by John Tawa
Thirty-five Manhattan Beach residents gathered at the Manhattan Heights Annex Tuesday night at a public meeting to help environmental planners identify issues to be addressed in the ongoing Environmental Impact Report for the joint Civic Center/Metlox site.
The EIR is expected to take four to six months. It will study the impacts of the city's proposed 57,000-square-foot public safety facility, as well four potential projects on the Metlox site: two 90,000-square-foot developments with a mix of retail, restaurant, office, lodging and public space, with underground parking; a 60,000-square foot project with on-grade parking; and an open space park alternative. The impacts of a library addition and a fully-leased H2O site (a development adjacent to the Metlox site) will also be studied. A no project alternative, which is standard, will be considered as well.
The 16 residents who spoke suggested studying crime, noise, trash, deliveries, water quality, storm drains and sewers as among the impacts of the project. Preserving view corridors, imposing a height limitation on the Metlox project consistent with the rest of downtown and studying the impact of a large public space also were issues raised during the two-hour meeting.
But the dominant concerns among the residents in attendance were traffic and parking, two issues already identified by the city and its EIR planners.
Many of the residents said that fall traffic counts already taken at intersections around the city would understate the impact of the Metlox project, because summer counts naturally would be much higher. However, traffic engineer Sam Ross said that the combination of historical data taken during summer months and the fall counts would allow the planners to extrapolate to approximate summer counts. Those numbers would be validated with actual summer counts taken in late July. If the numbers were not validated, additional public comment would be allowed before the EIR became final, Ross said.
Ross said that his company had identified 15 key intersections to be studied, but many residents felt that number was insufficient. Intersections south of the project and on the Rosecrans corridor were underrepresented, said Tucker Glavin.
Bill Eisen said that an eight-to-10-block area around the site needed to be analyzed for potential adverse impacts. Roger Cohn agreed, citing the large numbers of downtown employees who currently park on residential streets east of downtown.
David Wachtfogel explained that the economic impact of the Metlox project was a component that needed study.
"How many persons per day will it take to make the project viable?" he wondered. And if the project were moderately successful or stunningly successful, how many more people would it attract?
The public has until Jan. 21 to submit comments on the scope of the EIR. Send them to Bobby Ray in the Community Development Department, 1400 Highland Avenue in Manhattan Beach. Once the public comment period closes, the city and planners will meet to assess the scope of the EIR. ER