Plan to Clean Up Torrance Redevelopment Site OKd

In an effort to improve the blighted industrial area in northeast Torrance, the city Redevelopment Agency voted this week for a plan to provide up to $2.5 million to help clean up ground-water contamination at the former Armco steel plant site.

The 38-acre site is being developed by Gascon Mar Ltd. as a business park, which will include office buildings, a restaurant and a hotel. The retail buildings are under construction.

A portion of the money for cleanup will come from a promissory note from the Redevelopment Agency and will be reimbursed by taxes generated by the project, said Mike Bihn, senior principal planner with the city.

Gascon has set aside $1.75 million for the cleanup. Once that money is spent, the City Council, sitting as the Redevelopment Agency, will commit 50% of the rest of the cleanup costs, up to a total of $2.5 million. The Gascon project, called Torrance Center II, is included in the city’s 292-acre industrial redevelopment plan east of old downtown Torrance. The ground-water cleanup should not delay the project, which is scheduled for completion by 1994.

The actual cleanup operation will not take place until ground-water tests on adjacent sites--such as the Mobil Oil Corp. refinery and future North American Headquarters for Honda--are completed so that the cleanup effort can be coordinated, Bihn said.

He said he did not know how long it would take to complete those tests.

The 292-acre industrial redevelopment plan includes construction of the Honda site and Torrance Center I, a 12-acre office building project also developed by Gascon. Much of the ground water in the area is suspected of being contaminated.

The former Armco site is bordered by 213th Street on the north, Carson Street on the south, Western Avenue on the east and Border Avenue on the west. In late 1986, tests found low levels of ground-water contamination about 90 feet below the surface, Bihn said.

He said it has not been determined if the contamination there came from previous operations on the site or from off-site operations. The contamination is made up of several different chemicals, a large portion of which is a solvent solution that has various industrial uses, he said.

The contamination at Armco does not endanger drinking water, which is usually found at about 600 feet below surface, he said.

If the source of the contamination is later discovered, City Atty. Kenneth L. Nelson said the city can force those responsible to reimburse the cost of the cleanup.

City officials said the cleanup was needed to move forward with the redevelopment of the old industrial section of town.

Under a 1986 agreement, the agency provided up to $3 million for street, sewer, and lighting improvements in and around the Armco site. These funds would also be reimbursed through taxes generated by the project. Bihn said about 95% of the improvements have been completed.

“It’s a little bit frightening when you’re dealing in these sums and with long-term commitments, but in the long run it will be very beneficial to the downtown area,� said Mayor Katy Geissert.