LOS ANGELES | Downtown Project Rundown 4.0

[brudy]

Originally Posted by HunterK

Great writeup Wilcal - and so true. When you look at the big picture of Downtown LA you start to realize that it will never be one of the great Downtowns of the nation. All this development is nice, but in the end Downtown will be more of a neighborhood - and less of a true downtown. Thats just the way LA is, I'm not being negative or positive about it.

Since I live in downtown I tend to think of downtown as "the city" in a sense and I want all that being in the city brings. But you're right in that in LA downtown is just another neighborhood, at least for right now. Downtown does have a lot of what I think is required to be called a city. World-class art, music, civic life, restaurants, pro sports (even though I'm not a sports fan), transit. It's developing as the core of LA but it has a long way to go and just due to the sheer size and nature of LA with multiple cores it will probably never be the epicenter. But I think that's ok. We need a lot more density, a lot more turnover some of the old school businesses, more retail, and the homeless situation needs to be dealt with in a serious way. It's a 20 year proposition I think.

[DistrictDirt]

Originally Posted by alki

That's funny.....has he asked his parents why they bought the house; why they like a mcmansion?

My mom lives in a McMansion outside of Philly. Its heinous. Give me a craftsman bungalow or an adaptive reuse loft downtown with floor to ceiling windows any day over that. Chalk it up to generational differences.

[alki]

Originally Posted by Illithid Dude

I haven't. I never wanted to seem rude. They are actually all really nice people, despite living in a house that looks like a Four Seasons circa 1995.

Four Seasons circa 1995? LOL. Love it.

I understand............I thought maybe they had discussed the issue because of the article.

[RuFFy]

Originally Posted by brudy

Since I live in downtown I tend to think of downtown as "the city" in a sense and I want all that being in the city brings. But you're right in that in LA downtown is just another neighborhood, at least for right now. Downtown does have a lot of what I think is required to be called a city. World-class art, music, civic life, restaurants, pro sports (even though I'm not a sports fan), transit. It's developing as the core of LA but it has a long way to go and just due to the sheer size and nature of LA with multiple cores it will probably never be the epicenter. But I think that's ok. We need a lot more density, a lot more turnover some of the old school businesses, more retail, and the homeless situation needs to be dealt with in a serious way. It's a 20 year proposition I think.

I think one day we're all going to wake up and realize Downtown is just Downtown. But Los Angeles will become synonymous with everything from the LA River to the Sea, between the Santa Monica Mountains and Interstate 10. And when I say that I mean to say that the area described will become recognized as the Epicenter.

[alki]

Originally Posted by DistrictDirt

My mom lives in a McMansion outside of Philly. Its heinous. Give me a craftsman bungalow or an adaptive reuse loft downtown with floor to ceiling windows any day over that. Chalk it up to generational differences.

No worries, DD......we forgive you.

Anyone else need to confess their sins?

[alki]

Originally Posted by Wilcal

Mojeda,
it doesn't matter where you live, you give a lot to this forum with your efforts. I live 65 miles from downtown, but distance does not always correlate to true interest or involvement. In reference to your car break-in and parking ticket, I'm sorry, "it's the shits." Sometimes, I too, go through periods of "no good deed goes unpunished." Hang in there, and take care of your leg.

Well said.

[edluva]

Originally Posted by Kingofthehill

While people in LA do tend to be poorer, less educated and "cultured", and more working class than cities like SF, Tokyo, Boston, or Manhattan (which of these cities is nearly 50% poor Mexican and Central American immigrants? none), I think Chicago, as a whole, is far more blue collar and ghetto than LA. The good urban planning in the Loop area is the result of top-down urban planning, not because of the people there. LA has nothing as terrible, tragic, and utterly hopeless as the South and West sides of Chicago, of which are abandoned and crime-ridden.

London, NYC, Paris, Copenhagen, etc., have tons of immigrants, many of them poor and from legitimately f'd up countries. Part of the problem is the wealthy, nouveau riche people in LA, and their garish tastes, which tends not to favor things like good architecture, civic responsibility, education, etc., or other cosmopolitan ideas. In short: we have tacky rich people. I just got back from crisis-stricken Spain and Portugal (Lisbon, Madrid, Bilbao, San Sebastián, and Barcelona), and even with no jobs - and in Portugal's case, a per-capita GDP 50% less than our poorest state, Mississippi - people there have more class, dignity, and taste than 90% of the people back home.

