Street repairs latest woe for popular mall

Summertime is always crunch time around the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, as tourists and locals flock to the trendy outdoor mall. But this summer the congestion is worse than ever, thanks to a 14-month-long road construction project now making its way by the mall and tying up traffic for blocks.

The project, which involves widening sidewalks and converting one lane of traffic into a dedicated bus lane that loops around the Promenade, is designed to make the area more pedestrian and transit friendly. But critics say it could end up making things worse, even turning people away from the area as crucial thoroughfares are narrowed to one lane for cars in each direction.

The construction project comes at a crucial time for the Promenade. For the last several years, rising rents have driven small independent restaurants and stores off the three-block-long mall in favor of large national chains. The remaining local merchants are growing increasingly concerned as the economy slows, power bills rise and the start date for the city’s living wage law looms.

Now the city is considering whether to intervene to keep the remaining independents, a move that has caused an intense debate over the character of the maturing shopping center.

While those discussions continue, the more immediate concern is just surviving the summer construction onslaught. The 14-month, $14.5 million transit improvement project actually began last April at Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean Avenue, working its way east two blocks at a time. Sidewalks were ripped up, the street reconfigured and new utility cables were laid down in six-week increments. This month, right in time for the beach crowds, the crews arrived at the Promenade, which crosses the boulevard. Popular stores like The Gap and Anthropologie and eateries like La Trastavere have been directly impacted.

“We’re hearing that sales are down between 5 percent and 15 percent from last year,” said Kathleen Rawson, executive director of the Bayside District Corp., the non-profit agency that oversees the mall.

While part of the drop in sales is due to the slowing economy, “there’s no question the construction is having an impact, especially on those stores right near the cone zone,” she said. “At Second Street and Santa Monica (Blvd.), some of those shops reported sales drops of between 30 percent to 50 percent, so we know what’s coming.”

Rawson said the worst is likely to come this fall, when the crews round the bend at Fifth Street and head down Broadway past Santa Monica Place and the Promenade toward the ocean. “I’m very worried about the Broadway segment. That’s going to affect both the Promenade and Santa Monica Place,” Rawson said.

Holiday break

Construction crews will be taking a hiatus during the holiday season, but Rawson said she fears a drop-off in shoppers anyway. “People who may approach the area in the next few months will have a tendency to stay away, so we’re going to have to do a lot more advertising to tell people that the area will be open and have easy access during the holidays.”

The city and the Bayside District are spending $300,000 in advertising and outreach, including full-page ads in the Los Angeles Times. The city also has temporarily waived its ban on banners, allowing businesses in the construction zone to hoist aerial ads.

“Ensuring access during the construction is the top concern of businesses,” said Vicky Zale, an outreach coordinator on contract to the city. “Next is letting people know that the businesses are open.”

One major concern centers on plans to take the curb lane of auto traffic away in each direction on Santa Monica Boulevard and two lanes on Broadway. (The latter road is now one-way, but will be converted into a two-way street.)

The lanes on both streets will be converted into dedicated bus lanes and separate delivery lanes. Short right and left turn pockets for autos will intrude on these two lanes.

City planners say this will eliminate much of the interference with auto traffic caused by buses and delivery trucks. But critics say all it will do is create bottlenecks as two lanes in each direction are funneled to one.

“This isn’t going to do much to improve traffic flow,” said Bill Imhoff, a Promenade property owner and Bayside District board member who was part of a coalition that filed suit back last winter to stop the project. The lawsuit was dropped in April after a judge signaled that he was prepared to rule against the plaintiffs.

City officials have said they plan to change much of the downtown traffic circulation patterns in coming years. Furthermore, city Community Development and Planning Director Suzanne Frick said there would be plenty of signs warning oncoming cars about potential congestion points.

Promenade changing

While all this construction is going on, the Promenade itself is changing, partially a victim of its own success. It has many of the best attributes of a retail center: lots of foot traffic and the beach and hotels within walking distance.

So it’s no surprise that rents have been rising, making it difficult for the small independent shops that once dominated the mall to survive. In the last five years, rents have in many cases doubled from $5 a square foot to $10. Yet those rates are still affordable for national chains battling high rents in New York and Beverly Hills.

Besides increasing rents, large retailers have forced developers to rebuild lease sizes to a typical 7,500 square feet, instead of the 1,000 to 2,000 square feet more often needed by smaller mom-and-pop shops, he said. And national chains can afford to retrofit those spaces, either to enhance the stores themselves or fix any seismic problems with the buildings, according to Rob York, partner at Fransen Co., a real estate development consulting firm working with the Bayside District Corp.

As a result, Third Street Promenade has been inundated with national chains like Banana Republic, Barnes & Noble and Gitano because they are the only retailers who can afford the $10 a foot rents.

Many of the original independents are being bumped off to the much lower-priced Fourth and Second streets a painful change but an obvious next step for the burgeoning retail center. P.F. Chang’s and Benihana, for instance, have recently opened restaurants on Fourth Street.

“Fourth Street has suffered for a very long time,” York said. “In the early days, when Third Street was getting all the attention, Fourth Street was slighted.”

But there’s uncertainty as to whether Fourth Street will even remotely follow Third Street’s path.

“It won’t happen,” said Matthew May, president and owner of May Realty Advisors in Los Angeles. Other cities that have successfully expanded their promenades to include additional streets, such as San Francisco’s Union Square, are more focused on walking than driving, he said.

Saving shops

Over the last two years, Bayside District and city officials have grappled with ways to preserve the remaining independent shops on the Promenade. Most of the focus has been on changing the zoning laws that until now have given most property owners carte blanche to lease space to anyone who is willing to pay the escalating rents.

“We’re not headed for a total doomsday scenario, but some adjustments will have to be made, either in zoning changes or other incentives if we want to retain a healthy mix of businesses on the Promenade,” said Rawson. “That mix is what gives the Promenade its special ambience.”

Success has also bred other problems: congestion, lack of parking, lack of security, increasing homeless and loud music.

Some landlords and developers have said the lack of local flavor detracts from what made Third Street Promenade so popular more than a decade ago after an extensive, city-funded revitalization project.

Parking is increasingly tight, with few additional structures built in the past few years. The city opened a 300-space lot at Wilshire Boulevard and Fourth Street earlier this month, but other parking options may not be ready in time for the completion of the road construction next spring.

More challenging than congestion has been the increasing numbers of homeless scouring the area and the limited security available. Even street artists have become a significant problem.

“As soon as people started coming, we saw the shopping carts and the singers and jugglers, and now it’s almost like stepping over people who do every act violins, guitars, balls, chainsaws, even a psychic cat,” said Rafael Padilla, senior vice president of Muselli Commercial Realtors in Santa Monica. “While I agree this is part of the appeal and attraction, there are far too many down there.”

However intractable these problems might be, the Third Street Promenade remains one of the L.A. region’s premier shopping and tourist destinations.

“Congestion, parking and a high level of competition for a limited supply of retail space are all problems related to being very successful,” York said. “These are problems that most cities would love to have.”