Grand Avenue - Presentation Tuesday 22 February 2005

[LosAngelesBeauty]

The only hotels in LA County that have garnered Mobil 5 stars and/or AAA 5 diamonds are:

Bel Air Hotel
Beverly Hills Hotel
Ritz Carlton Marina Del Rey
Raffles L'ermitage
Peninsula
Ritz Carlton Pasadena
Four Seasons

The Four Seasons Westlake Village, which just opened, and the Montage Beverly Hills will also likely both be rated 5 stars/diamonds.

OC also has a few 5 star/diamond hotels.


That's more than most cities. A lot of people just toss around "5-star" title, when I think it's much harder to receive 5 star/5 diamond. I was reading in the Utah thread that they have five 5-star hotels, which is probably not the case.

I am curious how many 5-star/5-diamond hotels are in NYC, SF, and Miami.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

A Four Seasons hotel may potentially occupy that empty lot at 8th and Figueroa. It's also believed that W may open a Downtown location.

I hope Downtown will one day secure the top tier of 5 star luxury hotels:

Ritz-Carlton
Four Seasons
St. Regis
Peninsula
Mandarin Oriental

NYC is the only US city to have all five of them. San Francisco has all of those except Peninsula. Chicago has all of those hotel brands except St. Regis.


Well, we lost St. Regis, but gaining a Mandarin. I'm sure St. Regis will be back sometime, and we'll have all of them too!

[bjornson]

That's more than most cities. A lot of people just toss around "5-star" title, when I think it's much harder to receive 5 star/5 diamond. I was reading in the Utah thread that they have five 5-star hotels, which is probably not the case.

I am curious how many 5-star/5-diamond hotels are in NYC, SF, and Miami.

5-stars (5 diamonds will be noted):
NY:
Four Seasons (also Five Diamond)
Mandarin Oriental (also Five Diamond)
Ritz-Carlton, Central Park (also Five Diamond)
Ritz-Carlton, Battery Park (Five Diamond only)
St. Regis (also Five Diamond)

SF:
Four Seasons
Ritz-Carlton
St. Regis (also Five Diamond)

Miami (No Mobil Five-Stars, but the following are Five Diamonds):
Ritz-Carlton
Four Seasons


Chi (all Five Diamond and Five-Stars):
Four Seasons
Ritz-Carlton, a Four Seasons Hotel
Peninsula



LAB, please refer to my post to see what other hotels that are possibly higher than those top five.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ Wow, LA has the most 5-star/5-diamond hotels.

How can a place like Utah have any 5-star hotels? I can imagine something in Park City because of the Sundance and its resort appeal.

[Quixote]

Technically we have one or two (is the Four Seasons in LA or Beverly Hills?). The Bel-Air Hotel is currently the only Five Star, Five Diamond hotel in LA. Now we can add Ritz-Carlton and Mandarin Oriental to the list!

[Quixote]

Peninsula, arguably the most luxurious of all the chains you mention is very, very selective in their locations. They may believe that their location in Beverly Hills suits L.A. just fine. Besides, two locations so close to each other? But, you never know...give it ten years.


I don't the fact that they're so close to each other matters. Take Boston for example. Boston has two Ritz-Carltons, one in Boston and the other in Boston Common and the only thing that seperates them is a park.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Beverly Hill isn't separated from "LA." BH, WH, SM, are all areas of LA.

I don't view any of those municipal areas as separate entities from "LA." No one does. Unless you're pedantic. Take a look at any tourist website, or anything written about "LA." Does it ever leave out SM, BH, or even Pasadena? No, because LA works differently from other places. It's an amalgam of hundreds of communities patched together forming the metroplis we know as "LA."

[bjornson]

Technically we have one or two (is the Four Seasons in LA or Beverly Hills?). The Bel-Air Hotel is currently the only Five Star, Five Diamond hotel in LA. Now we can add Ritz-Carlton and Mandarin Oriental to the list!

Well, if we want to say within the city limits of L.A., then we can use Four Seasons, Raffles, Peninsula, Beverly Hills Hotel, and Bel-Air Hotel. Because if you wanted to get all technical, it's IN city limits, just not PART of the city. But you know what? Getting that technical is really boring.

I'm not too sure about Four Seasons. Sometimes these places just put a Beverly Hills address just to make it more prestigious. Barney's New York did something similar on Wilshire. It's what some stores do when they're near the BH or WeHo border. When these hotels place them in Beverly Hills, they know they are serving the Los Angeles market. The Four Seasons is after all the Four Seasons, Los Angeles at Beverly Hills.


What I want to come downtown is a Shangri-La, St. Regis, Four Seasons, and a Peninsula. One can only dream. Oh, and for some reason, the Bel-Air Hotel is not Diamond rated at all.

[Quixote]

^I know and agree with both of you that Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, West Hollywood, and Pasadena are in LA but not of LA. It's different for LA because of the city's layout. Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, and West Hollywood are their own cities yet they are completely surrounded by LA. If we were to discuss what's in LA City, it would be difficult to draw a line. It's just like the Vatican.

[DJM19]

I always consider those cities LA. They just arent geographically big enough or distinct enough from the rest of LA. And if you want to see some sites in the city of LA on vacation, you may very well stay in a hotel in Beverly Hills, its a hop, skip, and jump down the street from LA.

[bobcat]

The big difference is that the city of LA doesn't receive any tax revenue when people stay in hotels in BH and shop on Rodeo Drive. I suppose Grand Ave is an idea location for a 5 star hotel, as it will appeal to Bunker Hill executives, opera divas, and cultural tourists, whereas the Ritz will appeal to conventioneers, visiting athletes and artists playing at Staples, and tourists wishing to be in the center of "Times Square West."

[citywatch]

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/28/arts/28ouro600.1.jpg
A view of Frank Gehry’s plan for a retail, residential and entertainment complex on a parcel of land in Los
Angeles, across Grand Avenue from the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, foreground, and Walt Disney Concert
Hall, right.

Corner of Art and Commerce in Los Angeles

By NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF
NY Times, January 28, 2007

LOS ANGELES

HOW to find meaning in a centerless world? For a half-century, that has been the question facing the strip of corporate towers, cultural landmarks and undeveloped lots known as Grand Avenue in downtown Los Angeles. Time and again the avenue has been the focus of grandiose proposals by civic leaders who dreamed of transforming it into a cultural Acropolis. Angelenos watched the progress from the comfort of their suburban enclaves, mostly with bland indifference.

That all began to change with Frank Gehry’s Walt Disney Concert Hall, completed in 2003, which raised the level of architectural ambition for Grand Avenue. Next month the Los Angeles City Council and the county Board of Supervisors will review revised plans for a retail, residential hotel and entertainment complex that may reveal just how willing the city is to address the deep social rifts beneath the area’s newly polished surface.

Designed by Mr. Gehry for the New York-based Related Companies, the master plan for the site, a choice parcel directly across from Disney Hall, provides a case study for one of the most pressing issues in architecture today. Can the bottom-line world of mainstream development produce something of architectural value at enormous scale? Or is Mr. Gehry simply there to provide a veneer of cultural pretension? The project also offers a lens on the conflicts that continue to define the identity of downtown Los Angeles today: the tension between the fortified cultural and business district at the top of the hill and the vibrant Latino district to the east; between traditional East Coast planning formulas and this city’s informal urban landscape; between its high-culture aspirations and its pop-culture ethos. How Mr. Gehry negotiates all this could determine whether downtown Los Angeles will ever matter to anyone but civic boosters and curiosity seekers.

The downtown area’s decline dates from the late 1920s, when the birth of the Miracle Mile on Wilshire Boulevard heralded the triumph of a new motorized culture. For decades since, promoters of downtown Los Angeles have struggled to stem the exodus of businesses to the palm-lined streets of Old Town Pasadena, Westwood and Beverly Hills. Meanwhile cultural critics like Reyner Banham skewered the very concept of a traditional downtown core in a city best grasped through the windshield of a car.

The redevelopment of Grand Avenue has been the most significant effort so far to reverse that trend. It also ranks among the most misguided. First conceived in the 1950s by downtown power brokers like Buffy Chandler, the wife of Norman Chandler, who was then the publisher of The Los Angeles Times, the avenue was intended as a citadel of office towers and cultural monuments at the top of Bunker Hill. To create it, planners bulldozed a vast neighborhood of Victorian houses, replacing them with a network of freeway ramps, tunnels, underground roadways and elevated streets crowned by a sprawling Music Center at one end and a cluster of ominous-looking towers clad in dark glass and slickly polished masonry at the other.

In architectural terms the avenue said as much about the city’s cultural insecurities as its growing ambitions. The Music Center’s barren concrete plinth and fusion of classical and modern décor are an unoriginal takeoff on New York’s Lincoln Center; the generic corporate towers mirror those found in every American city, sleek corporate citadels devoid of imagination. Yet the architecture also masked an insidious social agenda: like other cities seeking to make themselves palatable to squeamish suburbanites and tourists, planners walled off the new cultural and business district from the rest of downtown.

Its elevated plazas, under the constant surveillance of security cameras and private guards, formed a virtual cliff that towered over the Latino underclass shopping in dilapidated Beaux-Arts buildings and theaters a few blocks to the east. The isolation became more glaring as the city’s growing density and booming Latino culture began to suggest a different reality.

That history began to turn with Disney Hall, which unlike its neighbors is woven into its immediate surroundings. Its sweeping steel facade, which unfurls like a ribbon along the avenue, echoes the curved facade of the Chandler Pavilion next door, its forms lifting up to allow the life inside the lobby to spill out onto the avenue. Grand stairs climb to a verdant public garden that wraps like a necklace around the rear of the building.

When Related hired Mr. Gehry in 2005 to design its entertainment and retail complex too, it seemed like a promising step. Few architects are as familiar with the avenue’s history or have played a bigger role in shaping the city’s architectural legacy. And although the project did not seem nearly as glamorous as Disney Hall, it was viewed as critical to the avenue’s success. Situated on the east slope of Bunker Hill alongside the Colburn School of Music and the Museum of Contemporary Art, it presents one of the last opportunities to repair the fractured link between the new cultural district and the old city center.

Yet in some ways the project represents a return to the predictable approach long favored by large-scale urban developers across the country. Related has now decided that the Mandarin Oriental Hotel will occupy the lower half of the south tower. (Bill Witte, president of Related’s California division, said the hotel’s cachet would help “brand” the residential condos.) The developers also plan to include more than a half-dozen restaurants, a bookstore, health club and a boutique supermarket, the staples of today’s high-end shopping mall. It’s the same formula the developer used for the Time Warner Center, the vertical mall that seems so out of place on Columbus Circle.

Meanwhile Mr. Gehry and Related have engaged in a quiet tug of war over how open the development should be to its surroundings. In an early version of the design, the two residential towers were set at the site’s northeast and southwest corners, visually framing the complex and anchoring it into the surrounding skyline. A series of two- and three-story retail buildings, loosely stacked upon one another like a child’s building blocks, were scattered along Grand Avenue, creating an informal street wall that served as a counterpoint to the flowing stainless-steel forms of Disney Hall.

These forms broke apart to allow street life to flow into the retail complex. Inside, the blocks framed small open-air courtyards overlooked by terraces. A staircase cascaded down from one of the courtyards to the corner of Olive and Second Streets, a gesture intended to open up the complex to the more chaotic street life farther down the hill.

Over the last year, as Mr. Gehry struggled to contain rising construction estimates, his boxlike forms became more static, lending the design a more formal symmetry. The proposed facades of the two towers (one 22 stories, the other 45), which originally included fractured planes of glass that gave the impression that they were coming apart at the seams, are also less dynamic, forming a polite backdrop to Disney Hall across the avenue.

Mr. Gehry added a large terrace above Olive Street so that visitors strolling down from Grand Avenue would pass under an elevated walkway to a sweeping view of the downtown skyline to the east. But in a major reversal, the developers forced Mr. Gehry to remove the cascading staircase that was the project’s main link to the life at the bottom of the hill, a bustle that spreads from Olive Street to Broadway’s Latino shopping district and beyond, to Little Tokyo.

Mr. Gehry has tried to compensate for this by anchoring the corner with a restaurant and packing more stores into Olive Street. He has also decorated his boxlike buildings with swirling canopies to pump life back into the restaurants and shops above. But the towering block-long facade that faces Olive Street is an eerie echo of the clifflike 1980s-era corporate plazas just to the south. And he still faces the challenge of overcoming the social apartheid of downtown Los Angeles: high culture separated from low, upper-middle-class concertgoers from working-class Latino shoppers.

The pressure to compromise puts Mr. Gehry in an awkward position. As a relatively unknown architect in the mid-1980s he captured the public imagination with a series of projects that drew on the bleaker, oft-maligned corners of the American metropolis: mini-malls, chain-link fences, corrugated metal sheds, cheap stud-wall construction in the suburbs. Projects like his 1978 house in Santa Monica, a stunning blend of tilting angles and mundane materials, and the Edgemar outdoor shopping mall there, with its signature elevator tower wrapped in chain link, were conceived as a salvo against the superficial glamour of places like Beverly Hills. By making room for outsiders and misfits, as well as the weary working-class suburbanites and Hollywood Boulevard drifters who were the flip side of the American dream, Mr. Gehry emerged as a populist hero.

In subsequent years, as he began working for cultural institutions that are open to architectural experimentation, he ventured into ever more flamboyant territory and became a global name. Now that he has returned to working with mainstream developers, Mr. Gehry says, he has far more leverage than he did 20 years ago. But the Grand Avenue development may ultimately say more about the limits of any architect’s power than about Mr. Gehry’s elevated status. Scanning a collection of study models for the plan at his office recently, I asked whether he might draw on his early history — the cheap materials and crude populist aesthetic that could be used to break down the avenue’s sense of exclusivity — for inspiration here. In other words, why not pick up the thread he discarded years ago rather than try to create glamour on the cheap?

Mr. Gehry paused for a minute. “My question has always been how well the developer could adapt themselves to this mixed ethnic neighborhood,” he said. “It’s uniquely L.A. and it’s very powerful, and the push-pull is about how do you do that. Hopefully it’ll happen over time.”

