Bayside airs concerns over mall revamping
DOWNTOWN — Several business officials downtown feel the city’s parking woes should be addressed before developers overhaul the mall.
Business leaders said on Tuesday they welcome a thriving new Santa Monica Place which would only serve to make downtown stronger, but aired concerns about how construction might adversely affect city traffic projects scheduled over the next 10 years.
Santa Monica Place representatives, city staff and consultants attended a regular meeting of the Bayside Business District — the body that helps govern businesses downtown — to try and determine what business owners expect of a re-modeled Santa Monica Place, a potential $120 million construction project.
Developers have been seeking the public’s input on the project since March.
“There is a real concern of how this project will mesh with the broader issues of downtown,” said Rob York, a Bayside consultant. “Downtown is going to be under construction for the next 10 years. It would be a mistake if all the city’s resources went toward the re-development of Santa Monica Place, when then there are other projects that have been in the tubes for years, such as the expansion of the parking supply.”
Randy Brant, Senior Vice President of Leasing and Development for Macerich, Inc., the company which owns Santa Monica Place, said the current site needs to be re-developed because it was based on an old, outdated suburban model that does not compete well with other shops on the Third Street Promenade. He said customers coming to Santa Monica are interested in an outdoor, urban lifestyle that the closed mall environment doesn’t provide, but which some level of redevelopment could.
The City Council in April 2002 approved a parking task force’s recommendations designed to shape downtown with a “park once, pedestrian first” theme so visitors would have to drive as little as possible.
The parking project recommendations include retrofitting, rebuilding and adding 1,700 new parking spaces downtown in coming years.
One-thousand more spaces would come from two brand new parking structures, to be located at the Santa Monica Library, scheduled to be completed in January 2006, and at the Civic Center, expected to be finished the following summer.
“Santa Monica Place will be piggybacking on (our success). I want to make sure they are policed the same way, or they would be getting a competitive advantage over us.” — BILL TUCKER Bayside board member
The plan also includes three parking structures that will be completely rebuilt, providing an additional 712 spaces.
The estimated cost of the project is $92.1 million. The city has earmarked more than $84 million, with $7.8 million yet to be secured. A majority will be financed from City Hall’s general fund and some state money, to be recouped through various fees and assessments.
The City Council scrapped a proposed development to replace Santa Monica Place last year due to controversy about the height of high-rise buildings included in the plans. If implemented, the project would have demolished the existing mall and erected three 21-story residential towers, an eight-story office building and an eight-story apartment building. Those buildings were to be built on top of a new outdoor mall, which developers described as a natural extension of the Third Street Promenade.
Assistant City Manager Gordon Anderson said the city has been authorized by the City Council to spend in the range of $150,00 to $250,000 to hire Moore Iacofano, and another consulting firm, Keyser Marston Associates, to facilitate the creation of a project that falls within nine council-directed guidelines intended to better satisfy the public’s vision for the Santa Monica Place site.
Moore Iacofano representatives have been hosting the “Re-imagine Santa Monica Place” workshop series in which the public took part during March. Anderson said the Bayside presentation is part of this process.
Keyser Marston Associates will then do an economic feasibility study in tandem with city planners to determine the pros and cons of concepts for the Santa Monica Place site that originated from the public discussion.
Anderson said Keyser Marston should have that study complete in May. These replacement concepts will then be presented to the City Council and the public for final approval, Anderson said. Macerich, the developer, will then reimburse the city for the costs of the consulting services.
In addition to how the Santa Monica Place construction might affect other projects downtown in the next few years, board members were also concerned about how a new, outdoor Santa Monica Place similar to the Promenade might affect their businesses.
In particular, Bayside businesses would want such an approach to a new Santa Monica Place to be policed in the same way.
If the new Santa Monica Place is like a public space, but private property — for example, which prohibits street performers or vagrants — it might be seen as a cleaner and safer alternative to shoppers than the Promenade.
“Santa Monica Place will be piggyback-ing on (our success),” said board member Bill Tucker. “I want to make sure they are policed the same way, or they would be getting a competitive advantage over us.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 6, 2005. Read the original PDF.