> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.smdp.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Council concerned about lack of outdoor dining on Promenade - URL: https://www.smdp.com/council-concerned-about-lack-of-outdoor-dining-on-promenade/ - Published: 2001-11-13T16:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-22T22:26:15.000Z - Author: Guest Author - Tags: Business, Promenade, #archive-import *Outdoor dining, ‘Superblock’ head council agenda* *By Daily Press Staff* The Santa Monica City Council wants you to eat outside. But because recent market trends affecting the Third Street Promenade have favored retail stores over restaurants, that’s not as easy as it once was. City staff believe this lack of outdoor dining could change the character of the Promenade, as well as undermine its long-term success, according to a staff memo. Six restaurants with outdoor dining have left during the last two years, while just one has opened. Retailers are willing to pay more rent than restaurants, staff said. The difference is “varying, but substantial,” according to the memo. However, city officials believe they can regulate the market through a series of measures scheduled for consideration at tonight’s council meeting. These measures include possible lower rents for restaurants with outdoor dining, encouraging more outdoor kiosks and vending carts and expanding outdoor dining to include space in front of adjacent retail stores. Also at issue tonight is the future of Santa Monica Place. Santa Monica’s only shopping mall could be transformed into public space as part of the city’s $120 million civic center redevelopment plan. The council is scheduled to discuss the possibilities of connecting Santa Monica Place to the main civic center area, located on Main Street between Colorado Avenue and Pico Boulevard. The council will decide if $150,000 should be allocated to provide “master planning services” by ROMA Design Group for the Santa Monica Place property as part of the Civic Center Specific Plan. The city’s cost for the services will be paid by the Macerich Co., which owns and operates Santa Monica Place. Macerich recently approached the city about the possibility of redeveloping the enclosed shopping mall, located at the south end of the Third Street Promenade and Colorado Avenue. According to a city staff memo, the Santa Monica Place “superblock” presents a critical link to the civic center area and it should be considered if the mall ever redevelops. One way to do that is to build a new freeway overpass to physically connect the two areas while encouraging reuse of the Sears sites for mixed-use, transit-based residential development to create activity linkages between the two areas. The city council is devising a massive redevelopment plan for the entire civic center area, complete with a renovated City Hall, a child development facility, a new civic center auditorium, parking garages and open space for parks. All of this will be on an additional 11 acres, which the city purchased for $53 million from the RAND Corporation, as well as on the property known as the civic center. The plan could encompass up to 15 acres of open space at six different locations, including a “garden walk” to link the civic center with the pier and Palisades Park; a town square to the West of City Hall and a pedestrian walkway along the north side of a realigned Olympic Drive connecting Fourth Street and Ocean Avenue. Up to 600 units of housing along Ocean Avenue and Olympic Drive also are under consideration. A renovated civic center auditorium could become a regional performing arts center, a concert venue, a community events center or conference center. *Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on November 13, 2001.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/111301.pdf?ref=smdp.com)