If not, he may have to stick to clients whose values better match his own.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/28/arts/28ouro650.2.jpg
An earlier plan with a staircase that has been eliminated.

[Vangelist]

Goddamnit, I was juist going to post this. There's still the NYT-discovery's-of-Culver-City article from this week's LA-heavy Grey Lady to post.

>>But in a major reversal, the developers forced Mr. Gehry to remove the cascading staircase that was the project’s main link to the life at the bottom of the hill, a bustle that spreads from Olive Street to Broadway’s Latino shopping district and beyond, to Little Tokyo.

"Major reversals," can be reversed again, eh?

[RAlossi]

I'm seeing a LOT of LA coverage in the NY Times and other NY-based publications lately -- it's very noticeable. A friend of a friend is in town from NYC this week, and we've been shuttling him around the various sights and districts. For some reason, I always feel like I have something to prove to non-LA visitors, but even more so to NYC visitors, in a kind of "See, we're not what your preconceived notions about us would lead you to believe" thing, you know?

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ I know exactly what you mean, that's how I felt when I was shuttling around my guests from Utah a week ago!

[LosAngelesBeauty]

by Harry Nobles & Cheryl Griggs - November 2004


Mobil has just released its Five Star hotel ratings for 2005; AAA promptly followed with its 2005 Five Diamond nominations. What is the difference between a Mobil Five Star rating and the AAA Five Diamond award? The more pertinent question might be “Is there a difference?”.

There are some differences and also some similarities. Both lists represent the absolute ultimate in hotel physical facilities, service, and atmosphere. Another shared attribute is price; Five Star and Five Diamond hotels are among the world’s most expensive accommodations. Room rates often exceed $500.00 a night; food, beverages, and other charges are equally costly. After all, these are not “overnight stops”; rather they are destinations for well heeled pleasure seekers and/or business travelers on a generous expense account.

Both organizations base the ultimate rating on an unscheduled and anonymous overnight experience and detailed evaluation of the property. AAA’s inspection staff is comprised of approximately 60 full-time “Tourism Editors” who inspect and rate all AAA approved lodgings. The Mobil Five Star decision makers are a much smaller group and tend to focus on current Five Star recipients and those with aspirations and potential for the top rating, while a field staff visits and inspects the lower rated properties.

The number of Five Star and Five Diamond rated hotels caught our attention; Mobil awarded the top rating to 31 of approximately 9000 lodgings in the U.S. and Canada. AAA evaluated more than 31,000 hotels and rated 85 at the Five Diamond level. Of the 85 Five Diamond hotels, Mobil awarded the Five Star rating to 28. AAA gave the Five Diamond rating to 24 of the 31 Mobil Five Star hotels. What do these statistics tell us about the two rating organizations?

We can see that despite some differences in methodology and philosophy, the final results are quite similar.

Is one award better than the other? We think not; both awards recognize the best lodgings in North America and both are prestigious, prized by the industry, and trusted by the traveling public. Neither system is perfect, but they are credible.

[SD_Phil]

^What a tease of an article!

[tujunga]

LA may not have the tallest buildings in the world but we can have some of the most beautiful if those finally get built.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

I am more concerned about the street life activities that will happen. We need diverse mix of everything like Manhattan or Downtown Chicago. I think Downtown LA will definitely have that feeling. We have everything ELSE in place; all the difficult stuff you can't just easily build like the Disney Hall, MOCA, Central Library, all the skyscrapers, City Hall, Broadway theatres, etc.

Now with LA Live and Grand Ave. Project, we're adding the VERY MUCH NEEDED retail that will give people places to shop. Then everything else like Disney Hall, etc. will be yummy icing on the cake! In essence, you have a real urban experience.

[LAMetroGuy]

When do you think Frank Gehry will provide renderings of his tower? I'm not talking about the current tinker toy model, but actual renderings of his tower? If they are going to break ground by December, don't you think that this should have been released already?

[colemonkee]

^ Gehry's more into models, so it's more likely you'll see revised models before renderings. He just finished a rather large revision on his Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, so I'm assuming he'll get to Grand Ave. revisions shortly. But that doesn't guarantee getting a render soon. They already started construction on his tower in downtown NY, and there's still no "final" rendering available.

Besides, I always assumed you would see the renderings before Gehry.... ;)

[Wright Concept]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-grand1feb01,0,7990871,full.story?coll=la-home-local

Redevelopment agency to vote on the Grand Avenue project
Questions about tax breaks for the $2-billion downtown complex are still unanswered.
By Jeffrey L. Rabin and Cara Mia DiMassa
Times Staff Writers

February 1, 2007

The plan to transform a stretch of downtown's Grand Avenue into a Frank Gehry-designed cultural and retail hub is expected to clear another major hurdle today, although key questions about public financial support for the development remain unresolved.

The city hasn't decided yet whether to grant Grand Avenue the estimated $40 million in parking and hotel tax breaks that developers say are crucial to building the project near the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Ultimately, it will be up to the Los Angeles City Council to decide whether to approve the tax breaks, a vote expected to come later this month. In the meantime, the Community Redevelopment Agency is to vote on the deal today — the latest in a series of government approvals the project needs.

The revitalization of Grand Avenue is the vision of philanthropist Eli Broad, who two years ago vowed that it would be accomplished "without using one dollar of general fund money from the city or the county."

The $2-billion high-rise project of cultural, retail, residential and business use is a privately financed venture rising on public land — meaning that it inevitably joined public and private interests.

A Times analysis shows that the Grand Avenue Committee, a nonprofit set up by a group of civic leaders to shepherd the project, has spent $4.2 million in public money, from the city and Los Angeles County, to help get the project off the ground.

The money — paid over the last six years — was used to begin the early planning for Grand Avenue. The work was managed by a committee made up of Broad and representatives of the public and private sectors. The committee selected a developer, setting the stage for public approval.

The money paid for the committee's lawyers, consultants and staff members, including Martha Welborne, the project's managing director.

The city and county sent their share of the seed money through the California Community Foundation, a nonprofit group that served as the administrator for the planning effort.

From the beginning, the Grand Avenue project has been marked by a nontraditional public-private marriage. Besides the proposed tax breaks, government agencies are providing the land, investing in street improvements and subsidizing affordable housing in the project.

The developer, Related Cos., and its fiscal partners, meanwhile, are taking much of the financial risk — particularly tenuous in a downtown real estate market that has shown signs of softening. They are also subject to a number of requirements, including the condition that all construction and permanent jobs in the development meet either "prevailing" or "living" wage requirements for the city.

Though each side bears a portion of the project's financial risk, each side also stands to profit if the development is a success. The city and county could reap substantial tax revenue from the project, far more than they receive now from the properties, which are either vacant or used as parking lots.

The Community Redevelopment Agency's board is to consider a package deal to approve the project. Included is $24.4 million in public assistance for street improvements and payments to the developer to subsidize affordable housing in the complex. The agency also must approve long-term leases on public land.

But before the project can break ground, it must also get approval from the City Council and the county Board of Supervisors.

Construction of the first phase — two high-rise residential towers, one with a five-star hotel, and 285,000 square feet of retail space — is expected to start in October and be completed in June 2011.

The entire development would be built on nearly three square blocks on Bunker Hill, amounting to 10 acres. There would also be a 16-acre park stretching from the Los Angeles Music Center to the edge of City Hall.

Bill Witte, president of Related California, said that without a 20-year rebate of the city's hotel tax, which is just above 14%, it would be hard to include a hotel in the project. "It's obviously crucial," Witte said.

Related announced last week that it had signed a deal with the Mandarin Oriental hotel group to manage the project's proposed 275-room hotel.

The developer and the city have been negotiating privately over the hotel tax and parking tax breaks. Neither Witte nor Jerry Miller, the city's chief legislative analyst, would disclose the amount of tax relief involved, but previous estimates put the figure at $40 million.

Councilwoman Jan Perry said Wednesday she expected that the tax breaks would be in line with what Related had requested. She said that the development in her district was "a very exciting model for other projects that may follow this."

Granting tax breaks for high-profile hotel projects is an increasingly common occurrence used by city councils nationwide. In 2005, the city granted another downtown mega-project — L.A. Live, which is not on public land — up to $290 million in subsidies and tax breaks.

To spur construction of a high-rise Convention Center hotel near Staples Center, the council agreed to about $246 million in hotel tax rebates over a 25-year period.

Perry defended the outlay of public money for Grand Avenue. "We're pooling our assets to have the greatest impact, instead of doing this piecemeal, which we have done in the past," she said.

Defenders of the public financing said that without the Grand Avenue Committee, the responsibility for getting the project off the ground would have fallen to already overworked city and county staff members, or to a project management company, which could have cost the government agencies 2% of the full construction costs, or around $40 million.

A handful of civic foundations — including the Broad Foundation, the James Thomas Foundation and the California Community Foundation — kicked in $176,579 in cash and $661,875 in in-kind donations.

Antonia Hernandez, vice chairman of the Grand Avenue Committee and president of the California Community Foundation, said it was important for her organization to support the effort.

"This project is very important for the civic life of Los Angeles," she said. "It's not just cultural. It's a park. It's economic development. It's creating a center for the city where people can come and gather together."

In addition, the committee received $358,000 in developers' fees, mostly from Related.

An MIT-trained architect and urban planner, Welborne, whose last civic project was promoting a rapid bus system for Los Angeles, has spent nearly six years shepherding the Grand Avenue project. She currently receives an annual salary of $246,800.

Welborne is a passionate advocate for the project's role in changing the face of downtown Los Angeles. "If we don't have a good heart of the city, what kind of city do we have?" she said.

Once construction starts, the nation's largest public pension fund is poised to play a key role in financing construction of the development's $775-million first phase.

The California Public Employees Retirement System, which invests the pension dollars of hundreds of thousands of state and local government workers, is a partner in the project along with Related and MacFarlane Partners.

Witte said CalPERS has invested in a number of other Related projects: two projects in Little Tokyo, a planned luxury condo tower in Century City and the Time Warner Center in New York City.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
jeff.rabin@latimes.com

cara.dimassa@latimes.com

[Wright Concept]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-cra2feb02,1,3410095.story?coll=la-headlines-california

Agency OKs Bunker Hill development
By Cara Mia DiMassa
Times Staff Writer

February 2, 2007

The Community Redevelopment Agency's board of commissioners voted Thursday to give approval to the $2-billion plan to build housing, a hotel and retail spaces on city and county land on an area of Bunker Hill near Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Before the 4-0 vote, with two commissioners absent, more than a dozen public speakers praised the project as a boon to efforts to revitalize downtown Los Angeles. As part of their vote, the commissioners approved spending $24.4 million in city money to fund street improvements and affordable housing in the development's first phase.

Before the project can break ground, expected in October, the deal also must be approved by the Los Angeles City Council and the county Board of Supervisors. Votes by those panels are scheduled for Feb. 13. A city report on the tax rebates for the hotel and parking parts of the project is expected today.

*

[LAMetroGuy]

same thing but from the Los Angeles Business Journal

Grand Avenue Project Wins CRA Approval

The $2.05 billion Grand Avenue project won unanimous approval from the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency despite concern over public subsidies.

The agency's board did not directly address reports the massive development plan, which calls for retail, housing and green space along the major downtown thoroughfare will likely need public funding of up to $200 million.

Speakers packed the meeting to praise the project.

"This is a project of regional, if not international, significance," said Carol Schatz, president and chief executive officer of the Central City Association of Los Angeles.

Grand Avenue Committee Chairman Eli Broad has said that the project could be completed without taxpayer money. But County Supervisor Michael Antonovich has estimated the project will require subsidies.

[bjornson]

Grand Avenue project needs help, report says
Tax breaks are essential, L.A. legislative analyst says. The rebates could top out at $66 million.
By Cara Mia DiMassa, Times Staff Writer
10:31 PM PST, February 2, 2007

The tax breaks sought by developers of the massive Grand Avenue project are indispensable for getting the high-rise development off the ground, a long-awaited city report found, but could end up costing the city more than originally believed.

The developer, Related Cos., is asking the City Council for hotel and parking tax rebates for the project, on city and county land near the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Related says the $2-billion project, conceived by billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad and designed by Frank Gehry, is financially unfeasible without them.

Early estimates put the tax rebates at $40 million over 20 years, but the legislative analyst's report Friday estimated the rebates could cost as much as $66 million.

While the tax breaks must still be approved by the City Council, the legislative analyst's report is a strong indication that the city will greenlight the project, which backers say would create an urban hub in the heart of the city.

The request for tax breaks has been controversial, coming as the downtown development boom is showing signs of cooling.

Related has spent months negotiating behind the scenes for the tax breaks, an increasingly common incentive used by cities to attract catalytic projects.

The city conducted an independent audit, according to the report, which concluded that "the funding to support the project would be 'net new' revenues generated by the project itself, and that public participation is essential to make the project economically feasible."

The largest tax break would be in the 14% city hotel tax, a maximum of $60.5 million over 20 years.

In an interview Friday, the chief legislative analyst, Gerry Miller, said that the $60.5-million figure was based on a current estimate of how much extra financing Related needs to complete the hotel.

Related announced last week that a five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel would be part of Grand Avenue.

That hotel chain's room rates are significantly higher than average. A double room at the Mandarin Oriental in San Francisco, for example, runs from $400 to $700 a night, depending on amenities and views.

Miller said that his office's estimates are that the hotel tax would generate only $45 million over 20 years, in which case the public subsidy would be significantly less.

He said that an audit will be completed once hotel construction is completed to determine exactly how much financing Related needed, and would adjust the cap on the hotel tax rebate accordingly: lower, but not higher. "We will only let them keep the hotel tax to the extent they need it to finance the hotel," he said.

While the project has attracted mostly praise at recent public meetings, the request for tax breaks does have its detractors.

Some have argued that by granting the subsidies, the city is not getting the best possible deal for itself. Others have complained that the hotel could have an unfair advantage downtown.

