Dear Friends & Members of Mid-City Neighbors,

Our City Council reminds me of the corporate heads of the railroad with a train run amok in the film Unstoppable: They seem in complete denial that a major train wreck is headed for our neighborhood. With the Expo coming to town and no plans to park cars as soon as they leave Freeway 10 or Pacific Coast Highway, these Council members seem to have their heads buried in staff reports about the next development asking for their approval. They keep nailing down piecemeal projects instead of confronting the danger headed our way. They need to side-track these projects and bite the bullet: Protect our city from the glut of cars that will make every development irrelevant.

Once City Council develops plans for parking that could generate income for our city coffers, we will see that, by changing the Circulation Element of the LUCE, our concept of appropriate Land Use will also change.

You may see it differently. Go to item 7-B on tomorrow night’s agenda dealing with the Lionsgate Project at Colorado and Stewart: Read the staff report, look at the pictures and read the conclusion. The Mitigating Monitoring Program means that traffic will be worse once this goes through. How much worse? We have a Mitigating Monitoring Program to measure the damage once it takes place.

Frankly, it may not be the fault of developers but in the process that makes such developments seem “unstoppable.” With an appropriate Circulation Element, projects that provide greater Community Benefits than yet another gym and coffee shop, wider sidewalks and more streets for all that traffic, could make more money for developers and for the city. But just as relationships call for a little more love and a lot more patience to survive, so does running a city for the benefit of all.

I encourage you to call City Council members to task. Here’s their email: . Here’s their phone number: (310) 458-8211. If you let them know how much you care for your neighborhood and tell them how important it is to switch from the track they are on to one that deals with hard issues first, you might have more of an effect than you imagine. Again, it takes love and patience to stay on the right path.

Thank you for giving this your consideration,
Gregg Heacock
President of Mid-City Neighbors
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