I agree with pretty much everything you said here.

With Chicago, while I can agree that it's at least as working class as LA in their respective city-propers, Chciago's enviable core is the product of top-down planning as well as the product of serving as an enormous singular regional employment center for the much larger educated class of Chicagoland. For perspective, 36% of Chicagoland has bachelors degree vs 29% for metro LA

We indeed have no shortage of tacky rich people, and we have a dire shortage of educated urbanites for a metro of our size. That's why we have an embarrassing downtown and core, and that's why we have embarrassingly stupid architecture in our core

[alki]

Originally Posted by edluva

I agree with pretty much everything you said here.

With Chicago, while I can agree that it's at least as working class as LA in their respective city-propers, Chciago's enviable core is the product of top-down planning as well as the product of serving as an enormous singular regional employment center for the much larger educated class of Chicagoland. For perspective, 36% of Chicagoland has bachelors degree vs 29% for metro LA

Chicago has a pretty vibrant core but much of the rest of the city....esp the South and West sides.....is made up of fairly poor neighborhoods. Its a city that experienced 146 homicides in the first 5 months of this year; down from 222 in the same period the year before. Many of those homicides are young black males. Chicago schools have one of the highest dropout rates for black males in the country. The metro area also suffers from slow employment growth. I am not sure its a city to which LA should aspire.

We indeed have no shortage of tacky rich people, and we have a dire shortage of educated urbanites for a metro of our size. That's why we have an embarrassing downtown and core, and that's why we have embarrassingly stupid architecture in our core

That's one element of the problem but I believe its far more complicated than that. I think I've posted before that LA was supposed to be the city of the future, spawning replicas like Phoenix and Dallas. When I was in grad school for urban planning, I took a whole course on LA as a model city of the future. DT was de emphasized in favor of a series of urban villages. Sprawl was good.

And let's not forget that the LA of the 1960s, 70s and 80s was one of heavy smog. DT was encased in smog 7 months out of the year. If nothing else, that spurred a lot of movement to the beach communites where there was minimal smog and cooler temps. If you were a rich dude, you wanted to work where you lived. And if you were an actor with urbanist tendencies, you lived in NY and commuted to LA to shoot a film or a pilot.

By the time I got to LA in the late 1980s/early 90s, DTLA was a dud. One friend.....a native Angeleno........told me to stop trying to make DTLA happen. It was depressing. And then when they did do something DT, like the Pershing Sq redo, it was terrible. LA was so bent on being cutting edge, every thing it did had to be different from what other cities were doing..........and typically it turned out to be a fail.

However, I think that's all changing. LA got beat up pretty badly during the 90s. And there were leaders who began to realize the sprawling city without a center was not working. That's when a lot of mass transit projects were started and the laws about rehabbing older bldgs into residential DT were relaxed. The concept of an LA Live was in the embryo stage. DT started to come back into focus.

Frankly, I think DTLA has turned a corner. Not all the new projects are architectural gems but some aren't bad. And the architectural style is changing albeit slowly. DT living is back and retail is making a comeback. And just for the record, I would have killed to have the DT you all have.

[blackcat23]

http://issuu.com/ladtn/docs/issuu_dtn_07...nnews.com/app/issuu/basicGrey/layout.xml

In the 7/22 edition of the Downtown News, Barry Shy offered up some specifics on his recently announced plans for two additional high rises in downtown.

On the surface parking lot on the NW corner of Olympic and Broadway, he's intending to build a tower that will "rise to about 13 stories along Broadway and about 20 stories along Olympic Boulevard." I'm assuming the varying heights has something to do with the mandate to maintain the existing height of the street wall along Broadway. The new tower will have 250 residential units, with the existing building that he purchased next door converted to 150 units.

At 916 S. Hill street, he's planning 250 units over 20 or 21 floors. This is directly across the street from the Olympic/Hill construction site, and a stone's throw from 888 Olive.

He paid about $30 million for all three properties. Shy says he's intending to start construction on these three projects, as well as the 40 story SB Omega proposal at 6th/Main within the next 12 months.

Barry Shy is nothing, if not ambitious. Steve Needleman also was quoted in the article lathering praise on him, which is probably the first time I've ever seen someone speak so positively about Shy.