The legislative analyst's report disputed the latter claim, saying that the Grand Avenue hotel "would not draw business from other hotels in the downtown area because there currently are no hotels of this caliber in that market."

The fact that Grand Avenue snagged a high-end hotel is one possible explanation for the increase in the projected hotel tax rebate.

Councilwoman Jan Perry said that she would ask the legislative analyst for clarification about the increase, which she said was not adequately addressed in the report.

"If the prior information had indicated one figure, then it's important to clarify that, to give the analysis as to why," said Perry, who represents the area where the Grand Avenue project would be built.

Perry and other backers of the project cheered the report Friday.

"What we are happy about is that the city, who did their own independent analysis, recognized the importance of the project," said Martha Welborne, Grand Avenue's managing director. "They saw the overall benefits of the project."

The project includes a number of public benefits. From the start, the deal has mandated a 16-acre park from the Music Center to City Hall, which Related will build at cost for the public agencies, and that 20% of the homes will be affordable for low-income residents. In the last few months, Related has agreed to a number of other requirements, including the condition that all construction and permanent jobs in the development meet either "prevailing" or "living" wage requirements for the city. It also will fund a job training program and a revolving loan program for housing for the needy.

The Community Redevelopment Agency approved the deal Thursday, including about $24.4 million for streetscape improvements and affordable housing subsidies, among other things, that the agency will fund. The county must still authorize about $4.6 million in public improvements in and around the project, as part of its approval of the plan.

The city and county are scheduled to vote on the plan Feb. 13.

If all moves forward as expected, the Grand Avenue project will break ground late this year, with the first phase — two high-rise residential towers, one with the hotel, and 285,000 square feet of retail space — scheduled to be completed in 2011.

Two more phases — which would include residential, retail and office space — are still in the planning stages.

Bill Witte, president of Related Cos.' California operations, said that while the developer expected to seek some reimbursement for the cost of building affordable housing in the second and third phases, he expected that there would be no further commitments of subsidies for the project.

"Everybody I think recognizes that the first phase is by far the riskiest," Witte said. "We really have tried to do the right thing, and the right mix, in the first phase, not just the most development-intensive.... This is about creating a critical mass, anchoring the district. I think there is a recognition that this package of assistance is not only needed for public benefits, but for helping to engender a really good urban scheme, as opposed to what would happen if you left it to the open market."

[Chase Unperson]

That's more than most cities. A lot of people just toss around "5-star" title, when I think it's much harder to receive 5 star/5 diamond. I was reading in the Utah thread that they have five 5-star hotels, which is probably not the case.

I am curious how many 5-star/5-diamond hotels are in NYC, SF, and Miami.

I think this 5-star/5-diamond Mobil/AAA is a bunch of payola based bullshit. Exhibit A is the Ritz Carlton Hotel Marina Del Rey. It gets five stars? I live abount a mile or less from it and people often stay there when they come visit me, and it is a piece of shit hotel. The pool sucks, the restaurant El Jardene is absolutely horrible both in terms of food and service and the decor is like 1970s trying to look like the 1930s. Anyone that would give that hotel 5 stars doesn't know what the fuck they are talking about. Also suspicious is that every four-seasons is and every Ritz Carlton in the country is on the list. The Sofitel in Chicago is infinitley more eloquant, sophisticated and a pleasant stay to over that piece of crap Ritz in out-dated Marina Del Rey and I know as I stayed 5 nights in a suite in Sofitel Chicago when I rean the marathon.

These lists should be totally disregarded.

[bjornson]

^HAhahah you're right. It's actually not five stars. It's Mobil three stars. It's five diamonds. I don't know what the hell is going on ha.

To compare other high-end hotels in the area:
The Peninsula (Five stars & five diamonds)
Raffles L'Ermitage (Five stars & five diamonds)
Beverly Hills Hotel (Five stars & four diamonds)
Beverly Wilshire-A Four Seasons Hotel (Four diamonds & four stars)
Four Seasons (Four stars & five diamonds)
Hotel Bel-Air (Five stars & four diamonds)

Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey (THREE stars & five diamonds)

WTF?

[Bernd]

Peopple don't actually pay attention to the AAA diamond ratings, do they? They're pretty worthless.

Stick with the stars.

[dragonsky]

Grand Avenue Keeps Moving

The Community Redevelopment Agency last Thursday voted unanimously to approve Related Cos.' $2.05 billion Grand Avenue Project. The development aims to bring 2,600 housing units and 449,000 square feet of retail to the top of Bunker Hill, including two Frank Gehry-designed towers and a 16-acre public park. The CRA is allocating about $24 million in public funds toward streetscaping and affordable housing. At the Feb. 1 meeting, union and community leaders spoke in support of the project. While the development will feature luxury amenities like a five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel, a high-end grocery store and health club, the developer is also incorporating community-oriented planning, including 100 units of affordable housing, a promised 30% of construction jobs to local workers and a revolving loan for more supportive housing facilities. "I think this is worth every single penny of public investment," CRA Commissioner Madeline Janis told the packed meeting. The project still needs the approval of two council committees, the full Council and the County Board of Supervisors. Those bodies must ultimately decide whether or not to approve Related's request for hotel and parking tax breaks.

[SD_Phil]

excellent news! this is another BIG piece of the puzzle in keeping the DT movement going.

[bobcat]

Grand Avenue Prepares for a Big Week

City, County Scheduled to Vote On $2 Billion Plan Tuesday

by Kathleen Nye Flynn

A major step in the future of Downtown Los Angeles is scheduled for Tuesday, Feb. 13, when both the Los Angeles City Council and the County Board of Supervisors are set to vote on the $2 billion Grand Avenue plan.

The city will discuss the most critical - and contentious - part of the project: requests by developer Related Cos. to receive rebates on parking lot and hotel taxes, which could add up to more than $60 million, according to a report recently released by the city's Chief Legislative Analyst.

"We have a pretty unique coalition of support which spans the business community, most of organized labor, the Downtown Neighborhood Council and the Community Benefits Coalition," said Bill Witte, president of Related Cos. "Because of the breadth and depth of that support, we are optimistic."

The first phase of the project would bring two Frank Gehry-designed towers, a 16-acre park, shops, restaurants and about 500 housing units to three blocks of county and city land on the top of Bunker Hill. Related Cos. said construction of the initial phase could start this October and wrap in 2011.

Earlier this month, the project was unanimously approved by the Community Redevelopment Agency, which is contributing $24.4 million for affordable housing and street improvements. The council's Housing, Community and Economic Development Committee approved the project on Feb. 6.

Gerry Miller, the city's chief legislative analyst, released a review of the project on Feb. 2, recommending that the City Council approve it. The report backed Related's request for 20 years of hotel tax rebates and 10 years of parking lot tax rebates.

The report found that the city would only use the money that is generated from the project itself and will not take funds out of its own coffers, said Miller.

"It is important to keep in mind that we are putting in money we wouldn't have otherwise," Miller said. "Without this investment, it is not feasible for developers to do the project."

The rebates will come out to $66 million, about half the total revenue that the first phase of the project will generate for the city, Miller said. The additional revenue would go into the city's general fund.

Without the rebates, investors would be hesitant to participate because the hotel revenue would not outweigh construction costs, said both Witte and Miller.

After the hotel is complete, Miller said he plans to recalculate the actual construction costs and readjust the rebates accordingly. The city would give fewer rebates if the construction costs are lower than expected, but will not give more than the agreed-upon cap of $66 million, even if construction costs exceed the predicted amount, he said.

Before reaching the City Council on Tuesday, the project will first head to the council's Business and Finance Committee on Monday, Feb. 12.

[bobcat]

According to the Grand Ave website (http://grandavenuecommittee.org/updates.php), the city council vote will take place at 10 am Tuesday morning, which I believe can be seen on livestream at

http://www.lacity.org/ita/itacv1.htm

[bjornson]

It's the invasion of Steve Lopez's cynicism!

Steve Lopez:
Points West
66 million reasons to re-examine Grand Ave.
February 7, 2007

"I don't like it," Merilie Robertson, a retired teacher, was saying Tuesday as she rode the Orange Line to her home in Canoga Park. "I'm always suspicious when tax breaks are given to corporations that are already very wealthy."

She was talking about the plans to remake downtown Los Angeles with a $2-billion Grand Avenue project that will include a five-star Mandarin Hotel, a 16-acre park and 3.2-million square feet of stores, offices and housing. And judging from my conversations with her and other bus riders in the Valley, she's not alone in smelling a rat.

Robertson doesn't object to the idea of remaking Grand Avenue, a campaign driven by billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad. Her problem is with the use of public funds — up to $66 million in tax rebates over the next 20 years, along with free public land and other sweeteners — to make it happen. And that's just for Phase One of a three-phase project.

Of course, that's practically chump change when compared to the L.A. Live project planned for the area around Staples Center, where the public giveaway is worth closer to $300 million.

"I'd like to see those public funds spent on something like housing and transportation," Robertson said. "The joke in the San Fernando Valley is that whenever you see potholes being filled and streets being fixed, there must be another election coming up."

Riding the same Orange Line bus was Caesar Gonzales, who commutes from Watts to Warner Center for his job at a collection agency. Gonzales takes the Blue Line to the Red Line to the Orange Line, spending 5 1/2 hours daily on buses and trains, and he said he's all for any jobs created by the big downtown projects.

But he stopped short of endorsing a public investment in private enterprise.

"I was brought up in a tough neighborhood but was bused to good schools," said Gonzales. "If not, I could have gotten caught up with gangs. A lot of my friends I grew up with are dead. What would I do with the money in my neighborhood? Lots of things. Stores. Movie theaters. A little promenade. Maybe if you had, like, some YMCAs."

Along the Orange Line, which I rode from North Hollywood to the mall at Warner Center, the feelings were pretty much the same. Lots of folks seldom make it downtown at all, thanks to the disastrous planning that has led to nightmarish traffic.

"I think it's rotten," said Dwight Elrich, who teaches piano and wondered why the city doesn't throw his tax dollars into building more of a cultural center in the Valley instead of downtown.

On my return bus ride, Jill Newton, a student and librarian, said she'd rather see $60 million spent to expand library hours.

"I like downtown more than I used to, but I don't think it should be developed before other places. And it sounds more like it's a development for tourists. A hotel is for tourists. A library is for people who live here."

The other side puts up a pretty good argument, pointing out that successful downtown developments would create new jobs and cash streams, filling city coffers and funding the kinds of citywide services the Orange Line riders are clamoring for. They point out the developers have agreed to reserve 20% of the housing they build for low-income tenants. And they argue that the money isn't really a giveaway: The city would simply allow the developers to keep the new hotel and parking taxes they generate for the next 20 years.

The developer, Related Cos., claims the project isn't economically feasible without public financing, and a city audit has rubber-stamped that notion.

Call me a cynic, but I'm not buying it. This is the way the game gets played in Los Angeles, a city run by developers and mismanaged by the politicians who roll over for them.

Is it fair to the Biltmore or the Bonaventure hotels for the city to give millions in tax breaks to the operation of the Mandarin Oriental, where rooms will go for between $400 and $700 a night?

Oh, don't worry about that, the city's legislative analyst says. The glittering new high-end hotel won't be competing with the lesser lights down the hill, so those shabby old-timers have nothing to fear.

Easy for him to say.

Where's Joel Wachs when you need him?

In the 1990s, he was the lone Los Angeles city councilman who stood up to the Staples Center developers who said the deal wouldn't pencil out without massive freebies. Only after Wachs alerted the public did they decide they could make do with less.

"It didn't turn out that the Staples Center needed all the benefits it was after," said Peter Dreier of the Urban and Environmental Policy Program at Occidental College. But as he noted, Wachs doesn't seem to have a contemporary counterpart on the council.

"If this is going to cost taxpayers millions of dollars, tens of millions, you'd better be damn sure that you've got your numbers straight and this has been subjected to the most careful scrutiny from different points of view."

Dreier's other problem is that he doesn't think there's a broader plan for making the project fit any particular vision of downtown Los Angeles over the next 20 or 30 years. And he's not alone.

"Every member of the City Council should be assigned to read 'The Death and Life of Great American Cities' by Jane Jacobs," said Ventura City Manager and former Pasadena Mayor Rick Cole, who has closely followed the changes in downtown Los Angeles.

What they'd learn, he argues, is that the building and remaking of cities is a task too vital to be put in the hands of developers. Rather than invite proposals for Grand Avenue, he argues, the city should have created its own plan, at its own cost and on its own terms, and then brought in the developers to execute the will of the people.

"What are these buildings going to look like and how will they impact their surroundings? How do you get public subsidies to maximize the public benefit? When you default to major landowners and major development companies, they quite rightly and sensibly are going to design projects that keep as many of the customers inside their project as possible," said Cole.

"Just look at the last 20 years, with Bunker Hill, the Convention Center, the Cathedral, Disney Hall, the Staples, all the major projects that were going to turn downtown L.A. around and haven't. They work individually and they're important, but they have to fit a plan and you have to make sure the public gets value instead of buying another pig in a poke, with someone saying the project is $50 million short."

The Grand Avenue project comes up for votes next week by the Los Angeles City Council and the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. I know it's late in the game, but not too late.

It'd be nice to see somebody start asking tough questions. In fact, I'd like to see someone call the developers' bluff and tell Related Cos. to take a hike if it doesn't think the project pencils out. I'm betting another developer would step in before the week is out.

From downtown to Warner Center, what would the city have to lose?

[bjornson]

Rick Wartzman:
California & Co.
A grand vision for affordable housing
February 9, 2007

Eli Broad has suggested that once its big makeover is complete, Grand Avenue will be comparable to the Champs-Elysees. That's bunk. But it may look a little like Sesame Street, and that's terrific.

The children's public television program — which, in the words of a recent study by a University of New Hampshire scholar, has "strived to exemplify and create an egalitarian and more tolerant community" — has had a tough time being replicated in the real world. This is especially true in L.A., which is highly balkanized along racial and class lines.

