BURBANK OKS NBC EXPANSION : COUNCIL CITES NEW JOBS, TAX REVENUE.

Byline: Lee Condon Daily News Staff Writer

The Burbank City Council on Tuesday approved NBC's plan to more than double the size of its studio over the next 25 years, a project expected to bring 4,300 new jobs and $2.5 million in annual tax revenue to the city.

In all, NBC plans to add 1.5 million square feet of studio and office space to its 44-acre Alameda Avenue complex, which the company has called home since 1952.

Company officials say they have outgrown their current facility, which now has 845,000 square feet of development, because of overwhelming demand for studio space. They will add four new office towers, six new sound stages and three new parking garages.

The studio first proposed the project in June 1996 and immediately embarked on an aggressive sales campaign in the surrounding neighborhood in order to deal with residential concerns.

``The approval of this master plan will allow NBC to gain control of its destiny,'' said NBC vice president Jack O'Neill. ``The company has been forced in recent years to lease increasingly hard to find production facilities outside Burbank and install 35,000 square feet of temporary trailers.''

While Warner Bros. and Disney faced organized opposition from residents when they brought their master plans in for approval, most residents at Tuesday's meeting lauded the NBC plan.

Some residents, however, did say they were concerned about the additional traffic.

``I live in the Media District,'' Robby Shaw told the council. ``It's hell to get in and out of where I live. The bottom line is simply problems with traffic.''

NBC generates 6,300 daily vehicle trips, a number expected to rise to 15,500 once the expanded lot is fully built, O'Neill said. The new traffic, totaling some 9,200 trips, will be spread throughout the day and night, not around rush hours, he said.

To help deal with the added congestion, however, the company has agreed to add traffic signals and reconfigure traffic lanes around its complex.

NBC, Disney and Warner Bros. all have created master plan expansion proposals within the guidelines of a 1991 document called the Burbank Media District Specific Plan, which was drafted in order to set the ground rules for studio development.

The Warner Bros. expansion approved in September 1995 by the Burbank City Council is expected to bring 8,000 new jobs to the city in the next 20 years. The company plans to add 3.3 million square feet to its 100-acre main lot on Warner Boulevard and its 30-acre Burbank Studios Ranch lot.

Disney is in the midst of its expansion, which the company estimated will bring in 6,000 new employees. Disney is adding 1.9 million square feet of office and studio space on Buena Vista Boulevard. Its master plan won approval in 1992.