The Arena and Other Filming Site Locations for Hot Rods to Hell 1967

The Arena filming was apparently done in Calabasas, California at a motel and restaurant that are gone now. The GPS location of what looks to be the remainder of the foundation and remnants of the parking lots are:

N 34 degrees 09.213 minutes

W 118 degrees 39.256 minutes

The site is to the north of Ventura Boulevard almost at its end in Calabasas. Ventura Boulevard is essentially a frontage road to the Ventura Freeway (101) in this area. The site can be easily reached by taking the 101 west/north out of Los Angeles. Exit on Calabasas Parkway north. Almost immediately turn left onto Ventura Boulevard. This intersection is most likely where the Shell and Motel signs were seen from the Arena in the movie. About a quarter mile as you climb the hill you will begin to recognize the surroundings from the movie. Especially, the Shell station that is now a Chevron, but has the same orientation, the hill to the back of the Arena, and the proximity of the 101 all fit. Part of the area has been terraced and built on since the filming, but the orientations of things are a fit. One feature that really sold me on this site was this unique ridge and slope east of the Arena that can be seen from some parking lot movie scenes. The ridge and slope are there and I photographed it from across the 101 from the Arena. The Arena is gone, but the site has not yet been built over. One can park along Ventura Blvd. and easily walk across the road onto the cleared area that for sure had once been built and paved.

We will have a 46 year anniversary Special Amateur Radio Event http://santhomasaquino.tripod.com this coming January with our radio club in the Palmdale area. The club has put off holding the event last few years. Here is the link for this coming special event: The background audio file at this site is soundtrack from the movie Hot Rods to Hell. Also at this site is a link to Amazon.com page to buy the commemorative DVD published in 2007 for the 40^th anniversary of the movie:

I will put up the pictures of filming locations that we found in the Antelope Valley. Here are the pictures of the Arena site against stills from the movie. 73s for now and have a wonderful summer. Bruce AL7LS

The first clue to the location was the "Steak Ranch" sign adjacent to the Arena. We searched Los Angeles Times around the period of the filming and found reference in a resturant section to the Billingsley's Steak Ranch in Calabasas and filming location people in the area. A reference to the Steak Ranch design drawings and a librarian response narrowed the location to Ventura Blvd. which ends at Calabasas and there is essentially a frontage road on the north side of the 101. Other steak ranches in southern California had locations that did not fit at all to the surroundings in the film.

1967 - 2012

Please find for me, or let me know how to find, the exact numbered street address for "Billingsley Steak Ranch", which you have the repository of its design drawings. I found with internet searches the reference to this establishment drawings which follow:

Finding Aids > UC Los Angeles > Special Collections, Young Research Library

Finding Aid for the Ayres & Fiege Architectural Drawings, 1939-1970

Series 3: Commercial buildings, 1945-1969 . 26 map folders

1957 . [ Map Folder 65 ]

1. Billingsley's Steak Ranch. 1957. 3 items.

Job Number 57-2. Billingsley's Steak Ranch--additions

Highway 101, CA.

Original drawings: exterior and interior elevations, plans.

Owner: Glen Billingsley.

This is the extent of what I could find using the internet. Hope you can help me. The information is completely for my personal use. Kevin

Current pictures looking in same direction (northwest) as above to the background hill taken from and showing a little of the remaining pad at the site. The hills have been terraced and built on east and west of the site.

Looking west into valley and the Shell gas station and Motel signs. This is the famous "She's All Yours" scene in the movie. The current Chevron station fits the location of the Shell with current picture taken from the far north of the site pad. Gas station properties usually stay gas stations because of underground storage tank contamination, and the like.

In the background to the east of the Arena past the motel sign was a distinct ridge that dropped off to the south. We took a picture of the ridge from across the 101 from the Arena site.

This is a picture we took south to north across west side of the site pad. We may have been very close to the Area here. I hope I can see the site again before it is built on. When standing to take the picture on the site we could feel the emotion "We'll be at the Arena tonight things everything will look different to me then you'll see - everybody will be turned on.".