The $2-billion Grand Avenue Project, though, may prove an important exception. Although it hasn't received as much attention as the plans for a five-star hotel, 16-acre park and retail and restaurant space, the downtown development is slated to include about 2,000 units of housing, with 20% of these designated "affordable" and subsidized for those who can't pay market rates.

The Grand Avenue development would hardly be alone in offering such dwellings. More than 20,000 affordable units have been created in L.A. since the late 1990s. But what makes this project extraordinary is the range of income earners it promises to attract: those buying seven-figure penthouse condominiums living alongside people who will be asked to shell out only $454 to $649 a month for a one-bedroom apartment or $630 to $900 for a three-bedroom unit.

To qualify, an individual must earn $16,975 to $24,250 a year, and a family of four must have income of $24,255 to $34,650. On the open market, rents for one-bedroom flats in the Frank Gehry-designed high-rise are likely to run at $2,500 or so, while the three-bedrooms should fetch $4,000 or more.

The first phase of the three-stage project — set to come before the Los Angeles City Council and county Board of Supervisors for approval next week — will feature 500 housing units, 100 of them subsidized.

Adding condos to the equation is particularly unusual. "I'm sure people in real estate are shaking their heads at this," says Bill Witte, president of the California arm of Related Cos., the developer on the project. In this way, Grand Avenue is poised to become an intriguing experiment — one that may well serve as a financial model for other developers and an inspiration for policymakers.

"I truly think the concept of mixed income is the wave of the future," says G. Allan Kingston, president and chief executive of Century Housing, a Culver City-based nonprofit housing lender that is not involved with Grand Avenue.

In his experience, Kingston notes, it's more common for a given building to be 100% affordable, with no tenants paying full freight. It's also not unheard of for the developers of a site, in return for certain public incentives, to meet their affordable-housing obligation at an entirely different location, or by sticking money into a central fund.

But those behind Grand Avenue were bent on making sure the project would have all sorts of people residing right there, with equal access to amenities.

Too often, "nobody wants to live with the janitor's family. That's very troubling to me," says Supervisor Gloria Molina, who chairs the joint city-county authority set up to implement the project. "We need to change that."

It is not as if no churning among classes occurs in L.A. Many of these experiences, however, are less than positive: young professionals stepping over the homeless on skid row as they stroll from loft to luxury car, or legions of Latino housekeepers reporting to work for wealthy whites in Pacific Palisades. "They're interacting — but as master and servant," says Phil Ethington, an urban historian at USC who has just finished drawing up a series of maps that examine segregation in L.A. by race and income.

What a high-profile project such as Grand Avenue reminds us, in a far more constructive way, is that "the whole society is inseparably integrated," as Ethington puts it. "Everybody's fate is linked to everybody else's."

This means learning to appreciate the struggle that a huge number of working people face in finding a home that won't bankrupt them. The term "crisis" gets tossed around so much that it's been rendered practically meaningless. But in the case of housing here, it's not hyperbole. Financial planners say people should spend no more than a third of what they make on where they live. By this measure, more than 50% of homes in Los Angeles were affordable in 1996 to those earning the area's median income; today, only about 5% are.

"I have said this time and time again to people 45 or 50 years old: 'Your children could not afford to buy the home you live in,' " says Councilwoman Jan Perry, vice chairwoman of the joint authority.

The Grand Avenue Project has attracted plenty of skeptics and naysayers. I, for one, don't accept the line trotted out by Broad, the billionaire philanthropist who conceived the undertaking, that the place is bound to become a "vibrant center" for all of Southern California. That's just not how the region functions. A more realistic goal is simply for Grand Avenue to become a destination (like the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica or Old Pasadena), rather than the destination.

Others, including my Times colleague Steve Lopez, have questioned the tax breaks being sought by Related, which could cost as much as $66 million. And some have carped that the project doesn't do enough for the poor.

But such criticism ignores the progressive wage standards and worker training programs tied to the construction and to permanent jobs there, along with the affordable housing that Grand Avenue would provide (in part through an initial $10-million public investment by the Community Redevelopment Agency).

These units will give hundreds of firefighters, teachers, secretaries, nurses and others a chance to live close to where they work as well as close to public transportation. And then there's the additional benefit: a rare opportunity for the well-heeled and those of less means to get to know one another as neighbors.

Witte points out that "you can't legislate social interaction. You can't make people go watch 'Monday Night Football' together." But when I dropped by the Paramount, a mixed-income high-rise in the heart of San Francisco built and managed by Related, I was struck by the camaraderie among the tenants — something encouraged by common areas such as a rooftop deck with views out to the bay.

Jim Blacksten, who lives in one of the subsidized apartments at the Paramount, says most people in the building have no idea who's in an affordable unit and who's not. But occasionally, it'll come up. "Some people are kind of standoffish at first," he says. But once they talk a bit, it's generally not an issue anymore. "It forces them to change their thinking a little."

It doesn't get any grander than that.

[DJM19]

Im often weary of "giving people what they want" in developments. Its important, yes, and should be considered seriously in design, but ultimately the designer of the the development should have 90% of the say.

Giving sellers and people too much imput has created all these horrible looking exurbs

[cava]

Im new to this board, and glad to find all the info and opinions here.
Being new to downtown myself, Im excited by the areas development and potential. I think Grand Avenue has the potential to be an excellent project among downtowns many, and I think Wartzman makes some very good points in his article: mainly its novel attempt in the mixing of classes - residents with very differenct income levels. The concept really flies in the face of the how LA has developed - with so many "gated" communities - living areas where only ones own class is allowed in, not noticing, seeing, relating to, so not understanding the other. This self-segregation has influenced commercial urban design, and has crystallized into the architecture of downtown that has so many large concrete facades and fortress that drawf and discourage people walking, strolling, and interacting on the street. It has created enclosed shopping areas - often walled off from the street, interior retail areas - completely invisible to the street, and elevated walkways - above the street from one large plaza to another empty large plaza - above the street. The recent NY Times article on Grand Avenue suggests that the project previously attempted to open itself up to the street-life, and included a staircase cascading down to second and olive street, but in a "major reversal, the developers forced Mr. Gehry to remove the cascading staircase that was the projects main link to life at the bottome of the hill". Brady Westwater in his blog rightly corrects the notion that there is "a bustle that spreads from Olive street to Broadways Latino shopping district and beyond, to Little Tokyo - saying that there is currenlty no bustle here on Olive street. Now, that is true, but I think it would be a mistake to discourage openness, the invitation to the street, by eliminating this staircase, and I believe thus eliminating any real street access on Olive street. Though the area may be dead now, there are many current and new residential and retail developments in and around the historic core that would welcome and definately utilize an inviting entrance into the project and its touted retail, park, and other amenities.

[dragonsky]

Editorial

Approve the Grand Avenue Plan

As soon as Feb. 13, the Los Angeles City Council and the County Board of Supervisors could vote on the $2 billion plan to transform Grand Avenue. Currently, the chief question is whether the project's hotel and parking facilities should get tax breaks that, over 20 years, could be worth as much as $66 million; that would come on top of $24 million in infrastructure improvements and housing subsidies.

This is probably the most important vote the governmental bodies will make regarding Downtown Los Angeles this year. Approving it means construction would go forward, with a potential groundbreaking this October. Rejecting it would put the entire plan up in the air, making it not impossible, but uncertain. It deserves the most serious consideration.

Los Angeles Downtown News strongly urges the governing bodies to approve this project. We're not pleased about the hotel tax break - a figure, by the way, about $20 million higher than reported early estimates - but we believe the development has the capacity to do tremendous good and bring many improvements and benefits, including hundreds of units of low-income or workforce housing, to Downtown, something which helps the entire city with its shortage of such residences. It also brings jobs and a broad boost to the Southern California economy. The potential pluses outweigh the significant costs.

It has not been easy for developer Related Cos. to get to this point, and they have been pushed, questioned and forced to make concessions on every aspect of the deal. That's a good thing - the project's main structures will rise on land owned by the city and the county, and our government officials need to negotiate the best deal possible for the taxpayers.

The project is so important because of what Grand Avenue is today versus what it could become: In 2007, taken as a whole, it is, frankly, nothing special. As is, it misses its destiny.

Grand Avenue atop Bunker Hill is a largely empty stretch of road that does not come close to meeting the standards set by the architectural highlights already on the street: Starting at Temple and running south, these include the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (by Pritzker Prize-winning architect José Rafael Moneo), the principal Music Center campus, Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall, the expanding Colburn School and Arata Isozaki's Museum of Contemporary Art. Down the hill at Fifth Street is the marvel of the Central Library.
*

The highlights of the Grand Avenue project are a 50-story tower by Gehry, which will include a five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel, and another 25-floor high-rise. The first phase of the project includes a 16-acre park connecting the Music Center and City Hall. Over the life of the plan there are also slated to be about 2,600 housing units - 20% of them set aside for low-income tenants - and nearly 450,000 square feet of retail space. It's possible the retail is overdone, but we think that aspect will shake itself out as market forces come into play.

We also think the park, while probably extraordinary, could be considered an unnecessary expenditure. The wide river of open space between the Music Center and City Hall is adequately pleasant as is, but the refurbished park is a legacy project of influential players and will almost certainly happen. Taking it off the table as a Related requirement would give the government some additional negotiating power if they are serious about saving the public's money. We're not recommending they eliminate the park. We're just pointing out this optional element so that Grand Avenue watchers can keep in context the elected officials' histrionics about the costs.

Even with the arguable shortcomings of the plan, Grand Avenue is still worth doing.

There is an enormous investment by all involved here, and should the project work, it will result in a hefty profit for Related. But mega-projects sometimes underperform and underwhelm, such as the Hollywood and Highland complex. It is important for those who reject the deal outright because of the tax breaks (arguing that the money could be better spent on the homeless or other places) to remember that Related is taking the biggest financial risk here.

One also needs to keep in mind that the hotel and parking tax breaks are different than taking money from the general fund. The 14% hotel room tax, by itself estimated to be worth up to $60.5 million, would not ever materialize without the hotel.

A city audit said the money is necessary to make the entire development feasible. That's the city weighing in, not just the developer. While some will scoff, the city in fact has a history of doing its homework well on big projects. Even with all the tax breaks that were finally negotiated for Staples Center, the economic energy created by the project has paid dividends far beyond what anyone projected. Along with its sales tax revenues, Staples propelled a wave of new projects in the surrounding blocks, ones that have turned around the once moribund South Park.

Along with urging approval, however, we encourage city and county officials to play a watchdog role in the development, to ensure that Related keeps its promises, which include a percentage of jobs to local workers and a loan for more "supportive" housing, the kind which includes treatment and other programs for low-income individuals who need more than a roof over their heads. And there should absolutely be strictures against coming to local government in the future and asking for additional money. The city is allowing enough breaks as is.

The new Grand Avenue will not be for everyone - many Angelenos will never visit it, just as many from the Central City rarely if ever head to Ventura Boulevard in the Valley - and some will always revile at what may seem like a playground for the upscale. But the project, as negotiated and envisioned, has public benefits and the potential to make Downtown a better community and bring economic energy to the city. Because of this, we urge the Council and the Supervisors to approve the Grand Avenue plan.

[Wright Concept]

If that's the case with the staircase, then Gehry should fight to the death about it, and I totally agree with him.

From an architectural as well as site specific element to the project(a hilly sloping topography), the staircase would provide that pedestrian connection that currently doesn't exist and removes a notion in my mind that this Bunker Hill is the modern version of the Acropolis where all the symbols are perched on top of the hill overlooking everyone else on the basin.

This would also do something that a similiarly laid out design a couple of blocks to the south in California Plaza didn't do, that is embrace the pedestrians on the bottom of the Hill at Olive and eventually on Hill Street from the beginning and not as an afterthought by adding Angels Flight.

The staircase would exercise the propoer notion in the subsequent phases on Parcel Q (?, it's the one bounded by Olive, First, Hill and Second) of how important a neighbor, Grand Avenue is to the PEDESTRIAN fabric of Downtown Los Angeles.

[bjornson]

Steve Lopez:
Points West
Grand Ave. plan not grand enough
February 11, 2007

I don't recall how old I was, but my love affair with cities began the first time my parents drove me through the Caldecott tunnel from our home in Contra Costa County.

San Francisco rose up across the bay, dazzling and mysterious, and when we got into the city I was all the more enchanted. It seemed to me a place of magical scale and infinite possibility, and I envied the people who knew its secrets.

Since then, I've been unfaithful. It wasn't San Francisco I loved so much as the idea of cities and the things that make them distinct. Was Paris an accident? Did Pasadena and Redlands just get lucky, or did someone fight to make them what they are?

Once, while researching what makes for a sense of place, I toured Charleston, S.C., on foot with its mayor. He was under pressure to approve a chain restaurant in the center of the historic district and said it would happen over his dead body, even though it would have been a catalyst for more commerce and tax revenues. A city is a precious gem, he told me, and his job was to guard it with his life and preserve history for the next generation.

In Los Angeles, that task is made all the more difficult by size and sprawl. Every neighborhood has its own history and charm, but what does one have to do with another, and what do any of them have to do with downtown? It was only at the city's beginning that downtown was really a core for the metropolis. There have been anemic efforts over the years to re-create that sense of a center, but only recently has it had much momentum.

Now, certain movers and shakers, led by philanthropist Eli Broad, have declared that we need a civic gathering place for everyone, and our natural center is downtown.

I like the notion, and I like the changes over the last several years. It's more diverse and more interesting, and I'd like to believe there'll be even more salvaging of the turn-of-century buildings that make up the soul of old L.A.

We've got a ways to go, though. It's not uncommon to see foreign tourists wandering the streets in the middle of downtown with a befuddled look that says they're wondering where Los Angeles is. In other words, things haven't quite come together yet. But we're told that the next piece in the puzzle is the Grand Avenue project.

Speaking of which, my ears are still burning from Carol Schatz's critique of my Wednesday column about Grand Avenue. I'd raised a few concerns about the planned $2-billion mega-development, for which the city and county have turned over public land worth a fortune to a private developer and also offered tax breaks and other subsidies that could total $100 million.

