After seeing the activity going on about more money to build rail cars in L.A. , I saw an item on Jose Huizar, my CM for CD-14 on a project for rebuilding downtown. I don't think I ever gave much attention to the idea as downtown has changed enourmously since the 60's that I remember it from and even still holding on in the 70's. The development of local shopping malls was what I think started the trend to take away retail business from downtown that began the slide downward. Well, CM Huizar's plan is not totally created in a vacuum, since there's that thing that when tax dollars are at work, SOMEBODY is making money- or will be- other than the intented purposes of a project.
Downtown looks like some parking and theatre issues are mixing to put Huizar in a position of acting for the benefit of the special interests. I read Zuma Dogg's Blog - whether you like him or not, he's constantly coming up with issues that have a ring of truth in them- this item was about some dissatisfied members of the public and a recall-Huizar orientation: the posting from Saturday, May 23, 2009: "A Letter About LA City's Broadway Trolley Project From "RECALL JOSE HUIZAR" Campaign: (Not to be confused with Recall Monica Garcia Campaign),"
http://ladailyblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/letter-about-la-citys-broadway-trolley.html
The idea is that Huizar is doing work to benefit a single interest that is out of line with the real desire and intent of the areas businesses. He appears to be planning a large parking structure to be built downtown that will mainly help one special interest. His work overall in the downtown project will work to squeeze out the current assortment of merchants that populate the storefronts of more notable predessor tenants who sold shoes, shirts, suits, and all the things that made people come to downtown for their shopping in days of old.
The new shopkeepers are usually small scale and often immigrants from Latina American countries, mainly Mexico. These folks will be left out of the big picture and whether it's good or bad for them or the overall public is a separate questions.
The other item that I finally am getting to is the Downtown Trolley. I first thought this was the bus dressed up like a trolley that is no big deal to do, but it looks like it's a full scale installation with rails and the whole to-do. That's not cheap and that's another pipe dream in my opinion if CM Huizar thinks this will be the key to revival of Downtown. Maybe it's San Diego that he's using a model, but you can't really use any city for a model since things never quite match here in Los Angeles, no matter how hard you try to press the puzzle piece in to fit.
Here's some history that I will have to come back to, but it's old in origing- back in 2008 in the L.A. Times in the Bottleneck blog focusing on traffic issues, where some comments are attached. Streetcar may get some funding in L.A.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/bottleneck/2008/09/looks-like-the.html
It's $5 Million and there's more- it's the CRA involved. All bad signs.
I will get back to this later, but this is just a start on what's going downhill for L.A. and who is doing it.
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