The Birth of a City – Valencia, California

OCTOBER 21, 1965

The birth of Valencia, California, was announced at a tremendous fiesta Monday night.

The farmlands lying west of Newhall-Saugus have been designed for conversion to a full-scale city.

That city, within 25 to 30 years, will have a population of some 250,000.

The first unit of the compact, towering civic center will, be a $2.3 million-dollar regional building for county offices. Ground for that will be broken next year.

Simultaneously, the first residential unit, with houses, parks, and schools, will be under construction. The area of immediate development, located between Lyons avenue, the Ridge Route, and Golden State freeway, is a 3500-acre parcel of the Newhall ranch, and will contain 30,000 people in three “village” units. The master plan for Valencia was prepared by Victor Gruen Associates, internally-known urban architects and planners.

Some 700 guests at “Fiesta de las Fallas” at the Valencia Golf Club joined in the fireworks and formalities that surrounded announcement of plans for Valencia.

The new city will be developed on lands of the Rancho San Francisco, known as the Newhall Ranch. Originally granted (in 1839) to Antonio del Valle, the ranch has since 1875 been the property of the Newhall family, which in 1883 organized The Newhall Land and Farming Co.

Thomas Lowe, president of the farming company, explained: “When it became apparent that time had come, due to population and tax pressures, to develop the land for people rather than crops, the easiest way would have been to sell it off to sub-dividers and let them develop it in a random style.

TWO YEARS WORK

“Instead, the stockholders preferred to use their vast acreage in a better-planned way. The idea of Valencia was conceived, and two years of extremely intensive planning, both architectural and financial, have produced an outline of what we hope will be as nearly an ideal city as can be developed.”

Lowe explained that the areas dedicated to commerce and industrial development will largely remain the property of the farming company, to be handled on long-term lease.

That scheduled for residential development includes: the 3500-acre plot which has been sold to California Land Company. The latter will supervise planning and marketing of residential tracts, while actual designing and building of various types of homes will be done by various builders and developers.

Valencia, city with a preplanned outline, is similar in concept to various “New Towns” which are under construction in this country and abroad.

‘LARGER IN SCOPE’

Kerry Patterson, executive vice-president of California Land, just returned from a tour of European “New Towns” in Scotland, England, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Germany, reported that Valencia Is larger in scope than any of the communities he visited.

“We have to produce more people and faster,” he said.

“We are not a subdivision, nor a suburb. We have decided to create a city, and for that purpose we have sought the best professional help.

“Our primary purpose has been to conceive a city where individuals may have a freedom of choice; where families will grow up and the children will want to come back to raise their own families.”

The goals are carried out in the concrete plan, Patterson continued, by dividing the land into neighborhoods, each with its own elementary school.

Neighborhoods will be grouped into villages, which will have a shopping cultural, and general center, and a junior high school. Groups of villages will have high schools, and all will be linked to the civic center.

A major feature of Valencia will be that one-third of the land area is being reserved for open space — parks, parkways, public golf courses, and wilderness areas. The plan projects every type of housing typical of a city, from low-cost housing to highrise apartments and estates.

Models of the civic center, typical housing areas, and plans of neighborhoods and villages were displayed. Designer Victor Gruen, who has redesigned cities and downtown centers in this country and abroad, explained the details of the concept of Valencia.