Schatz, head of the Central City Assn., told me she was so mad on Wednesday she had to wait until Thursday to call and say I was incredibly off-base in questioning the merits of the three-phase project, which will include a five-star hotel, two high-rise residential towers, and scads of office and retail space.

Among her several points was the argument that everyone in the city would benefit from the millions in taxes this project would generate, so the millions in subsidies would be paid back in spades. We had a cordial chat despite our differences, and I told Schatz she'd be pleased to hear that I was about to tour the site with another of my critics.

Madeline Janis, who voted to approve the project as a member of the Community Redevelopment Agency, wanted to tell me why, and we agreed to meet for a tour. As we walked down 1st Street from Disney Hall, she recounted how L.A. Councilwoman Jan Perry and L.A. County Supervisor Gloria Molina, among others, had insisted on concessions the developer — Related Cos. — initially resisted.

"We're going to have 1,800 permanent jobs here," Janis said when we got to the ugly erector set of a parking garage that will mercifully be leveled for the first phase of the project, "and thousands more temporary jobs during the construction."

It was a major victory, she said, when Related Cos. agreed to a stipulation that every employer — from the hotel to the restaurants and janitorial contractors — would abide by the city's living wage law (currently $10.64 an hour) for every employee.

Janis, executive director of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, said it was also a coup to negotiate a job-training commitment from the developer, and a requirement that 20% of the 2,000 apartments and condos be reserved for residents earning less than roughly $35,000 a year. It's conceivable, she said, that someone will commute by elevator to a job in the supermarket that's in the plans.

This is precisely the kind of mixed-income project Los Angeles badly needs, she argued. We live in a place where few people can afford to live near service-economy jobs, and that's a contributing factor in everything from segregation to traffic to air quality. Grand Avenue is a model for future development, she said, and worth the millions in public subsidies.

I'm on board with that general concept, though I'm not convinced the developer should have gotten a penny in tax breaks on top of the sweetheart deal on the land. But my other concern is one I alluded to in the Wednesday column.

As billed, this project — linked with great Grand Avenue institutions like Disney Hall, the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Colburn School — will forever change the face of downtown Los Angeles.

Does it complement them? Is it what we want? Is it what we need? Do you feel as though you had enough of a chance to speak up? (If not, Tuesday could be your last chance, when both the City Council and Board of Supervisors are expected to sign off on the deal).

At the risk of offending a man who could soon be my boss, we're about to turn over one of the rarest and most precious commodities in Los Angeles — open space that's owned by all of us — to a mega-development that could be dropped into any city anywhere.

When I asked Janis what kind of shopping we might find among the retail shops, she said "high-end chains," like Banana Republic, for instance.

I'm sorry, but I have a problem with that.

I have no interest in walking from a Banana Republic on Grand Avenue to the ESPN studios at the L.A. Live sports-entertainment complex planned for the other end of downtown, where I could look through the window at yammering monkeys.

Why not turn Grand Avenue into a tree-shaded, pedestrian-only promenade? Or build an all-season, outdoor theater for L.A. Phil rehearsals or Colburn student performances? The possibilities are endless.

But instead of creating a distinct sense of place that says something interesting about one of the world's most dynamic cities, we're in danger of building a monument to banality that happened to pencil out for the developer and figures to generate millions in taxes.

As Janis says, though, it's a years-long project with lots of details still to be worked out, including the way the project connects with the Civic Center and a redesigned 16-acre park. So there's time to tinker, and maybe still time for an injection of the very thing that gives the great cities of the world their sense of romance and mystery.

Imagination.

On a happier note, here's an update: Shari Kahane of West Hills, the terminal cancer patient who was ticketed on Jan. 25 while lugging her oxygen tank to an office where she was going to sign her will and last testament, has some good news to report. The ticket has been rescinded. "I apologize for the actions of this traffic officer," a parking enforcement official wrote to Kahane in a letter forwarded to me by the staff of Councilman Dennis Zine, which interceded in her behalf. "The Traffic Officer will be provided with additional training regarding his behavior with the public."

[Carioca]

This dude is on crack!

"At the risk of offending a man who could soon be my boss, :slob: we're about to turn over one of the rarest and most precious commodities in Los Angeles — open space that's owned by all of us— to a mega-development that could be dropped into any city anywhere."

open space, oh you mean that vacant lot wrapped in chain link fence, yah i would miss that. Let's call the whole thing off...

he says "I'm sorry, but I have a problem with that.
I have no interest in walking from a Banana Republic on Grand Avenue to the ESPN studios at the L.A. Live"
right after saying -"Did Pasadena and Redlands just get lucky, or did someone fight to make them what they are?"

no pal, they got a BANANA REPUBLIC!!!! and what are those other people called, oh yah- CUSTOMERS!


WHATEVER...

[ocman]

Steve Lopez has made it clear that he doesn't like Los Angeles, so I doubt he's taken much interest in what happens in downtown.

This dude is on crack!

"At the risk of offending a man who could soon be my boss, :slob: we're about to turn over one of the rarest and most precious commodities in Los Angeles — open space that's owned by all of us— to a mega-development that could be dropped into any city anywhere."

open space, oh you mean that vacant lot wrapped in chain link fence, yah i would miss that. Let's call the whole thing off...

he says "I'm sorry, but I have a problem with that.
I have no interest in walking from a Banana Republic on Grand Avenue to the ESPN studios at the L.A. Live"
right after saying -"Did Pasadena and Redlands just get lucky, or did someone fight to make them what they are?"

no pal, they got a BANANA REPUBLIC!!!! and what are those other people called, oh yah- CUSTOMERS!


WHATEVER...

[bjornson]

That's why he's great friends with Antonovitch!

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Steve Lopez is annoying.

[LongBeachUrbanist]

Those parcels have sat as ugly tinkertoy parking structures for decades. And now Steve Lopez proposes building a park there? You've got to be kidding.

If he had been advocating a park on that land for decades, I might agree with him. But he didn't. And now there is a plan in place -- a plan that has gained an enormous amount of consensus throughout the city.

I do not think the design is perfect. I think it should be more open to the surrounding neighborhoods. But lets have some perspective here. While we may be debating the cut of the diamond, Lopez would have us stick with our old lump of coal.

[cava]

Previously Lopez's attitude seemed to buy into the popular mythology that all large development is bad, all development pits the rich against the poor. That to build something nice downtown is a mistake - Just forget it. It is evidence of a lack of vision - to be able to see beyond what is, to imagine a better place.

Here his attitute seems to shift and he does give credit to the benefits of the project that he may have been unaware of before: millions in tax benefits generated for the city, thousands of new jobs, both temporary and permanent, paying at least a "living wage" for all those jobs, a jobs training commitment to hopefully help those who need to develop their skills, and a very large commitment to affordable housing.

But then he protests the inclusion of the evil clothing "chain store", "Banana Repulic" oh no - not "Banana Republic"!!. run run.. He doesnt mention the proposed heath food store, art galleries, and other components. It would be nice if independent retail were included in the mix, yes, but Related has more experinece dealing with chains, and its only realistic to expect chains to be a component - and its not a horrible thing, it is reality. The project needs retail - it helps it financially, and is one part of the whole project. It does also need more than that - it does need as he states, "imagination": in how it connects with the Civic Center, and how it develops the 16 acre park. He asks "Why not turn Grand Avenue into a tree-shaded, pedestrian-only promenade? Or build an all-season, outdoor theater for L.A. Phil rehearsals or Colburn student performances?". Well, actually, many of these ideas of public open green space have been proposed to the projects park designers, and many have already been incorporated into their developing park plan. I dont know if he is aware of this.

[cava]

In earlier plans, in addition to the hotel, art galleries, health food store, a large gym, and electronics stores, an "art-house" movie complex was part of the mix. Later they dropped this, but I dont know why - I think what would be such a fantastic addition to this project - I guess it would have been a new Laemmle theater.

I dont know if Laemmle said no, but if they did I would hope they would reconsider. It would be a fallacy to base the decision on the performance of their current downtown theater. The Grande theater is almost impossible to find - has no street presence - is hidden down a flight of stairs - is old, not well kept, has tiny tiny screens, and often would get the least popular line up of films, (although recently they have been mixing it up a little more.)

It would be a great counterpoint to LAlives Regal chain, and further differentiate it as more of an arts focused development.

[colemonkee]

In earlier plans, in addition to the hotel, art galleries, health food store, a large gym, and electronics stores, an "art-house" movie complex was part of the mix. Later they dropped this, but I dont know why - I think what would be such a fantastic addition to this project - I guess it would have been a new Laemmle theater.

I dont know if Laemmle said no, but if they did I would hope they would reconsider. It would be a fallacy to base the decision on the performance of their current downtown theater. The Grande theater is almost impossible to find - has no street presence - is hidden down a flight of stairs - is old, not well kept, has tiny tiny screens, and often would get the least popular line up of films, (although recently they have been mixing it up a little more.)

It would be a great counterpoint to LAlives Regal chain, and further differentiate it as more of an arts focused development.
Actually, the Regal Theater at LA Live was one of the chief reasons why Related stopped pursuing the theater option for Grand Ave. That and they mentioned that the costs of construction could not pencil out for a theater in their project specifically.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

It's not like Downtown LA doesn't have enough deadzones. And I would hardly consider the Grand Ave. Project's design to be below average for anything already built in LA. It's definitely going to be a better neighbor than say, Beverly Center or even the Grove. Once there is enough density (aka mass amounts of people in a compact area), even streets with blank walls will have people walking by them. Just look at Manhattan. Not every single block of that island is retail. There are places in NYC that have large blank walls or just brownstones without retail, but yet a lot of people still walk by them because they're on their way to somewhere else. My point is, the Grand Ave. Project seems to only "leave behind" Olive Street, and I don't think that is the worst thing in the world.

Nothing is worse than having it be the way it is right now. LA needs to get rid of all these deadzones. It CONSTANTLY feels that many parts of LA are "works in progress" and just never QUITE THERE. Build the freakin' project already and for heaven's sake, get rid of Lopez!!! He's horrible.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

he should focus his attention on getting rid of the county buildings and having a station box for the downtown connector built.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ YES! EXACTLY!

His priorities are FUCKED and he has total lack of vision for the LONG TERM for a city's life span.

I actually sent him my old letter about why the County Buildings should be demolished a loooong time ago (2 years ago) and obviously nothing happened from that. lol What a RETARD, I swear to god, please stop posting his bullshit. He's on the same retarded wavelength as Joel Kotkin now IMO.

[dktshb]

On NPR "which way LA" they're devoting tonight's show to the Grand Avenue project. Tune in to KCRW on 89.9 at 7:00 and listen.

[citywatch]

Steve Lopez:
I'd raised a few concerns about the planned $2-billion mega-development, for which the city and county have turned over public land worth a fortune to a private developer and also offered tax breaks and other subsidies that could total $100 million.

At the risk of offending a man who could soon be my boss, we're about to turn over one of the rarest and most precious commodities in Los Angeles — open space that's owned by all of us — to a mega-development that could be dropped into any city anywhere.
That land he says is worth a "fortune" can't be all that valuable since it's been sitting vacant for over 30 to 40 yrs.

And what's so precious & rare about open space, whether owned by the govt (or "us") or not, when it's nothing but a scroungy parking lot & some weed choked fields, or one more wasteland/deadzone? Seems like we already have a ton of those things.

[Quixote]

It's not like Downtown LA doesn't have enough deadzones. And I would hardly consider the Grand Ave. Project's design to be below average for anything already built in LA. It's definitely going to be a better neighbor than say, Beverly Center or even the Grove. Once there is enough density (aka mass amounts of people in a compact area), even streets with blank walls will have people walking by them. Just look at Manhattan. Not every single block of that island is retail. There are places in NYC that have large blank walls or just brownstones without retail, but yet a lot of people still walk by them because they're on their way to somewhere else. My point is, the Grand Ave. Project seems to only "leave behind" Olive Street, and I don't think that is the worst thing in the world.

Nothing is worse than having it be the way it is right now. LA needs to get rid of all these deadzones. It CONSTANTLY feels that many parts of LA are "works in progress" and just never QUITE THERE. Build the freakin' project already and for heaven's sake, get rid of Lopez!!! He's horrible.

You and I think alike. :)

[LAsam]

That NPR program was great, I now support the project 110%. I love the complaint from Steve Lopez about how the towers will block his view of Disney Hall from the bottom of the hill. That's a great reason to not create jobs and build a 5 star hotel.

[bobcat]

For anyone who missed it you can listen here:

http://www.kcrw.com/news/programs/ww/ww070212should_the_public_su/

[danny1100]

If there is anything in downtown that doesn't belong and will be blocking views, it's the damn police headquarters. Where was steve on that?


That NPR program was great, I now support the project 110%. I love the complaint from Steve Lopez about how the towers will block his view of Disney Hall from the bottom of the hill. That's a great reason to not create jobs and build a 5 star hotel.

[DJM19]

Steve us just a Johnny come lately. Parking lot sits there for 35 years and he never says a word. Now that people will actually follow through on a proposal, its the wrong idea.

This is downtown, if we are going to have grand urban proposals, this is the place to do it. And there is a park in the plan. He could devote more time to making that bigger by rallying support for the demolition of the county buildings there.

Not to mention, he acts like a park is the only place a public can enjoy. How about a plaza, or outdoor resturaunt/cafe seating? These are ACTIVITIES that add to the outdoor experience, and bring a diversity of things to do in the area

[POLA]

Wow, Steve loco lopez really just lost all respect from me. Those were the worst -seriously the worst- arguments against grand ave I've ever heard. A tent? Are you kidding me? Oh and the Irony of complaining that your view of a Gehry building will be blocked by a view of a Gehry Building. Dude, that guy is worse then a pta in San Fran.

[RAlossi]

Wow. I've been feeling more and more anti-Steve Lopez lately, but COME ON! The benefits to the city and county for this project are HUGE. I was a little skeptical about the tax breaks before, but think about all the jobs and retail sales taxes this project will directly and indirectly create. More tourists = more tax revenue. Jeez!

