SANTA CLARITA TRANSIT TO LEASE SITE FOR CITY VEHICLES.

Byline: Teresa Jimenez Daily News Staff Writer

Santa Clarita Transit has outgrown its facility for parking and repairing vehicles, and will lease a parking area down the street to solve the problem.

The Planning Commission on Tuesday approved the use of the parking spaces at Court Security Systems across from the city transit facility to park Dial-a-Ride vans.

The business parking lot exceeds the size required by city code, allowing enough space for the van storage, a staff memo explained.

Still, the solution will be only temporary. Since the city took over the transportation service seven years ago, the Santa Clarita Transit-Field Services Facility at 25663 Avenue Stanford in the Valencia Industrial Center has been too small to accommodate all of the vehicles, said Ron Kilcoyne, transportation manager.

``Ever since we've started we had another parking facility across the street'' to make room, said Kilcoyne.

The city plans to build a new transit facility within three to four years and staff members have been looking at several sites around town.

Areas north of the Valencia Industrial Center and in the Golden Valley Road area are being considered for the facility, which would be built to hold 150 buses and other vehicles, said Kilcoyne. Santa Clarita Transit currently has 71 vehicles, he said.

``It would be all in one place,'' said Kilcoyne.

The city could buy land within a year if federal transportation funding is approved by Congress, said Kilcoyne.

Meanwhile, the city has approved $45,000 in the 1997-98 budget to lease space for the 12 Dial-a-Ride vans. The money was not used immediately because the parking spaces were hard to find, said Kilcoyne.

Space needed to be found in the area so that drivers, mechanics and maintenance workers would have easy access to the vehicles, said Kilcoyne.

``It is difficult to find space,'' said Kilcoyne. ``We need to keep everything close together. At a distance doesn't work.''