Construction Projects

The City Council on Wednesday gave the go-ahead to permits for three new San Fernando Valley construction projects. The council approved a measure exempting the Marvin Braude Constituent Service Center--planned for Van Nuys Boulevard and Sylvan Street--from a 15-foot building-line setback requirement in effect since the 1950s.

LAS VEGAS - For nearly five years, the steel-and-concrete skeleton of the abandoned resort project has taunted this city, a glaring reminder that casino operators here can't win every economic wager they place. The stalled Echelon project sits on hallowed gambling ground: It's where the old Stardust casino was imploded. Construction on the new $4-billion resort began in 2007 and froze a year later - a failure so embarrassing that city officials later ordered owner Boyd Gaming Corp.

In a move that could shave months off the time schedule for several construction projects now underway, the City Council on Tuesday will consider streamlining the paperwork process. The ordinance before the council would allow developers to merge two or more parcels into one lot without having to file a new project map with the city. "It's part of the city's overall business-friendly concept," city planner Mike Balsamo said. "There would be no negative impacts on the city from this."

A Los Angeles building department engineer suspected of taking as much as $60,000 while giving bogus approvals to new construction projects across South Los Angeles has lost his job, lawyers for the city said Monday. In the latest development in a two-year series of corruption probes of the city Department of Building and Safety, investigators in the city attorney's office have forwarded information on Frank Rojas, a 23-year agency employee, to the FBI and the U.S. attorney's office.

The City Council, tired of construction projects that leave neighbors enduring noise, dust and unsightly lots for years, has enacted a law that levies fines for failure to complete work within a designated time. The city is among the first in the San Gabriel Valley to impose a timetable for builders. Under the law, approved by the council late Wednesday, a property owner would have six months to complete a $50,000 project, nine months for $100,000 project and a year to finish a $250,000 project.

Bill Kreger, 59, Los Angeles County administrative official who supervised major construction projects. At the time of his death, Kreger was executive consultant to the county's Economic Development Corp. He had served for many years as assistant chief administrative officer handling the department's asset management division.

Los Angeles County officials are recommending that the Sheriff's Department lose its authority to manage large construction projects after costs to renovate a facility in East Los Angeles far exceeded its budget, including more than $1 million in overruns that were not approved by the Board of Supervisors. Renovations of the Biscailuz Regional Training Center in East Los Angeles originally were expected to cost about $9.

Worse than living next-door to a construction project is living next-door to one that grinds to a halt. Residents on one Redondo Beach street look forward to the day when construction crews start making noise again. For more than a year, neighbors have been comparing notes about the half-finished remodel, wondering when--and if--it will ever be done.

When it starts to rain in the Soviet capital, it is as though a referee has called time out in the game of one-upmanship played along the Ring Road that circles the Kremlin. Whether at the wheel of a lowly subcompact Zaparozhets or a chauffeured, black Volga shuttling the Communist elite, drivers promptly brake to a stop, jump out and install their windshield wipers.

The San Fernando Valley's biggest development--Walt Disney Co.'s proposed $2-billion Glendale campus--moved forward with the release of its environmental impact report during the third quarter, while a host of other projects were started, completed or announced. Among the busiest developers of projects already under construction in the Valley is Trammell Crow Co., which is focusing on infill sites.

MOSCOW -- Exactly a year before the 2014 winter Olympics in the Russian city of Sochi, President Vladimir Putin fired a highly placed official Thursday after personally inspecting the construction process the day before. Akhmed Bilalov, vice president of the national Olympic Committee, lost his job because of delays and overspending in the construction of the ski-jump complex Russki Gorki in Krasnaya Polyana, which is part of the "mountain cluster" that will serve as a hub of Sochi Olympic events.

The summer before Kenna Castillo started sixth grade at Sierra Madre Middle School, education officials ordered demolition of the aging campus to make way for a brand-new school. More than 2 1/2 years later, construction has yet to start, and Kenna is wrapping up eighth grade in a hodgepodge of trailers on a dirt lot. On Tuesday, Pasadena Unified school board members ordered yet another delay for the rebirth of Sierra Madre Middle School after bids for the $22.5-million project came in nearly $9 million over budget.

The University of Southern California has not always been the best neighbor. In recent years, as the population of undergraduates from out of state has grown, students have overwhelmed the university's supply of campus housing and descended on the neighborhood, where opportunistic property owners jacked up rents that students could pay and displaced families that couldn't afford them. Now the university has a chance to repair some of the disruption it has caused, and, wisely, it is doing that.

The excavator's teeth bite into the footing of a recently demolished sound wall. A dozen empty dump trucks along Sepulveda Boulevard rumble forward one by one. Tons of concrete and rebar tumble into each bed, the booms and clatters echoing against the metal sides. Up the slight hill, the walls and windows of a house on South Thurston Avenue begin to shake and rattle. It is 2 a.m. Tuesday, and the racket of the 405 Freeway construction has roused the Sandifers. Again. As Angelenos brace for 53 hours of disruptions from Carmageddon II, this weekend's temporary closure of the freeway, Kim Sandifer can only dream that her construction-related misery could be confined to a few days.

Camp Kilpatrick, the Malibu-based juvenile detention facility that inspired the 2006 movie "Gridiron Gang," is suspending its one-of-a-kind high school sports program effective in January, said Jerry Powers, chief of the Los Angeles County Probation Department. The camp that can house as many as 110 juvenile inmates is being relocated during a three-year construction project. Football Coach Derek Ayers said his team will have one final season this fall competing in the CIF Southern Section.

The 2014 World Cup is scheduled to kick off in San Paulo, Brazil, in a little less than two years. But there's no guarantee Brazil will be ready by then. A report from Brazil's sports ministry last month said just 5% of planned World Cup-related projects, including an airport expansion and port improvements, were done — and nearly half hadn't even been started. Of those underway, many projects are well behind schedule while the costs for others have soared to as much as three times original estimates.

A former official of the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles and two of his brothers have been charged with engaging in an elaborate scheme to enrich themselves by steering contracts for construction projects at the city's housing projects. Federal prosecutors allege that Victor Taracena, who supervised construction projects at the housing authority from 2003 to 2007, arranged for numerous contracts to be awarded to companies controlled by his brothers, Bennett A. Taracena and Diego L. Taracena.

SACRAMENTO — Officials Monday announced an overhaul of California prisons that would cut spending by billions of dollars, cancel some construction projects, close one lockup and bring back 9,500 inmates housed in other states — all while meeting court orders to reduce crowding and improve medical care. If state lawmakers and federal judges sign off on the proposals, California's long-troubled prison system would look significantly different by 2016 — smaller, cheaper and more autonomous.

If you are heading in or out of Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) anytime soon, you might want to pack a little patience. Roadway closures linked to construction projects mean the beginning of traffic headaches that start today (Tuesday) and will continue for the next two years, according to an airport statement. It won't exactly be carmageddon, but travelers would be wise to allow more time getting to and from LAX. The airport will begin closing some lanes on departure and arrival roadways because of a $4.1 billion airport upgrade known by the acronym (trademarked, no less)

Re "Brown's bloody budget," Editorial, May 15 Because of a $16-billion budget deficit, Gov. Jerry Brown is proposing $544 million in cuts to California's court system, which has already lost more than $600 million in funding over the last four years. This round of cuts will mean the judicial branch has had its budget cut by nearly 30% over the last five years, far more than any other branch of government. Trial courts will be asked to absorb the cuts by tapping into reserves and suspending construction projects.