[Mojeda101]

AWESOME news! I love how they are all so close to the Streetcar route. I will enjoy keeping you guys posted on those. I love how they're all close together

[MarshallKnight]

Originally Posted by RuFFy

I think one day we're all going to wake up and realize Downtown is just Downtown. But Los Angeles will become synonymous with everything from the LA River to the Sea, between the Santa Monica Mountains and Interstate 10. And when I say that I mean to say that the area described will become recognized as the Epicenter.

I'd say it already has. LA is one of the prime examples of a polycentric city you'll find in urban planning. And its "epicenter" has been roughly defined as the corridor that follows Wilshire and Santa Monica Blvds from Downtown to the ocean. Like beads on a necklace, you have something like eight distinct urban centers, each the size of most regular cities: Santa Monica, Brentwood/Westwood/Century City, Culver City, Beverly Hills/Miracle Mile/WeHo/Fairfax, Hollywood, K-Town/Mid-City, Silver Lake/Echo Park and DTLA (depending on where you draw your lines). And the studies that I've seen don't usually include Glendale, Burbank or Studio City, although I'd argue they're all significant hubs.

Downtown will always be at the far east end of that chain of urban centers, which will make it more difficult to shift anything more than the daytime population of the city that way. People want to be central. Or at least, reading every Craigslist ad ever written would have you think so (Mar Vista as "central?" Who do these people think they're fooling?)

If I had to define one real center of the city, it would probably be the area bounded by San Vicente to the west, Western to the east, Sunset/Hollywood Blvds to the north, and Wilshire to the south. But you could argue it all kinds of ways. Although it's not what I've always thought of as the "ideal" city (I'd prefer it if it were squeezed to NY-style density), I've come to really appreciate that polycentricity and the diversity of places you can be and live.

[202_Cyclist]

MarshallKnight:
"I'd say it already has. LA is one of the prime examples of a polycentric city you'll find in urban planning. And its "epicenter" has been roughly defined as the corridor that follows Wilshire and Santa Monica Blvds from Downtown to the ocean. Like beads on a necklace, you have something like eight distinct urban centers, each the size of most regular cities..."

Exactly-- Century City's skyline, alone, is bigger than many other mid-size cities. I would also add Long Beach to the list of significantly dense, walkable, urban areas in the LA metro region.

[The Illusive Man]

Originally Posted by 202_Cyclist

MarshallKnight:
"I'd say it already has. LA is one of the prime examples of a polycentric city you'll find in urban planning. And its "epicenter" has been roughly defined as the corridor that follows Wilshire and Santa Monica Blvds from Downtown to the ocean. Like beads on a necklace, you have something like eight distinct urban centers, each the size of most regular cities..."

Exactly-- Century City's skyline, alone, is bigger than many other mid-size cities. I would also add Long Beach to the list of significantly dense, walkable, urban areas in the LA metro region.

Can't forget about the LAX area too. I work in the area and I would say its a decent job center, with a skyline of its own.

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by The Illusive Man

Can't forget about the LAX area too. I work in the area and I would say its a decent job center, with a skyline of its own.

This will probably get deleted because it is frowned upon here to look at what other cities are doing but this is absolutely correct as well. There is a significant employment base around LAX and the Playa del Ray development will be considerable.

One of the DC blogs (http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/19565/virginia-cant-manufacture-demand-at-dulles/) had a post about Dulles yesterday and a proposed road next to Dulles. LA World Airports and LA MTA should encourage significant transit-oriented development next to the Crenshaw Line's LAX station. This will both provide more ridership and help to recover the cost of the Crenshaw line investment. If there is just the Crenshaw line station surrounded by the current LAX parking lots, this will be a missed opportunity.

[brudy]

Originally Posted by blackcat23

http://issuu.com/ladtn/docs/issuu_dtn_07...nnews.com/app/issuu/basicGrey/layout.xml

In the 7/22 edition of the Downtown News, Barry Shy offered up some specifics on his recently announced plans for two additional high rises in downtown.

On the surface parking lot on the NW corner of Olympic and Broadway, he's intending to build a tower that will "rise to about 13 stories along Broadway and about 20 stories along Olympic Boulevard." I'm assuming the varying heights has something to do with the mandate to maintain the existing height of the street wall along Broadway. The new tower will have 250 residential units, with the existing building that he purchased next door converted to 150 units.

At 916 S. Hill street, he's planning 250 units over 20 or 21 floors. This is directly across the street from the Olympic/Hill construction site, and a stone's throw from 888 Olive.

He paid about $30 million for all three properties. Shy says he's intending to start construction on these three projects, as well as the 40 story SB Omega proposal at 6th/Main within the next 12 months.

