Thursday, December 5, 1996
DEVELOPMENT:
Increase
in parking shortage and congestion key issuesBy Laura Lake
There is no record that John Postley, who lives in Bel Air,
actually attended the Friends of Westwood meeting. He did not sign
in. Had he attended, he would know that participants told reporters
that they enjoyed the meeting because they had the opportunity to
talk about issues of personal concern to them. Hardly a staged
meeting.
This movie mall is not the goose that laid the golden egg, but a
Trojan horse in Bruin land. If movies were the key to prosperity,
Westwood would be booming. UCLA’s Anderson School Report made it
clear that the salvation of Westwood will be projects that serve
the neighboring communities, not a regional entertainment center.
Frankly, people in Westwood are tired of having people outside of
Westwood tell them what’s good for them.
Friends of Westwood surveyed our community and found that 90
percent oppose the project, 5 percent are undecided, and 5 percent
support it. This is not a case of a silent majority. Westwood
residents are angry that such a project is even under
consideration.
We used the developer’s published "fact sheet" and traffic study
for our briefing packet. Those alarming facts regarding traffic
(26,000 additional car trips per day), closing Glendon Avenue, 17
additional movie theaters, the height, the lack of required
parking, etc. … spell disaster for Westwood.
As far as the Advisory Committee goes, the issues of paramount
concern to our community, like movie theaters, have not been
addressed. The mitigation measures are questioned by the committee,
but no response is forthcoming. It is a smokescreen for the
developer.
Having written the first book on environmental mediation as an
alternative to litigation, and started the grants program for
environmental mediation at the Ford Foundation over 20 years ago, I
think my judgment on legitimate negotiations versus public
relations gimmicks is pretty sound. That’s why Friends of Westwood
declined to participate. Many of the current participants are
beginning to resent the lack of answers to hard questions.
Friends of Westwood chose to provide our input directly to Mr.
Feuer and city departments. We hired our own traffic engineer to
review the documents and found that the project would have massive
impacts on our already gridlocked streets. The proposed mitigations
are flawed and would change the way of life for Westwood
irreparably.
Residents want to see the site developed as a low-rise,
pedestrian-oriented, mid-to-high-end retail (along with the market
and the drug store). Developers assure us that this can be done
profitably. If developer Ira Smedra were smart, he’d eliminate the
movies and rely on his entitlements.
Laura Lake, Ph.D., is the president of Friends of Westwood,
Inc.