would be out of place in their neighborhood. Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., who did not attend the hearing, said he is concerned about the proliferation of cellular phone antennas in the south Valley.

“It is a continuing problem, much like satellite dishes a few years ago,” Close said, recalling that the city had imposed tight restrictions on the installation of large satellite dishes.

But Lillenberg said he believed it will be difficult to develop a blanket policy on the antennas because each case has unique features.