I hope they break ground ASAP.

[colemonkee]

Steve Lopez now joins Joel Kotkin to form LA's own Duo of Uber-NIMBY's, or DUMBY's.

[bjornson]

Man I hope to GOD Steve Lopez writes some more "interesting" articles for us to talk about.

[bobcat]

Wow, Steve loco lopez really just lost all respect from me. Those were the worst -seriously the worst- arguments against grand ave I've ever heard. A tent? Are you kidding me? Oh and the Irony of complaining that your view of a Gehry building will be blocked by a view of a Gehry Building. Dude, that guy is worse then a pta in San Fran.

Oh, and what about him saying that the city shouldn't invest in a project since we don't know exactly how things will turn out. Are we supposed to use a crystal ball to look into the future and only invest if we know it'll turn out well? Maybe the city can ask Dr Who if they can borrow his tardis. :rolleyes:

[bjornson]

YAY!!!!!!!! An editorial by Steve Lopez's BFF!

Grand Ave. -- a bad deal for Joe Taxpayer
The downtown mega-development relies too much on government subsidies for questionable benefits.
By Michael D. Antonovich, MICHAEL D. ANTONOVICH is a Los Angeles County supervisor.
February 13, 2007

DEVELOPERS OF the Grand Avenue project in Los Angeles' civic center are attempting to build a $2-billion hotel-retail-condo complex — not on their own dime but on yours. It is the taxpayers of Los Angeles County who would subsidize downtown luxury hotel guests at $400-plus a night.

Not long ago, we were promised that this project would be built without taxpayer subsidies. Now, in addition to a deal on the city and county land the project will be built on, the developer wants tax breaks that could reach $66 million over 20 years for the first phase of construction. The developer, the Related Cos. of New York, also admits that it is likely to come back for more subsidies for the second and third phases. That's in addition to $30 million in "public assistance" from the Community Redevelopment Agency and the county — for a total public "down payment" of nearly $100 million.

Two years ago, the county retained economist Allan Kotin, who stated that the project "is definitely not a revenue-maximizing plan for the landowner [the taxpayers]." Given the state of the real estate market today, with decreased demand and increased construction costs, that statement resonates even louder. If the project were a good investment, it would attract more private capital and no subsidy would be required.

Proponents of Grand Avenue — which would cover 16 acres extending south from Grand Avenue along First Street and include a $185-million hotel, 449,000 square feet of retail, up to 681,000 square feet of office space and about 2.5 million square feet of high-rise residential units along with an improved civic center park — contend that the project would be the new economic engine for downtown L.A. They also point out again and again that 20% of the housing created would be "low-income" units.

But these "pluses" need careful examination. First, consider housing. To be economically feasible, affordable housing in Southern California is typically low-rise. The high-rise towers planned for Grand Avenue are far and away the most expensive type of housing construction. If the social goal is to provide affordable housing, we can invest our public money in a more cost-effective manner.

Another supposed benefit of the Grand Avenue project — an improved civic park running from the Music Center to City Hall — would be paid for out of $50 million worth of deferred rental fees on the public land beneath the commercial Grand Avenue buildings. It is yet to be determined, however, whether the buildings on either side of this park area — the county's Hall of Administration and the Stanley Mosk Courthouse — would be demolished, replaced or relocated. It is imprudent to commit millions in public money to improve a park without having any idea what type of buildings would surround it.

Then there is the matter of whether Grand Avenue would be the economic engine we've been promised. We've heard these same arguments during the debate about the L.A. Live project adjacent to the downtown Staples Center, which also includes ground-floor retail, luxury condos and high-end hotel rooms — and massive subsidies. One can only speculate as to whether both of these projects will create and sustain the demand necessary to survive economically.

It's crucial that the residents of L.A. County understand that Grand Avenue comes with trade-offs. If tomorrow we sold just the county land underlying the development, conservative estimates indicate that it would bring in nearly $100 million. That means we could spend $50 million to improve the civic center park and have nearly $50 million to pay for much more, and much more cost-effective, low-income housing.

On top of that, consider what our subsidies could pay for, if they didn't go toward paying for the Grand Avenue development. Nearly $5 million of the "public assistance" for the Grand Avenue project would come from unrestricted county taxpayer funds that could be used instead for public safety, public education, parks, libraries or relief of regional traffic congestion.

I believe that development of county- and city-owned property should be a taxpayer-driven process rather than developer-driven, and that the majority of the benefits from that process should accrue to residents, not to the out-of-state developer. Although some of the goals of the Grand Avenue project are laudable, there remain more questions than answers.

The project is scheduled to be voted on today, after just one day of debate, by the Board of Supervisors and the Los Angeles City Council. Several public meetings to discuss the development have been canceled. This isn't right. The economic analysis of this project should be disseminated to all residents in the city and in the other 87 cities and 134 unincorporated communities of the county. A reasonable amount of time should be set aside for a thorough debate and analysis on the real merits of the Grand Avenue project.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

is this guy really serious? i seriously cant stand him. FUCK YOU ANTONOVICH. i dont know how many times i can say it. He is a retard, all jokes aside. all his negatives about the projects have been dispelled and he did not even talk about any of the positives. FUCK YOU YOU DUMB FUCKING NIMBY DUMBy whatever the hell you want to call it! AH%$*&#*

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Hmmm, I'm wondering how his vote weighed in on this meeting being canceled? I mean, it seemed to me that Molina and Perry were very much for this. Why would the City Council post pone the meeting based on one Supe's retarded brain fart?

Well, at least he did mention something that alludes to a very, very positive outcome: the dismantling of the County Buildings! The consideration from Antonobitch means that it's very likely those things will go!

I say don't worry. Eli Broad is also behind this. A billionaire like him doesn't get pushed away just like that.

[LAsam]

^I don't think the vote today is cancelled. I think he is saying several PUBLIC meetings were cancelled. I think this project is going to get approved.

[RAlossi]

Argh... I haven't heard anything about a meeting cancellation. Considering ALL the hoops Related has had to jump through I'm amazed that anything gets done here.

[LongBeachUrbanist]

I heard the KCRW show last night. Here are Lopez' assertions, and my rebuttals:

Steve Lopez said: We could be using this land for parks or mid-rise public housing.

My response: Well why haven't we then? We've had years to do this, with no outcry from Lopez. I'll tell you why: the city/county don't have the money. So who's supposed to pay for these things Lopez would rather have? Under the current deal, we get a huge park (well, we get the Mall turned into a park), plus a number of other improvements, paid for by the developers. If we sell the land off, we might get good money out of it (probably not though), but then we get no amenities and no say in the design.

Steve Lopez said: The new development will block his view of Disney Hall.

My response: First of all, who cares about your view? Why is your view more important than anything else. Second, your view is already blocked -- by the rusty old Tinkertoy parking structure that's been there for decades. The new development will move this parking underground.

Steve Lopez said: We are putting commerce above our basic needs.

My response: We are making a choice between leaving a gaping hole in the city for another couple decades, versus building a vital, transit-oriented, mixed-use development, which includes low-income housing, streetscape improvements and a renewed and expanded 16-acre park. Oh and BTW, will contain world-class architecture.

Steve Lopez said: We shouldn't be 'giving away' tax revenues to a commercial enterprise.

My response: I'll admit, I'm uncomfortable with the idea of special tax breaks here. At the same time, though, I think this is money we wouldn't be getting anyway. Right now, it is nothing but a parking structure. Moreover, these are only specific tax breaks: sales tax and other taxes and fees would not be affected.

In conclusion, this is a well-organized project that was initiated several years ago by the City and County, that included a design competition that was open to multiple developers, and that included the public in countless meetings. This thing has gotten tons of public feedback, and is ready to move forward.

Kudos to Bill Witte for making Steve Lopez sound like a childish whiner.

[LongBeachUrbanist]

I mean, it seemed to me that Molina and Perry were very much for this. Why would the City Council post pone the meeting based on one Supe's retarded brain fart?

Aren't the City Council and the County Supe's having separate meetings? I can't imagine County Supe Antonovich would have any influence over a City meeting.

[bobcat]

Eli Broad is now speaking...

http://www.lacity.org/ita/itacv1.htm

Lawyer representing the Bonaventure is opposed. :rolleyes:

A housekeeper working at the Bonaventure is in support. :jester:

[LAsam]

All the councilpeople I have heard speak so far are supporting this project. I think things are looking pretty good.

[bobcat]

And it is approved unanimously.

[LAsam]

Today is a good day for LA!

Now lets hope the County approves.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

fantastic! great updates.

[bobcat]

Basically, everyone except the guy representing the Bonaventure was gushing over the project, even the council members representing the valley. I'm really impressed with the way Related was able to draw support from such a broad coalition of business, labor, and community.

[RAlossi]

Wow! This is great news. Let's just hope Antonovich hasn't soured the County Supervisors on this ...

[bobcat]

News Flash from DT News:

City Council Approves Grand Avenue Plan
Work on $2 Billion Project Could Begin This Fall

by Kathleen Nye Flynn and Kathryn Maese
The City Council this morning unanimously approved a long-awaited, $2.05 billion plan to revamp a stretch of Grand Avenue atop Bunker Hill with two high-rises that will include a high-end hotel and condominiums, along with a retail promenade.
The 14-0 vote at 11:52 a.m. pushed through a contentious package of tax rebates and exemptions for developer Related Cos., which could be worth up to $66 million over 20 years from the public parking and hotel components.
“I’m gratified that people did their homework,” said Related President Bill Witte, adding that the council members made a strong effort to “demystify” details of the project. “Even if they weren’t from Downtown they understood.”
The approval means Related could begin construction as soon as October (the County Board of Supervisors is also expected to approve the plan this afternoon).
“Today is a culmination of many years of work,” said Councilwoman Jan Perry, who sits on the Joint Powers Authority overseeing the project. “This is about jobs, housing at all income levels onsite, a tremendous amount of open space for the entire city of Los Angeles.”
Proponents of the plan said the project would not be feasible without the tax breaks, particularly since investors are wary that projected revenue from the 50-story Frank Gehry-designed high-rise would not outweigh construction costs. A report from the city’s Chief Legislative Analyst stated that the money would not come from city’s general fund, but would instead be generated by the project itself.
“When I approach these types of projects there are two essential questions that have to be answered,” said CLA Gerry Miller during the meeting. “The first is, is it net new money and/or is the general fund potentially at risk? The second is, is public reinvestment necessary to make the project feasible? Unless the answer to both of those questions is yes, there’s really no point in proceeding with the discussion. In this case the answers to both of those question are in fact yes. This is all net new money.”
The $775 million first phase would unfold along Grand with buildings rising on lots owned by the city and county. The plan calls for two towers, one of which will include the five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel at a cost of $185 million.
Also planned is a 16-acre civic park, shops, a market, restaurants and about 500 housing units. Related has agreed to hold 20% of the apartments for low-income renters. Construction is expected to take about four years.
Two later phases could add 164,000 square feet of retail, 2,160 residential units and another hotel. Those stages would also include 20% affordable housing.
Detractors of the mega-development have said that money that could go to municipal coffers should not be given to private developers, especially given Related’s plan to build thousands of market-rate housing units. Likewise, some hoteliers said the tax break for the Mandarin hotel is not fair to competitors.
“Subsidies for this luxury hotel and condos are unneeded and based on a fraudulent study,” said Chris Sutton, an attorney for the 1,100-room Westin Bonaventure hotel. He added that he plans to litigate and seek referendum petitions if necessary.

[bobcat]

The livestream (http://bos.co.la.ca.us/Categories/MtgsBoard/LiveBroadcast.htm) for the Board of Supes meeting doesn't seem to be working but the meeting can be heard at (213)974-4700.

Once again Eli starts the discussion...

[LAMetroGuy]

If steve lopez was in New York, he would argue that Penn Station blocked his view of Madison Square Gardent... what a joke! Glad this project passed, maybe Steve Lopez and the Bonaventure folk can go and cry their sorrows away on a surface parking lot somewhere in downtown LA!

[LongBeachUrbanist]

:cheers: :drummer: :twoguns: :cucumber: :apple: :bowtie: :dancing:


“When I approach these types of projects there are two essential questions that have to be answered,” said CLA Gerry Miller during the meeting. “The first is, is it net new money and/or is the general fund potentially at risk? The second is, is public reinvestment necessary to make the project feasible? Unless the answer to both of those questions is yes, there’s really no point in proceeding with the discussion. In this case the answers to both of those question are in fact yes. This is all net new money.”


Perfectly put. The so-called "subsidies" are actually monies coming out of the project (being reinvested), and are necessary to move forward. IOW, public money is not being used.

Thank goodness the scare tactics didn't work.

I am more concerned about the County vote. Antonovich is obviously against this, and Knabe (my supe) is a real dick and may side with him. However, I know Molina is for the project, and would guess that Zev and Burke would vote yes as well.

I guess we'll soon find out!!! :fingerscrossed: :fingerscrossed:

[LongBeachUrbanist]

From LA Times, 13 February 2006:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-ex-grandave13feb14,0,1283141.story?coll=la-home-headlines

City Council approves Grand Avenue project
By Cara Mia DiMassa

Despite criticism about tax breaks and land giveaways, the Los Angeles City Council today unanimously approved a sprawling mini-city atop Bunker Hill that will alter L.A.'s skyline and set a course for future development in downtown and beyond.

http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2006-11/26520966.jpg Included in the Grand Avenue plan are a park between City Hall, center, and the Music Center, foreground, up to 2,600 housing units, a 275-room hotel and a movie theater complex. (Genaro Molina / LAT)

Council members described the vote as a turning point for Los Angeles, which for decades has been trying without success to establish a central cultural hub in downtown that would draw people from around the region.

"This is a historic day for Los Angeles. It changes the entire completion of the center of our city," said philanthropist Eli Broad, who spearheaded the development.

Grand Avenue has emerged as perhaps L.A.'s most ambitious effort at creating dense high-rise developments that attempt to place housing next to rail lines, jobs, cultural attractions and shopping.