That's pretty awesome. Even though he and his buildings have a bad rap, he's bringing people to downtown with units that aren't over the top expensive.

[Wilcal]

Originally Posted by Mojeda101

Downtown is becoming costly for me to visit. Was given a parking ticket today for being late to my meter by less than 10 minutes. A few updates ago my window was smashed into. I can't keep up with this, I swear.

Leg cramped up midway through the update. Wasn't able to get the massive update as promised. Although I did get 8th/Grand, 8th/Olive, Wilshire Grand, Broad/Parcel, and Ava. With a little teaser for the Courthouse site.

Block 8 is just south of Ava right? If that's the case I think it broke ground. Otherwise, a new part of Ava is beginning to unfold. Photos should be up tonight.

Mojeda,
if I may make a very delicate suggestion, I do so with a medical background. Since you are obviously having issues your mobility might I suggest that if you have a GP contact him or her and ask for a DMV disability release. The DMV will gladly issue you a (DP) placard, plate or both whichever you request. That way when you are downtown and you find street parking there will be no charge on the meter (this may even be safer than an enclosed garage where break-ins occur). You can theoretically drive to each location and park with hopefully a comfortable walk. Of course, this does not apply to private parking. I do not know the extent of your disability nor is it my business, but I hate to see someone who is in pain, as well as someone stopping something they enjoy. Good luck and keep up the good work.

[citywatch]

Originally Posted by alki

And just for the record, I would have killed to have the DT you all have.

I think that best sums up LA today compared with the past.

Ppl who troll message boards will happily disagree, & armchair urbanists who tend to over analyze why things work or don't work will debate until they're blue in the face no matter what, but all things considered....all things being equal....I think the city today is better than the city you left behind.

Originally Posted by blackcat23

On the surface parking lot on the NW corner of Olympic and Broadway, he's intending to build a tower that will "rise to about 13 stories along Broadway and about 20 stories along Olympic Boulevard."

The new tower will have 250 residential units, with the existing building that he purchased next door converted to 150 units.

At 916 S. Hill street, he's planning 250 units over 20 or 21 floors. This is directly across the street from the Olympic/Hill construction site, and a stone's throw from 888 Olive.

His projs.....outlined in green....will help add to a growing mass of improvement to the southern part of broadway & south pk. I'm only cautious about him cuz he does have a reputation of being perhaps tricky, & so I'm not sure if his sources of funding are going to be easier to find than what has caused problems for a big company like Related & its plans for bunker hill since around 7 yrs ago. But hope springs eternal.

I didn't mark the old bldg he's also purchased & which he plans to convert into apts, & which I'm guessing is between the corner parking lot he now owns & the old UA theater bldg.

[colemonkee]

^ Correct. The conversion would be the building directly to the north of the green square at Broadway and Olympic and just south of the United Artists Building/Ace Hotel. If even half of these projects move forward, this area will be hopping.

Speaking of other hopping areas, crews were (loudly) removing asphalt at the Saris-Regis project at 2nd and San Pedro this morning when I walked by, so that project is officially in site prep phase. And crews were hard at work pouring the second floor on Ava Little Toyko Phase 1 (at 2nd and Los Angeles). Once that cures, it will be stick construction from there on out. If the Federal Courthouse actually gets underway with heavy construction activity over the next few months, 2nd Street will be undergoing quite the construction boom.

[SoCalKid]

Why does everyone hate on Barry Shy? I mean that as a legitimate question, I'm unfamiliar with the issues that people have with him. From my understanding he has converted a number of beautiful historic vacant buildings into apartments with ground floor retail. Isn't that exactly what we want?

[Illithid Dude]

Originally Posted by SoCalKid

Why does everyone hate on Barry Shy? I mean that as a legitimate question, I'm unfamiliar with the issues that people have with him. From my understanding he has converted a number of beautiful historic vacant buildings into apartments with ground floor retail. Isn't that exactly what we want?

He may convert buildings, but he does so in the worst possible way, with no actual respect to the building. For example, look how he destroyed the lovely building on Spring and Sixth by painting it an atrocious shade of teal and haphazardly cutting out windows on what was once a beautiful marble facade. Or look how hideous ducts and vents spew out of the bottom floor of all his building. Or look how the signage he uses is so low quality that it rusts after a year, smearing the facades, and that he doesn't care enough to repaint them.