California Highways (www.cahighways.org): Route 258

This routing was planned as freeway. It looks to break off US 101 near Cahuenga, then run along Normandie or Western until it reaches Route 405, when it becomes Route 213. It was never upgraded.

According to the 2013 Traversable Highways report, the route concept report recommends revised proposed alignment ~ 3.5 miles westerly and that description be : "from Route 405 near LAX, to Route 101 near Hollywood.". The nearest route is Western Avenue.

Whitnall Parkway

Some maps show the Route 258 freeway connecting to the Whitnall Freeway from the valley. This is due to the confusion between the proposal for the Whitnall Freeway (which was Route 64), and an earlier, 1927 proposal for a Whitnall Parkway that remained on planning maps until the 1960s. The figure to the right shows the Whitnall Parkway approach; a 2014 LA Times article used words that made this appear to be the freeway proposal from the 1960s (it clearly isn't, as the Route 64 freeway ran across Chase and Malibu Canyon, and the Route 258 freeway ran along Normandie). This approach connects to Route 258, along what is now "Whitnall Highway" in Burbank (which could be the source of the naming of this route). It does not appear substantiated in the route definitions, so this doesn't appear to be a highway at the state level. Gordon Whitnall was involved in city planning around 1916. Whitnall's vision for Los Angeles was both practical and idealistic. He believed that Los Angeles' geographical location made it predestined to be the most important city in the West. He also saw that Los Angeles was not just L.A. proper, but the numerous other satellite cities that surrounded it. These contiguous cities suffered from poor transportation and scattered administrative centers. Quickly promoted to Director of City and County Planning, he envisioned a sprawling metropolis made up of numerous organic civic districts, linked together by a series of arterial highways, and unified by a centrally located administrative and government center downtown near the historic Plaza, where it would be "accessible to all." Whitnall and the planning committee also envisioned four "highways" that would radiate from the valley into arteries leading to the city. These parkway/highways were more modest in design from the modern freeway, and often featured a landscaped center strip separating opposing lanes of traffic. They were Balboa Boulevard, San Fernando Boulevard, Remsen Boulevard (seemingly never built), and most ambitious of all -- Whitnall Highway. Whitnall Highway would stretch diagonally southeast by northwest from Newhall (now part of Santa Clarita) through the San Fernando Valley, and meet up with the entrance of a two-mile tunnel originating off Riverside Drive (which was being expanded into a major artery linking the valley to downtown) that would run under Griffith Park into Hollywood, via Bronson Avenue. Had this tunnel been built it would be the longest highway tunnel in California, and even today would rank as the third longest highway tunnel in the USA. On June 5, 1927, the first section of Whitnall Highway opened to a crowd of 300 at the intersection of Whitnall and Cahuenga Boulevard. Gordon, the guest of honor, christened the highway at the ceremony, which also celebrated the opening of 400 residential tracts owned by the Hugh Evans Corporation. Homeowners in the projected path of the highway began to protest the city's attempt to enforce its right of way through their property. The road was extended, despite further protests, to Oxnard Boulevard in 1931. Yet, after 1934, both plans for the highway and the tunnel abruptly disappeared from the news, though variations continued to appear on maps of proposed transit routes. Over the years, Burbank and North Hollywood tried to figure out what to do with the quirky wide road, and all the free public space below the giant transmission towers which loomed overhead. Portions of the land were used as makeshift playgrounds, parks, and bike trails, but by 1973 the city of Burbank was at a loss. The community seemed to have little interest in pushing for landscaping, or the creation of public parks, and the city had a hard time commercially leasing the land, since nothing permanent could be built under the structures. In 1989 a group of mentally challenged people created a garden on 21 miles under the power lines. In the '90s Burbank finally commissioned the Whitnall Highway Parks North and South.
(Source: LA Times, 10/28/2014; KCETLost Landmarks, 6/28/2013; Jayne Vidheecharoen/Slideshare, 4/18/2011)

Whitnall Parkway, 1948 A late 1940s parkway plan shows the Whitnall Parkway in a bit more detail. This image, from the 1948 publication Street Traffic Management for Los Angeles, shows the freeway / parkway plan that had been in the works during the 1940s (at least from the city's perspective). It had the Whitnall Parkway following much of the rail line across the San Fernando Valley and seemingly into Simi Valley. At the Southeastern end, the Whitnall Parkway connected to the Normandie Parkway (which provides some explanation for why Route 258 was also considered part of the Whitnall Freeway).
(Source: LA Metro Primary Resources, "Past Visions of Los Angeles’ Transportation Future: 1940s", retrieved 12/23/2023)

LA Metro Traffic Assn 1956 - Whitnall Fwy The Whitnall Freeway also appears on the Los Angeles Metropolitan Traffic Association "Freeways in State System" map from 1956. On this map, the Whitnall Freeway starts at the Century Freeway, near Imperial Highway, and continues N to the W of Western Avenue (perhaps along the line of Wilton or Van Ness) to cross over the hills into the valley. Unlike the 1948 plans, the Whitnall did not connect with the San Fernando Parkway but turned to cross the Hollywood Freeway extension, and then continuing over towards Chatsworth and Stoney Point, and on into Simi Valley and Ventura County. Also notable here is the La Cienega Freeway, which would have continued up La Cienega, perhaps Fairfax, across Crescent Heights and Laurel Canyon to meet the Whitnall; the La Cienega Freeway eventually became the unbuilt Laurel Canyon Freeway and Route 170.

MTEB Proposal for Whitnall Freeway By 1958, maps were showing the Whitnall moving closer to the eventual Route 64 version. The 1958 Metropolitan Transportation Engineering Board (MTEB) Master Plan of Freeways and Expressways (PDF) shows that, at the city level at least, there were plans to construct he Whitnall as a route starting at Route 405, going approximately along the Route 258 freeway route. Crossing US 101, where Route 258 ended, it skirted the western edge of Griffith Park, connecting with Whitnall Highway in Burbank, and eventually connecting with something near Route 64, the Whitnall Freeway. This version of the Whitnall in the San Fernando Valley ran E/W, ending at the Decker Canyon Expressway. A separate route, the Sherman Expressway slightly to the S, ran from the Reseda Expressway (Route 14) to the Malibu Freeway, which then ran N/S along Malibu Canyon to Route 1. This plan appears to have led to the eventual LRN definitions for what became Route 258 and Route 64. For Route 258, the traversable route is Western Avenue, with Caltrans having no plans to assume maintenance. The freeway routing was never determined. The route concept report recommends that the alignment be moved 3.5 mi westerly, and the definition be from Route 405 near LAX to Route 101 near Hollywood.
(Map Source: LA Times, 10/28/2014. Note that this shows a different routing of Route 64 than some other maps, which have it terminating at the I-5/Route 64 junction. It could reflect different planning options over different times.)

The plans for the full Whitnall persisted at least into 1971, when a map of the Circulation System - Santa Monica Mountains Area, Part of Mulholland Drive Scenic Development Plan, showed what appears to be the Whitnall Parkway, extended from the end of Western Avenue (Route 258) to Route 134 and into Burbank, presumably to meet the Whitnall Highway in Burbank.
(Image source: Circulation System - Santa Monica Mountains Area, Part of Mulholland Drive Scenic Development Plan, Dated: 1971 Source: CSUN Archives, via email from Will Poundstone, 11/29/2024)