Initial Work Begins on Channel Gateway Project : Development: Although plans for the complex of condominiums, offices and apartments near Marina del Rey have not been approved, the developer is already cleaning toxic soil contamination at the site.

The project has yet to be considered by Los Angeles officials, but developer Jerome Snyder is confident he will win swift approval for plans to build Channel Gateway, a major complex of high-rise condominiums, offices and apartments on the edge of Marina del Rey.

For several weeks, bulldozers have been at work clearing the 16-acre site in the Oxford Triangle area of Venice in an effort to remove the toxic legacy of past industrial operations from the soil. The cleanup work is the first step in readying the land for building.

A major developer with long-standing connections at Los Angeles City Hall, Snyder wants to construct two 16-story condominium towers, a series of smaller apartment buildings, a 314,000-square-foot office tower and parking structures containing space for 3,470 cars.

The Channel Gateway property, bordering crowded Lincoln Boulevard just outside Marina del Rey, is less than three blocks from the site of the massive and controversial Marina Place regional shopping center approved last week by the Culver City Council. It also is less than a mile north of the vast Playa Vista property, where a huge residential, office and marina development is planned.

Marina Place has generated strong opposition from residents who fear the Venice-Marina del Rey area will be strangled by traffic if the shopping center is built.

But in a dramatic role reversal, some of the Venice-area residents most outspoken in their opposition to Marina Place last week praised Channel Gateway this week as a model development that is sensitive to community concerns.

Attorney Debra L. Bowen, who has threatened to challenge Marina Place in the courts, told a Los Angeles Planning Commission hearing on Monday that Channel Gateway should proceed. “This project goes a long way toward responsible planning on the Westside,” she said.

Venice activist Dell Chumley said the proposed residential and office complex is evidence that neighbors can negotiate their differences with a developer.

Ironically, the only criticism of Snyder’s plans at Monday’s hearing, called to solicit public comment on Channel Gateway for a report to the Planning Commission, came from other developers and from Marina del Rey business people. They said they feared that Channel Gateway would worsen traffic congestion and threaten their own development projects.

Representatives of leaseholders in the county-owned marina asked the city to postpone action on Channel Gateway until a new study of traffic in the marina area is completed this summer.

While not asking for the delay, Larry Charness, chief of planning for the Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors, expressed concern about several aspects of the Channel Gateway development. “I am convinced that this project, in combination with other developments proposed in the city of Los Angeles and Culver City . . . will further impede traffic circulation in the marina,” Charness said.

Channel Gateway is expected to generate about 8,500 vehicle trips a day, including nearly 1,000 trips in the afternoon rush hour. But traffic consultant Sam Ross said the effect on Lincoln Boulevard could be offset by roadway improvements and additional traffic signals at nearby intersections.

The complaints from the marina were the only trouble spot for Snyder.

Off and on for two years, he has been talking with community leaders about ways to make Channel Gateway acceptable to area residents. Plans for a major shopping center that would have generated far more traffic were abandoned in favor of the proposed project, which is predominantly residential and has less impact.

Before he and his partners purchased the property, Snyder met with Los Angeles Councilwoman Ruth Galanter to discuss their plans. “I told the councilwoman I didn’t want to get into a major fight,” Snyder said in an interview.

Galanter said she told Snyder to consult with community groups, incorporate more affordable housing and reduce the commercial aspect of the project to minimize traffic.

The design that emerged calls for 544 apartments in several clusters of four-story buildings and 512 condominiums in two 16-story high-rises. About 20% of the apartments would be designated as affordable housing, to be rented at below-market prices to qualifying low- and middle-income tenants. Additional apartments would be built on adjoining land if Snyder is successful in acquiring that property.

Channel Gateway attorney Catherine Reuter said Snyder has agreed to contribute $1.25 million for housing and other neighborhood improvement projects. Residents will be given consideration for construction jobs, a child care center is planned for office workers, and a shuttle service is to be established for beach-goers who want to use office parking on weekends and holidays.

Reuter said a program to clean up areas of soil and ground-water contamination on the property is under way. Soil and ground water in the area have been polluted by solvents and other chemicals from some of the earlier industrial uses of the land.

Asked why he was undertaking the cleanup effort before receiving approval to build, Snyder said he was eager to “get going on it” because his interest expenses on the project are “close to a million dollars a month.”

With community leaders on board and Galanter supportive, Snyder said he is optimistic the project will win approval. The Planning Commission will consider the project April 19. A final decision would rest with the Los Angeles City Council unless the matter is appealed to the California Coastal Commission.

“There is no reason we shouldn’t be building in four months,” Snyder said. “We are prepared to proceed as soon as we get a building permit.”

Snyder, for years a major campaign contributor to city, county and state officials, overcame initial neighborhood objections to his $150-million Wilshire Courtyard office project near the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and gained council approval of it after extensive negotiations with city officials. His firm, J. H. Snyder Co., converted the high-rise Marina City Club in Marina del Rey to condominiums and is jointly developing the $450-million Water Garden office complex in Santa Monica.