While some consider it a model for "smart growth" aimed at encouraging people to walk and take mass transit rather than drive, others see it as a tax giveaway that is not in the interests of local government. They also question whether the project would be the regional magnet its backers hope.

The developer, Related Cos., says the $2-billion project, designed by Frank O. Gehry, is financially unfeasible without the subsidies.

Early estimates put the tax rebates at $40 million over 20 years, but the legislative analyst's report estimated that the rebates could cost $66 million.

Related has spent months negotiating behind the scenes for the tax breaks, an increasingly common incentive used by cities to attract catalytic projects.

The city conducted an independent audit, which concluded that "the funding to support the project would be 'net new' revenues generated by the project itself, and that public participation is essential to make the project economically feasible."

The largest tax break would be in the 14% city hotel tax, a maximum of $60.5 million over 20 years.

http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2006-11/26465164.jpg Phase One of the project, which is to rise on the site of the parking structure at left, was supposed to break ground as early as next month. But officials now say it will be delayed at least until October and possibly beyond. (Bryan Chan / LAT)

Gehry designed the first phase of the project, the centerpiece of which is a translucent, glass-curtained tower rising 47 stories above his landmark Walt Disney Concert Hall.

His schematic designs call for two L-shaped towers, the 47-story structure and a 24-story building, at opposite ends of the block east of the concert hall.

The designs are for Phase 1 of an ambitious plan by Related, Broad and top city and county officials to transform a part of downtown known as a 9-to-5 office community into a vibrant place where people would live, shop and dine.

The design attempts to connect the new buildings to Disney Hall by installing a grid of light strings crisscrossing Grand Avenue, from the towers and pavilions to the hall. Also to that end, Gehry wants to repave Grand Avenue in a pattern of varying shades of stone, to create connections among the street, the buildings and the planned civic park nearby.

The taller of Gehry's buildings would be covered in a dramatic glass design. Preliminary models show either striped panels of alternating shaded glass or a pleated glass surface that looks like fabric folded around the building. The smaller building would have a more austere form, looking like a light-filled glass box.

Three shopping and dining pavilions would rise near the base of the two towers, mimicking the undulating lines and rough forms of Disney Hall but constructed of stone and glass rather than steel. Elaborate plantings of trees and other greenery on above-ground floors would create the effect of a hanging garden.

While the project has attracted mostly praise at recent public meetings, the request for tax breaks does have its detractors.

Some have argued that by granting the subsidies, the city is not getting the best possible deal for itself. Others have complained that the hotel could have an unfair advantage downtown.

From the beginning, the Grand Avenue project has been marked by a nontraditional public-private marriage. Besides the proposed tax breaks, government agencies are providing the land, investing in street improvements and subsidizing affordable housing in the project.

Related and its fiscal partners, meanwhile, are taking much of the financial risk -- particularly tenuous in a downtown real estate market that has shown signs of softening. They are also subject to a number of requirements, including the condition that all construction and permanent jobs in the development meet either "prevailing" or "living" wage requirements for the city.

Though each side bears a portion of the project's financial risk, each side also stands to profit if the development is a success. The city and county could reap substantial tax revenue from the project, far more than they receive now from the properties, which are either vacant or used as parking lots.

Construction of the first phase -- two high-rise residential towers, one with a five-star hotel, and 285,000 square feet of retail space -- is expected to start in October and be completed in June 2011.

The entire development would be built on nearly three square blocks on Bunker Hill, amounting to 10 acres. There would also be a 16-acre park stretching from the Los Angeles Music Center to the edge of City Hall.

[LAsam]

Any news on the County's opinion?

[bobcat]

Zev is supporting it. Mike is against.

They talked about the Hall of Administration and that it'll cost more to retrofit it than to rebuild.

Approved 4-1!

[DJM19]

Thats solves that then, KNOCK THAT SUCKER DOWN

[LosAngelesBeauty]

OMG, my dream is coming true! Please tell me they're going to tear those fuckers down and EXPAND that park into the most prestigious on the West Coast. It would be absolutely amazing, a 20-something acre park surrounded by world class venues and architecture:

1) The Music Center (Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Ahmanson Taper)

2) The grand DWP headquarters

3) Walt Disney Concert Hall

4) Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (and to a certain extent the LAUSD performing arts high school)

5) City Hall

6) Caltrans and Police HQ

7) LA Times

8) New Federal Courthouse

9) Mandarin Oriental hotel

10) Colburn School


It would hands-down, become one of the most powerful cultural centers in the world.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

I'd like to re-post my letter I wrote back in November 2004 to address my concerns with the park. This is also how I initially got involved with Downtown LA, so it's also quite sentimental to me! :haha:
------------------------------------------------------------------

LOS ANGELES GRAND AVENUE PROJECT


The following is my letter to the Los Angeles First District Supervisor, Gloria Molina, concerning what I and many others feel, will be a dire problem for the Grand Avenue of tomorrow if we do not address this before the final development plans are established.



Dear Gloria Molina,


After reviewing the plans for the Grand Avenue project, it has come to my attention and civic concern that one significant issue, that is not being fully addressed, will almost certainly continue to circumscribe the area's potential vitality planned for Grand Avenue: the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration and Courthouse buildings.

City and urban planners, through empirical research, have come up with "rules" that a park should follow in order to become successful by connecting people together and truly creating the community that a world-class city like Los Angeles needs. It is truistic to mention, however, cities like San Francisco and New York have successfully created wonderful parks (Golden Gate Park, Central Park, etc.) that have become centers of vibrant activity. Their dedication to provide these meeting grounds not only aids in connecting the people together, but also promotes a kind of civic pride few in Los Angeles truly feel today due to a lack of strong identification with the city. A feeling of being "disconnected." The suburbanization and dependency on the automobile have led to the endless sprawl that has slowly eaten away at the very fabric of social connection which holds a city together. The need for a strong central core must be the next phase of Los Angeles' long-range development plans. Perhaps we (the people of our great city of Los Angeles) should invest more thought and heart into this "master project" along an infamous avenue that has failed time and again to become "the Champs" of LA since the last Victorian home was demolished on Bunker Hill. Let us plan without forgetting our past mistakes and let us not repeat them again. This is our last chance to get it right.

Taken from the Project for Public Spaces a park must fulfill these 4 rules to be truly considered a "Great Park."

1) Activity and Uses

"What types of activities make parks community magnets? When a park provides a place for people to ice skate and also an area nearby where people can sit and talk, get warm and get something to eat or drink, its chances of becoming a good place are increased, simply because there are numerous things to do, attracting many different people. A good place should be regularly available so that people can rely on it when the chatting whim strikes. The Great Good Place by Ray Oldenburg identifies neighborhood spots that act as the glue of their communities, drawing people to them for companionship and relaxation. Examples might be a neighborhood bocce court in a park, a corner bar, a coffeehouse or a playground -- all are places characterized by popular informality. Their users can anticipate lively conversations with the 'regulars,' 'characters,' and other neighbors. According to Oldenburg, in good places every person is known for their social self, not as an employee or family member -- roles, he says, that can make people feel like they are in straightjackets from which they long to escape. A good place also encourages people to 'sit and set a spell.' Being able to sit, converse or just look at passersby is key."

2) Comfort and Image


"Good details can tantalize -- they signal that someone took the time and energy to design amenities that welcome, intrigue, or help. City Comforts: How to Build an Urban Village by planner/developer David Sucher and People Places: Design Guidelines for Urban Open Spaces, edited by Clare Cooper Marcus and Carolyn Francis, are packed with thoughtful design ideas including community bulletin boards, restrooms, shade trees, child-friendly niches and bike racks. Author and urbanologist William Whyte talks about the importance of movable seating in his book, City: Rediscovering the Center. Today two thousand movable chairs are scattered on the lawn of Bryant Park in New York, transforming the park from a drug infested public space to a popular mid-town haven."

3) ACCESS AND LINKAGE (!)

"A good place is easy to see and easy to get to -- people want to see that there is something to do, that others have been successfully enticed to enter. On the other hand, if a park is not visible from the street or the street is too dangerous for older people and children to cross, the park won't be used. The more successful a place is, the more the success will feed upon itself. Sometimes, if a place is really good, people will walk through it even if they were headed somewhere else. Tony Hiss' book, The Experience of Place explores how people look ahead to orient themselves: "We let the layout of a place give us an advance reading on such things as whether we can linger there or need to keep on moving" -- if your visual signals are blocked you won't proceed."

4) Sociability

"A sociable place is one where people want to go to observe the passing scene, meet friends, and celebrate interaction with a wide range of people that are different from themselves. Have you ever noticed how many enjoyable conversations you can have at a farmers' market or a flea market? Psychologist Robert Sommer's research says that people tend to have four and a half times more sociable talks with people in a market versus a supermarket. How can the builders and managers of today's parks learn more from other places such as markets about where and how social activity occurs?"


Rule #3 (Access and Linkage) is why the civic park planned for Grand Avenue will fail to become the "new Central Park" of Los Angeles. The reason is because the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration Building and the Courthouse are both monolithic structures (and quite popularly agreed upon by the public as "eye-sores") that block at least 60% of access to the park! In addition, they provide no entertainment or social relevance to Grand Avenue. It does not take a city planner to predict that those two imposing structures on both sides of the park will prevent many people on the street from entering it. Mainly because the two buildings would literally force entrance and exit from the park to only two sides of the rectangular park creating an inconvenience many pedestrians would avoid.

Furthermore, the structures that would be constructed on parcels Q and W-2 (Map: http://www.grandavenuecommittee.com/plan.html) will benefit little (if at all) from the proposed "civic" park because the people who dwell/eat/work inside cannot walk easily and directly across the street to the park (heading north) because the fortress-like Courthouse stands firmly between them. Pedestrians on the street will also have a hard time (rather impossible) seeing any activity going on inside the park, further diminishing the "civic" park's potential to attract people and becoming the city's "new central park." "A good place is easy to see and easy to get to -- people want to see that there is something to do, that others have been successfully enticed to enter. On the other hand, if a park is not visible from the street...the park won't be used." This idea of an unused park cannot be more true of the current park that sits between the Hahn Building and the Courthouse because most people in Los Angeles (and in Downtown for that matter!) have no idea that this park even exists! Why? Because it's pretty much hidden behind concrete.

The solution to this potentially dire problem for the new Grand Avenue is to completely dismantle the two badly aged buildings: the Hahn Building and the Courthouse. The resulting cleared land can then be seamlessly added to the original park creating an aesthetically pleasing environment and a socially conducive area for all to enjoy. Not only does this add more needed space to a relatively small park of only 16-acres (Central Park, New York is 843 acres), but it will truly be the heart of Grand Avenue as it will essentially socially and visually connect The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, the Music Center, Disney Hall, the new developments yet to be constructed on parcels Q and W-2, and our beloved City Hall. The rest of the entire region will also benefit through a "ripple effect" because of the social and visual power created by connecting such important venues establishing a world-class culture mecca.

This idea of connectivity and linkage should sound familiar to those involved with the Grand Avenue project. It was because of the connectivity and linkage of all the cultural venues (from The Cathedral down to the MOCA and even the Central Library) along Grand Avenue that recently evoked such optimism for the future of Grand Avenue. As more cultural venues were added, such as the Cathedral and Disney Hall, so did the appeal and importance of Grand Avenue. That same concept of connectivity and linkage will need to be applied to the park and the important venues that surround it (and I'm not referring to the Hahn Administration Building or the Courthouse either, which have no relevance to the grand scheme of Grand Avenue promoting sociability). The more you connect, the more appealing and powerful the area becomes. Not only will dismantling the Hahn Building and the Courthouse make the proposed park truly great, but it will be the action needed to connect (both visually and for pedestrians' easy access) parcels Q and W-2 to the Cathedral as well as the Music Center and vice versa. Combining these forces together will undoubtedly be more effective than separating them.

I implore you, as the First District Supervisor and Grand Avenue Authority member, on behalf of all Angelenos who passionately hope the Grand Avenue Project succeeds, to earnestly consider the supported approval of dismantling the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration Building and the Courthouse to make way for a truly wonderful and integrated cultural mecca. I was advised by managing director of the Grand Avenue Committee, Martha Welbourne, at a recent symposium to raise this issue early on because there is a possibility that the services provided in these two buildings can be relocated and incorporated into the new Grand Avenue plan. The success of Grand Avenue will add significant momentum to the burgeoning Los Angeles Central Core (Downtown) development, which can help develop the civic pride many Angelenos lack today. Bunker Hill's history has been far from the success visionaries had hoped for--mainly because it lacked effective social and visual linkages. Let us all plan wisely and not repeat the same mistake again. Downtown deserves a great civic park and should not be neglected any longer.


Sincerely,

Brigham Yen






More to read...

Los Angeles has a lot to work on to stay afloat. In order to truly establish itself as a world player in the future (as other cities in Asia and Mexico assert themselves on the world stage), Los Angeles will need to develop an undoubtedly strong central core, being Downtown, to compete effectively for business as well as providing easy accessibility. And in Downtown, Grand Avenue is one of the main foundations that needs to be built to bring civic life and pride back into the core and entire metropolitan area. And in Grand Avenue, the proposed civic park will have to be successful to link the community together socially and visually. And that means we have to demolish the Hahn Administration Building and the Courthouse in order to link such an important cultural area together. I don't think anyone can dissent from this idea, unless they WANT Downtown Los Angeles to fail! I think demolishing those two monolithic eye-sores to help successfully create one of the main foundations of Downtown is a small sacrifice to pay and will only help reverse the trend of suburbanization by bringing life back into Downtown and reasserting Los Angeles' world-class status.



See how those two buildings (marked with X) can be potentially devastating to the area, both socially and visually?
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/7793/36519631kl4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
-The flow is obstructed: For example, for a visitor/resident, instead of walking through the park after a musical/opera at the Music Center, they would prefer to walk directly back to their hotel or residence because it is VERY inconvenient to walk around the Courthouse (which offers absolutely no social/entertainment value to the immediate area). Not only does this mean less "natural" areas to escape the busy city life, but possibly less people lingering outside, which decreases the vibrancy of the entire area. Furthermore, views from inside the park are also obstructed as one cannot see the Disney Hall nor the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.



