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# SMC Seeks Public Input on Airport Campus Long-Range Plan at March Workshops
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/032605-story/
- Published: 2005-03-26T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T06:26:35.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Education, Santa Monica Airport, #archive-import

*By Daily Press staff*

Santa Monica College is looking for some vision. SMC is seeking public input on its long-range planning effort for the soon-to-be-open Santa Monica Airport campus at two “visioning” workshops, scheduled for 7 p.m. on both March 29 and March 30 at the Barker Hangar, 3021 Airport Ave.

SMC is currently developing a long-range educational plan that will assure the community of continued access at the airport campus to college transfer programs and job training.

The planning process includes an environmental review to address issues that are identified during the study.

The March 29 workshop will have a Santa Monica focus while the March 30 workshop will have a Mar Vista focus. The new campus is located in the city of Los Angeles, adjacent to the city of Santa Monica.

The satellite campus is a 10.4-acre site at 3171 S. Bundy Dr. that the college purchased from BAE Systems in December 2001 for $30 million. A number of site improvements, including the removal of a 100,000-square-foot building, a new sound wall, and landscaping, were completed in 2004 following a series of meetings with nearby neighbors to develop consensus. An existing 64,000-square-foot building is currently being renovated to house programs to be offered this summer, including nursing, teacher training and professional development.

The new campus will provide “an opportunity to broaden career programs offered by the college, both for the beginning worker and for the worker looking to improve skills or change careers,” said SMC interim president Dr. Thomas J. Donner. “It is also an opportunity to provide needed community improvements.”

The Santa Monica airport campus is just south of SMC’s shuttle parking lot, in operation since 1988\. The shuttle serves more than 1,700 students a day. The shuttle lot must be relocated as two youth soccer fields and an off-leash dog park have been approved for this site and surrounding area.

As part of the long-range planning for the airport campus satellite site, SMC has proposed to fund the city of Santa Monica’s Airport Park (the planned soccer fields and park improvements) in exchange for the right to build replacement shuttle parking underground at college expense. Funding for the project would come from Measures U and S, bond measures passed by Santa Monica-Malibu voters in March 2002 and November 2004\. “This proposal has several benefits, including the ability to enlarge the available park space sufficiently to build the planned soccer fields to standard size for high school tournament play and adult use,” Donner said. “This would free city funds for other uses and would free college funds for other field space improvement projects, probably as joint projects with the city. By maintaining the shuttle lot at its current site, traffic between the new airport campus and the main campus is most likely reduced as well.”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 26, 2005.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/032605.pdf?ref=smdp.com)