Photo by Zach Behrens/LAist Remember when there was that big freak out in the Santa Clarita Valley? Six Flags Magic Mountain was going to close and quite possibly become torn down for more housing. Not good. The "extreme" roller coaster theme park is the single largest employer in the area, it fills up the hotels with tourists, adding green to the local economy and hey, it's an institution of the little Valley that could......

The Santa Clarita Valley region has always been rumoured to have been inhabited by Bigfoot, but what was encountered in the Fall of 1974 was bizarre to say the least, and unlike any typical Bigfoot sighting. Several teenage boys had experiences they would never forget. In October two teenagers in the area observed a tall, muscular creature covered in hair which was carrying a dead pig through the undergrowth. Although they were naturally shocked to......

There's something similar about Weeds on Showtime and today's marijuana bust in the Santa Clarita Valley. If you watch the TV show and know the SCV, you know that it is filmed there (opening credits are very much the neighborhood of unincorporated Stevenson Ranch). And now today, via the Santa Clarita Sheriff's Station's Blog/RSS feed (see, SCV can be hip too), we find that "detectives discovered a substantial indoor marijuana grow estimated to contain more......

And maybe some rain boots too. The weather that might have ruined the Rose Parade should strike Los Angeles tomorrow. The LA Times reports that the next four days of rain will most likely bring the most rain in "Southern California since 2005, and possibly even since the 1990s..." The storm will be the strongest on Saturday where up to 10 inches could fall in the mountain areas, 3 inches in the valleys and 8......

Anyone who travels north via The 5 during holidays knows once you start hitting the northern part of the Santa Clarita Valley (a few minutes past Magic Mountain), traffic backs up, making it a slow hump over the Grapevine. Caltrans warns of why traffic will be additionally heavy these next thirteen holiday days:The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) advises motorists planning to travel on the Golden State Freeway (Interstate 5) in north Los Angeles County......

The Geminid Meteor showers are set to peak this week, especially on Thursday and Friday. Um, great date night, anybody? Astronomers studying the phenomenon, David Levy and Stephen Edberg, are terribly enthused: "If you have not seen a mighty Geminid fireball arcing gracefully across an expanse of sky, then you have not seen a meteor.' Those guys are serious!!! "The Geminid Meteors are usually the most satisfying of all the annual showers, even surpassing......

Despite the risk of building a home, selling a home and moving into a home in a high risk fire zone, companies, homeowners and governments still find it acceptable finds the LA Times today. "This is a land rush into danger," said Roger Kennedy, former director of the National Park Service and author of a recent book on wildfires. "A land rush by people who do not understand what they are doing and who......

Last week's devastating Agua Dulce/Santa Clarita Valley wildfire was started accidentally by a "male juvenile" playing with matches, the L.A. County Sheriff's Department announced Tuesday. The Buckweed Fire blackened over 38,000 acres, destroyed more than 60 structures, and led to an estimated $7.4 million in damages. On October 22, one day after the blaze began, a detective questioned a "boy" who "admitted to playing with matches and accidentally starting the fire," according to the Sheriff's......

What would you save out of your home if you had 15 minutes to get out? I can guarantee that it won’t be what you’re thinking right now. Yesterday, as a resident of the SCV -- that’s the Santa Clarita Valley/Valencia/Magic Mountain area to you city folk – I had the opportunity to play the “What Would You Take to a Deserted Island – Wildfire Edition” game. Some of the items I “saved” make......

It's starting to feel a little like Fall: an "unseasonably strong and cold storm system" is headed our way. Bundle up! How green was Burning Man this year? Elsa Wenzel from CNet's News.com explains her perspective: "As a first-time Burner, I've finally shaken the playa dust from my shoes and mind to conclude that it was perhaps the most and the least eco-friendly mega-event I've attended." With a name like Inland Empire, you deserve......

An Antelope Valley resident once told me that the slogan of Palmdale was "Why throw it in the trash when you can throw it in the front yard?" It was so rude. I loved it. Palmdale and Lancaster always feels worlds away. Many of the thoroughfares have names like Avenue R-12 or Avenue P-8. Only a select few are lucky enough to live on Avenue Q (who doesn't like puppets singing about STDs and......

Brrrrrrrrr... did you enjoy cuddling under your blankets last night during that blast of cold weather? Don't forget that it snowed in Los Angeles less than a year ago (and will SCV be so lucky?). Maybe this is Los Angeles' way of saying hello to Beckham with a little frosty cold treat. We're enjoying it. After all, some of us are transplants. Besides the top stories that you probably already know by now, A.M.......

SoCal winter hikes have a benefit: hiking past 9 a.m. does not bring on heat stroke. And if you are doing a 5.1 mile, two and a half hour hike with a 1000 ft. elevation gain and loss, it cannot hurt to sleep in a little. Named after Darius Towsley, who discovered oil here in 1865 and later sold it to Chevron (then Pacific Coast Oil), this Santa Clarita Valley hiking spot is only......

Cameron Smyth is the newly elected State Assemblyman who succeeds outgoing Assemblyman Keith Richman in the 38th Assembly District, which covers all of Santa Clarita Valley and portions of Simi Valley, Los Angeles, Glendale and some northern communities of the San Fernando Valley. Twice elected to Santa Clarita city council and appointed mayor for two years, Smyth rode to higher aspirations easily this past election season. Gossip around the city talked of how he would......

Someone has been hacking their way into MySpace user accounts and posting bulletins for them (bulletins are a way of communicating with all your MySpace friends without e-mailing them all individually). Sneaky thing is, the bulletin is about Six Flags Magic Mountain and the targets are a good number of residents in the Santa Clarita Valley, which is home to Six Flags in its Valencia neighborhood setting. hey guys, just heard from a friend......

It's going to be a long time before any of this happens. If it happens. LA Mayor Villaraigosa and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom might go head to head for Governor. Both deny it though. A little closer to home, two bloggers debate over annexation and other issues in the Santa Clarita Valley. Should Stevenson Ranch, which has the highest sales-tax-revenue-generating strip mall in all of the county's jurisdiction, annex into the city of......

Yesterday, Curbed LA ran their first Where the Hell is...? column with Castaic. Since we have some experience with Castaic (cold shudder), here are some fun tidbits: Next door (and some claim it's part of Castaic) is Val Verde. Literally translated to Green Valley, local newspaper The Signal references its history as the "Black Palm Springs." Nowadays, the beautiful dirt road community is predominantly populated by orchard laborers and CalArts students (Paul Reubens, a.k.a......

LAist Rants are strictly the opinions of the author in question. They are even in first person! We keep them on Sundays because even the hive mind needs a rest. Traffic, everybody hates it. We are all tired of sitting on the freeways and streets burning gas and going nowhere. Everybody knows what a drag it is taking 45 minutes to go 12 miles. It stinks. Let's take into account that there is only......