Whatever is constructed on parcels Q/W-2 (hotel/residential/office towers), the people cannot walk across the street to the park easily, vice versa. People will have to walk around those huge buildings, which will be an inconvenience most may not tolerate. Anyone who doubts me, should go to parcel Q/W-2 and pretend/imagine that the hotel/residential tower/office buildings are completed and you want to go to the "great" civic park. Not so easy is it? (I did that recently when I took my cousins there for a tour) Next, go inside the park: can you see the Cathedral from inside the park? No. Can you see the "new hotel?" (or residential tower?) Maybe, depending on where you're located at in the park and how tall they will be. Can you see Disney Hall? No. Will the park offer spectular views? No. Will you like the park? Probably not. See my point? So what exactly DO YOU SEE? An UGLY and towering courthouse with no relevance to the cultural area what-so-ever!

The Grand Avenue planners are thinking extremely narrowly circumscribed by a limited budget of course. Nevertheless, they present a plan that assumes that it's just a "straight line" and they can ignore anything that lies outside that straight line (Grand Avenue). It is common sense that Downtown Los Angeles needs to be connected in all ways and directions, ESPECIALLY for a park in such close proximity to some of the most significant and highly concentrated cultural venues in the entire metropolitan area!

As the illustrations clarify, the view from inside the park will suffer for those who enter! If one is in the park, would it not be ideal to have a unobstructed (almost 360 degree) view of the beautiful Disney Hall, the meaningful Cathedral, the modern new hotel/residential high-rises, the rest of the Music Center (which is partially blocked by the two eye-sores depending on how far east you enter the park), and to the east, City Hall? Instead of feeling connected to Grand Avenue, you'll feel like you're in another area altogether. There will be a feeling of disconnection that will obviously not be as effective as feeling visually connected to the area.

Given the history of Bunker Hill, the idea of connectivity seems to be as elusive as coming up with an adequate source of funding. In the end, the structures (hotel/residential/office/retail) that are planned to be built on the parcels may not suffice if they are not tied together by a successful park which is socially and visually necessary to Grand Avenue.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

excellent all the way around! lets tear that mutha down, along with all the BS buildings around the park.

on a side note, im glad that the fellow county sups dont listen to the BS spewed from Antonobitch.

[bobcat]

OMG, my dream is coming true! Please tell me they're going to tear those fuckers down and EXPAND that park into the most prestigious on the West Coast. It would be absolutely amazing, a 20-something acre park surrounded by world class venues and architecture:

1) The Music Center (Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Ahmanson Taper)
2) The grand DWP headquarters
3) Walt Disney Concert Hall
4) Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (and to a certain extent the LAUSD performing arts high school)
5) City Hall
6) Caltrans and Police HQ
7) LA Times
8) New Federal Courthouse
9) Mandarin Oriental hotel
10) Colburn School

It would hands-down, become one of the most powerful cultural centers in the world.

You left out MOCA.

Other things said during the meeting:


Related is hoping the high end condos fetch $800-900 per sf.
Zev wants the civic park to be even greater than Chicago's Millennium Park.
Zev spent a lot of time addressing the Bonaventure lawyer's arguments, which in the end appeared to be groundless.

[colemonkee]

This is fantastic news all around. Let's hope the powers that be keep the ball rolling so it can get started on time in Rocktober.

EDIT: forgot this little dude. :rock:

[Quixote]

OMG, my dream is coming true! Please tell me they're going to tear those fuckers down and EXPAND that park into the most prestigious on the West Coast. It would be absolutely amazing, a 20-something acre park surrounded by world class venues and architecture:

1) The Music Center (Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Ahmanson Taper)

2) The grand DWP headquarters

3) Walt Disney Concert Hall

4) Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (and to a certain extent the LAUSD performing arts high school)

5) City Hall

6) Caltrans and Police HQ

7) LA Times

8) New Federal Courthouse

9) Mandarin Oriental hotel

10) Colburn School


It would hands-down, become one of the most powerful cultural centers in the world.

Don't forget MOCA which was designed by a prestigious Japanese architect (I forget his name). Like my signature says, Grand Avenue will become the cultural hub of the West Coast. If only Colburn and MOCA were more prestigious and we had a ballet hall at the Music Center, LA would rival NYC as the cultural capital of the US! I don't just propose that the two County buildings be demolished but also the other buildings that sit on the park site. I would love the parcel of land bounded by Grand, Spring, First, and Temple Sreets to become one giant park of about 40-something acres actually. I would also like to see Hill and Broadway closed off. Grand Avenue will truly become one of the greatest areas in the world. I'm also hoping that the buildings in Phases 2 and 3 will be individual iconic towers like the ones that are part of the new WTC proposal. I'm hoping SOM can design one of those buildings.

[bobcat]

Interesting preliminary design for the iconic tower.


GRAND AVENUE PROJECT PASSES GO
City and county OK the $2.05-billion plan to reshape downtown L.A.
By Cara Mia DiMassa and Jack Leonard
Times Staff Writers
http://www.latimes.com/media/graphic/2007-02/27900603.gif

February 14, 2007

Despite criticism about tax breaks and land giveaways, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and the Los Angeles City Council gave final approvals Tuesday to a sprawling mini-city atop Bunker Hill that will alter L.A.'s skyline and set a course for future development in downtown.

Elected officials and other backers of the Grand Avenue project described the vote as a turning point for Los Angeles, whose civic leaders have tried for decades without success to establish a central cultural hub downtown that would draw people from throughout the region.

"This is a historic day for Los Angeles. It changes the entire complexion of the center of our city," said civic booster Eli Broad, who is spearheading the development.

The $2.05-billion Grand Avenue project would be the largest single development in downtown history, and would be built almost entirely on public land that would be leased for 99 years to mega-developer the Related Cos. It has few if any equals in the region, in part because of the complexity and scope of the private-public partnership.

The project also has emerged as Los Angeles' most ambitious effort to create dense, high-rise residential developments next to rail lines, offices, cultural attractions and shopping.

Though some consider the project a model for "smart growth" aimed at encouraging people to walk and use mass transit rather than drive, others see it as a tax giveaway that is not in the interests of local government. Critics complain that Related is essentially getting a double subsidy: The city and county are leasing the developer public land for a profit-making business at the same time that the city is granting breaks on future hotel and parking taxes.

They also question whether the project would be the regional magnet its backers hope.

Both the council and board voted Tuesday, in part to demonstrate their lock-step support for the project. The City Council approved the deal 13 to 0, with Councilman Ed Reyes absent. The supervisors approved the project 4 to 1, with Mike Antonovich voting against it.

By approving the deal, the governmental bodies agreed to transfer the land for the first phase of the project — a county-owned parcel — to the Grand Avenue Authority, a joint city-county agency that will in turn lease it to Related. (Later phases include land owned by the city's redevelopment agency.)

The votes green-light all three phases of Grand Avenue, which calls for at least five new high-rise buildings and 3.6 million square feet of development.

The first phase would include two translucent glass residential towers to be designed by Frank Gehry, one 49 stories and the other 24.

One tower would include a five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel. Two hundred of the 1,000 housing units included in the first phase would be reserved for low-income residents.

The municipal bodies also approved the development of a 16-acre park between the Music Center and City Hall as part of the project's first phase — one of the civic benefits that backers said was vital to the project's success.

The development marks the furthest-reaching effort by local leaders to turn downtown into a 24-hour district on par with areas of New York, Chicago, London and Paris. Downtown has long retained a reputation as a sleepy district that virtually shuts down at sunset, though a recent boom in lofts and other high-end residential development is slowly changing that.

The project will rise in an area that since the early 1960s has been at the center of plans for downtown's revival. Through the 1950s, Bunker Hill was a funky — even seedy — collection of Victorian apartment buildings and boardinghouses that inspired some Los Angeles writers. The city leveled the neighborhood to make way for an extension of the high-rise district.

Backers believe that Grand Avenue can succeed where other downtown revitalizations have failed. They said that it would rise amid such cultural landmarks as Walt Disney Concert Hall, the other venues of the Music Center and the Museum of Contemporary Art at a time when downtown is suddenly a hot destination for the first time in decades.

But even some supporters said it remained to be seen whether such a massive undertaking could change the way people think about the city center.

"Done right, redevelopment is a tool for good. Done wrong, it's horrible," county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said. "I really believe, let me tell you, there have been more pairs of eyes looking over this project than any I can ever remember."

Though the project has attracted mostly praise at recent public meetings, the tax breaks and other public support have their detractors.

"The desire for an iconic skyline, that's just for aesthetics," said Antonovich, a longtime opponent of the project. "That should be borne by a developer and not the taxpayers who reside in the entire county."

Christopher Sutton, an attorney for the Westin Bonaventure Hotel, which has opposed the tax breaks for the Mandarin Oriental, told the City Council and the Board of Supervisors that his client was prepared to take legal action to block the project if necessary. He called the project a "direct threat" to the Bonaventure.

The hotel issued a similar ultimatum when the convention center at L.A. Live, another mega-project being built at the south end of downtown, received a larger tax rebate in 2005. But that project has moved forward and will open its first phase this year.

Related Cos. said the Grand Avenue project was not feasible without the subsidies. The developer has spent months negotiating behind the scenes for the tax breaks, an increasingly common incentive used by cities to attract catalytic projects.

Early estimates put the tax rebates for Grand Avenue at $40 million over 20 years. But a recent report from the city's legislative analyst estimated that the rebates could cost $66 million. The largest tax break would be in the 14% city hotel tax, a maximum of $60.5 million over 20 years, the report said.

From the beginning, the Grand Avenue project has been marked by a nontraditional public-private marriage. Besides the proposed tax breaks, government agencies are providing the land, investing in street improvements and subsidizing affordable housing in the project.

Related and its fiscal partners, meanwhile, are taking much of the financial risk — particularly tenuous in a downtown real estate market that has shown signs of softening. They also are subject to a number of requirements, including the condition that all construction and permanent jobs in the development meet the city's "prevailing" or "living" wage requirements.

In addition, the agreement calls for developers to give at least 30% of jobs to workers living within five miles of the site. That clause was criticized by Antonovich, who described the city deal as unfair to workers who live elsewhere in the county.

"It's Jim Crow of the 21st century," Antonovich said. "We're denying them their constitutional rights to work in their own county?"

Despite those criticisms, several civic leaders said it was rare for the city and county to cooperate so fully as they have to move the Grand Avenue project forward.

Councilwoman Jan Perry, who serves on the joint powers authority board, called the level of cooperation unprecedented.

Though the city, county and developer each would bear a portion of the project's financial risk, each also would profit if the development was a success.

The city and county could reap substantial tax revenue from the project, far more than they receive now from the properties, which are either vacant or parking lots.

Related has written a $50-million check to the civic agencies, which represents the prepaid ground lease on the first phase and a portion of the second phase of the project.

Related has said that construction of the first phase is expected to start in October and be completed in June 2011.

[Quixote]

Get rid of the LA County Courthouse, LA County Hall of Administration, LA County Law Library, Hall or Records, Criminal Courthouse, and that stupid flat "thing." Close of Hill and Broadway. This is what we should be aiming for. I remember reading that the Hall of Records building has some architectural significance? If that's so, I wouldn't mind it being turned into a cultural center or a cafe/restaurant/bar.

http://www.grandavenuecommittee.com/images/district_plan_large.gif

[bobcat]

If only Colburn and MOCA were more prestigious and we had a ballet hall at the Music Center, LA would rival NYC as the cultural capital of the US!

Colburn and MOCA are already very highly regarded. Where LA could improve is in dance and live theatre.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

^ add a cap to the freeway, and a greenbelt to tie in Chinatown and the surrounding area.

[Quixote]

Yeah but Colburn isn't anywhere near the status of Juilliard and MOCA is nowhere near the status of The Met.

I can make these comparisons though:

Carnegie Hall/Walt Disney Concert Hall
Lincoln Center/Los Angeles Music Center
Madison Square Garden/Staples Center
Radio City Music Hall/?
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts/Central Los Angeles Area High School #9
Times Square/LA Live
Time Warner Center/Grand Avenue

Lincoln Center has more theaters/facilties/organizations. NYC's institutions are still a bit more famous/prestigious than their LA counterparts.

[bobcat]

Yeah but Colburn isn't anywhere near the status of Juilliard and MOCA is nowhere near the status of The Met.



Not true, Colburn is VERY prestigious and its students typically are accepted to Juilliard as well. It's true that it's not as well known as Juilliard to the general public, however.

MOCA is a contemporary art museum and should only be compared to other contemporary art museums.

[bjornson]

MOCA is contemporary art museum. A better comparison to the Met would be LACMA or the Getty, but those aren't downtown.

[Quixote]

Zev wants the civic park to be even greater than Chicago's Millennium Park.


Now that's how big we should be thinking and what we should be aiming for. Chicago has a pretty solid cultural center in that area though with Millennium/Grant Park, Art Institute of Chicago/Museum Campus, as well as some music venues on Michigan Ave. Their theater district isn't too far from there. All the while it's all architecturally beautiful.

Though LA will have a more impressive cultural center than Chicago IMO.

[Quixote]

How about MOCA and MOMA? I'm not sure where MOCA stands when paired together with all the other modern art museums in the US but I know that LA is the contemporary art capital of the world.

[Quixote]

From Wikipedia:

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is a pre-eminent art museum located in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It is regarded as the leading museum of modern art in the world.


The MOCA downtown Los Angeles location is home to almost 5,000 artworks created since 1940, including masterpieces by classic contemporary artists, and inspiring new works by emerging and mid-career artists from Southern California and around the world.

In 1986, the celebrated Japanese architect Arata Isozaki completed the downtown location's sandstone building to international critical and public acclaim, marking a dramatic achievement in the contemporary art world and heralding a new cultural era in Los Angeles.

As the Los Angeles Times declared "There isn’t a city in America—not New York, not Chicago, not Houston, not San Francisco—where a more impressive museum collection of contemporary art can be seen."