Doing the Math for City Hall
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Jeanne Laurie
Sunset Park
Recent development proposals make it obvious that they would be a dramatic burdens to the people in the neighborhood and the people of Santa Monica
There is already far too much traffic in Santa Monica, and especially along the Olympic Corridor. The traffic now is at road rage levels. It isn’t a figure of speech, it is a fact that pedestrian traffic moves faster than the cars. The problem with being a pedestrian is that it is dangerous because of the level of traffic. Drivers are so anxious to get into the intersection or on to the freeway that they are not paying attention to pedestrians. Drivers have abandoned civility and good sense. The cars not only choke the flow of traffic, they block the flow of traffic. Cars enter intersections where there is no chance of clearing the intersection before the light turns red.
Paramedics would not be able to get to injured people because no car has room to get over to let an ambulance or fire department vehicle approach the scene. It wouldn’t take much creativtiy for some ambulance chasers to sue the city for lack of services that resulted in deaths. How much has the city paid for the Farmers Market crash? And, I don’t believe the city was at fault for that. But lawyers did.
How many deaths is one development worth? How many mangled cars and injured people? How many stress claims and angry or violent people? One facility would be bad enough by itself, but it is combined with a horrific number of other developments in the same area. No matter how many dollars these buildings would bring to the city coffers or personally profit designated individuals, it is not worth the problems it will cause for the residents of Santa Monica. None of the so-called enhancements do anything to mitigate traffic or lower the levels of traffic.
It doesn’t make any difference how you play with words or do “Hollywood accounting.” The developers claim that the number of car trips will be reduced by 50%. The number of car trips will DRAMATICALLY increase. If you take 50 percent away from an imaginary number, it still leaves THOUSANDS more car trips to intensify the anger of drivers and annoy the resident
How much business is the City of Santa Monica going to lose because people outside Santa Monica will not want to go to Santa Monica to shop or be entertained. Check with the Music Center people about how many subscribers they have lost because people don’t want to be aggravated by driving downtown. There is lots of local theater. People don’t have to put up with the traffic going downtown.
There are also lots of shops, bars, restaurants, and movie theaters elsewhere. Why put up with mind-grinding traffic when there ar so many other places that don’t have the traffic nightmare that is Santa Monica
How much of a drain on the city’s resources will all these buildings cost? How much more water will be used? How many more paramedics will be needed? Where is all the trash generated going? I didn’t see any solar panels in the design.
What happened to LUCE? The allowed space for LUCE is already far more than the city can handle. Then before the ink is dry on LUCE you want to make exception after exception for developers. How about having the developers get together and build a monorail with THEIR money. That would be an enhancement. Not just a few flowers that are supposed to make up for strangulation traffic and for builidngs that dwarf existing buildings and block the sun. The people of Santa Monica have stated over and over that they do not want New York City canyons of buildings.
Another problem with tall buildings is that it damages the privacy of existing buildings. Many complaints have been registered with the City of Los Angeles because business people can look down into the backyards of residences.
We all hope the economy will pick up. However, there are For Lease signs all over Santa Monica. How much more commercial space do we need? The amount of commercial space vs. affordable housing is too far off the scale already.
Believing that the light rail is going to take care of all of this is absurd. It is just an excuse and more Hollywood accounting to justify the developers’ assault on our city.
If the council members have tunnel vision for $$$$$$$, they are not worthy representatives of the people of Santa Monica. Council members have to think of more than just $$$$$$$$. The livability of a city MUST be given priority.
The comment that came out of the last Planning Commission meeting was: The only good thing that may come out of this plan is that it will finally piss off the people of Santa Monica so much that their opinion of the council members will show in the November election. If that’s too complicated for you, that means you will be voted out of office. Enough is enough.
Have some integrity. Be actual representatives of the will of the peopl
Do not allow oversized, superfluous buildings that require exceptions to the building regulations.
Jeanne Laurie
Sunset Park
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Commerical development? We need commercial and industrial use units to keep business in the city and to restrain costs of repair and maintenance of real property. A mix of residential, commercial, and industrial use units are critical to the health and vibrancy of any city. Several of my supplies’ providers have had to re-locate or are in the process of re-locating because the buildings they occupy have been approved for high-rise residential housing. These include tool rentals and building parts’ suppliers–both in downtown Santa Monica and further inland. Many contractors refuse to work in Santa Monica due to the excessive red-tape in performing projects. Many homeowners are denied use of their property due to the same red-tape.
As for “affordable” housing, what is “affordable” ? Starting salaries for educated young professionals in Santa Monica are $50,000- $120,000/ year. Quite a number of my neighbors earn 6-figure salaries AND occupy rent-controlled apartments.
It is fact that Santa Monica has among the highest residential rents in the nation. It is fact that Santa Monica real estate values have held in the face of gross decline-in-value elsewhere in the Southland, the State, and the Country.
Rents respond to market forces more readily than top-down approaches. So does development. Hence the proposed re-development of commercial and industrial use tracts to residential/high rise residential use –IN THE NAME OF AFFORDABLE HOUSING. How many of those “affordable housing” units are or will be FOR SALE?
The cluster of “rabbit warrens” recently constructed on Olympic at 20th street is responsible for gross congestion on Olympic Blvd. The size of bachelor units, these rent-regulated one-bedrooms air-spaces (efficiency units) at $1188 -$1400/mo rent on an equal par to, or much higher than, units of similar square footage(or larger) that are also much closer to the beach. Nor does the former include garage/car space. Santa Monica is inundated with housing that is not rented. Thus the abounding “For Rent” signs. Businesses are closing or relocating. Hence the “For Lease” signs.
If SMRR alignments/people are accepting monies from development, then clearly the rubric “AFFORDABLE HOUSING” is a catchphrase of MANIPULATION and CONTROL whereby “developers” garner low-interest loans–provided a small percentage (less than 5%) of the units built will be “affordable”. Essentially, members of one group of sect–developers– stay in business while members of a select political group preying on the fears of the Public line their pockets via fees and kickbacks.
How many of those units built with Public Funds will be offered for private/individual purchase? When new housing or commercial or industrial space is built with low-interest loans, i.e. our taxes, YOUR MONEY and MINE, and not offered for sale to the public, then the city declines into fiefdoms… Neo feudalism.
Wake up! Santa Monica! Amend your political nutrients! Residents of Santa Monica have been fed the corn-syrup diet that the City, in collusion with an out-dated agency called SMRR, works for “renter’s” rights. In fact, bureaucracies work in the interests of bureaucracy, not people.
We are all tenants of city and nation; for we all pay taxes. Some of us have assumed a much greater investment in the City of Santa Monica through steep mortgages on which we pay handsome property taxes. These taxes are the bases of support of the Public, City employees, and low-interest loans to developers.
Santa Monica needs parks, tree-lined streets (palm “trees” are not trees), independent small businesses and a mixture of residential, commercial and industrial use real estate. Santa Monica would be wise to increase the small-ownership base. We cannot declaim “commercial” development when mechanisms of manipulation such as “affordable housing” undercut the lives of all who live and work here.