END OF THE ROAD—Above, a crowd gathers in late October for the traditional Sunday morning, El Camino Shopping Center car show near Old Town Calabasas. But newly posted signs tell the collector car owners they can no longer come to the center due to complaints about parking. Left, Calabasas resident Jeff Diament holds a citation he received for bringing his Dodge Viper to the show. The popular and long-running Sunday car show at the El Camino Shopping Center in Woodland Hills has screeched to a halt and is being shut down due to a complaint that the event was taking up too much parking space.

For the past six years the show has been held in the parking lot on Mulholland Drive near Old Town Calabasas in the same shopping center that is home to a major grocery store, banks and small businesses.

But last month the activity came under fire after the shopping center’s owner filed a lawsuit against the Village Coffee Roaster, the epicenter of the activity. A court hearing was scheduled for yesterday.

JANN HENDRY/Acorn Newspapers Regency Centers acted on complaints from Vons, according to Jim Arden, a loyal car show attendee and attorney for the Coffee Roaster. Apparently the grocery store’s customers were having trouble finding places to park on Sundays and were complaining to the grocery store employees.

But other stores had their biggest days when the show came to town, especially the Coffee Roaster.

“The shopping center isn’t controlling parking in a fair way—they are choosing which businesses can have space for customers to park,” Arden said. “They’ve decided that Vons customers are going to take precedence over other people.”

After the lawsuit was filed, sheriff’s deputies and security personnel were assigned to the shopping center to keep the show cars away.

“They are posting guards to keep the people out that they don’t think are shopping at Vons,” Arden said. “You drive in in a minivan, you’re fine. You drive in in a nice car, you have to leave.

“They could’ve done something to cover the whole area, put parking gates up or regulate the whole lot. What they can’t do is stand there and say, ‘You can come in and you can’t.’”

Arden filed a motion and cross complaint in an effort to dismiss the Regency Center lawsuit.

“They are discriminating against people based on how they look and what they drive,” Arden said.”

Regency Center attorney Ernie Park of Bewley, Lassleben & Miller in Whittier confirmed that he received a copy of the countersuit but would say little else.

“We’ll sort it out within the judicial process,” Park said.“ A lawsuit has been filed, and when things are in litigation, our policy is not to comment.”

Dustin Troyan, who is named in the lawsuit, runs the Village Coffee Roaster and called the shopping center’s move a “nowin situation.”

“Sundays were our busiest days, and it was a lot of these small businesses’ busiest days,” Troyan said. “Now they’ve effectively put us out of business. I’m looking for work. My employees all have second jobs. After December, we won’t even be open anymore on Sundays.”

Troyan said the armed security guards have been rude and have used foul language against collector car owners who still enjoy cruising by.

“It’s absolutely incredible to me that in this economy they will choose to basically tell Jay Leno he can’t get his coffee here,” Troyan said.

The popular TV host and automobile collector had been a supporter of the El Camino show.

Organizers say they are looking for alternate venues for the show.