Heart of the City needs resuscitation
AES sponsored a series of movies in Seaside Lagoon this summer. Tony Chavez AES Redondo Beach plant manager said, “AES Redondo Beach is excited to offer the community an opportunity to spend a wonderful evening enjoying the beautiful downtown Redondo Beach area.”
If only it were true. Not the part about the movies, they ran four times between July 23 and August 13. By all accounts, they were, in fact, “wonderful evenings.”
The part I wish was true was the part about “beautiful downtown Redondo Beach.” A downtown area creates the pulse of a city or town. Who hasn’t gone to an unfamiliar city and asked a stranger how to get downtown? Even without knowing much about a place, we assume it has a downtown. Most of the time, we’re right.
In a very real sense, a downtown is a city’s heart. Redondo Beach has no downtown and as much as it pains me to say it, no heart. That isn’t to say the people, their compassion, intelligence; talents and other qualities don’t give the city heart. It just doesn’t have a geographic heart and for me that’s a big problem because it deserves one.
You’ll often hear people talk about a place having a “small town feel.” That term usually refers to people being open and friendly to their neighbors. They see each other in public places and add new segments to conversations that seem to have been going on for decades. They talk about their kids and ask about where they’re going to college or when they’re getting out of the service.
This all happens in Redondo, but it seems to happen with less frequency and predictability than in other places. Right next door in Hermosa you’ll find it happening on Pier Avenue, Pier Plaza and Hermosa Avenue. Manhattan Beach even has signs to tell visitors they’re downtown but they probably know it before they see the signs.
Students of local history know Redondo had a thriving downtown before the 1960s “urban renewal” craze replaced it with apartment complexes and condominiums. Redondo Beach’s downtown was in the perfect location, right next to the harbor. It’s worth a visit to the Historical Society to check out photos of the Plunge, the Fox Theater and the nearby Hotel Redondo.
We have Riviera Village and the Artesia Corridor but neither of those places feels like downtown to me. Part of the problem stems from the unusual shape of the city. It’s kind of like a 50s pin up girl with a bulbous portion at the top and another at the bottom and a skinny waist in the middle. If we were to create a new downtown logic might dictate that we place it right at the waist, somewhere near the Performing Arts Center.
Forget logic. I think they got it right the first time. I’d like to see our new downtown built near the old one, right beside the harbor. I’d like to see a reliable shuttle system running between the new downtown and neighborhoods throughout the South Bay. We could leave our cars at home when we go downtown.
We actually have an opportunity to begin rebuilding Redondo’s downtown right beside the harbor where Chavez said it was this summer. Ballot measure G would enable new development that could be combined with a planned transformation of what’s already there to create whatever the citizens of Redondo Beach believe would best suit their needs.
Here’s a simple fact the opponents of Measure G would prefer the voters in Redondo Beach don’t understand. Regardless of the variety of uses stated in the zoning document, such as timeshares and commercial, there won’t be one nail driven or one yard of concrete poured without the approval of the citizens of Redondo Beach.
Approval of Measure G does not begin a process that will end with three-story timeshares being built in the harbor. It begins an exciting process through which the community can begin planning and deciding what it wants to do with the harbor. No one will come to swindle us out of our land. The only people who will have the ability to ruin our community are its citizens and we simply won’t let that happen.
I want us all to begin planning King Harbor’s next incarnation but I’m afraid if the tiny bit of forward progress that Measure G represents doesn’t happen now, the dream of taking the bus to downtown Redondo Beach will remain just that, a dream.
Comment on this or any other King Harbor topic at www.kingharborboater.com click on the “blog” link. Harry Munns is a Redondo Beach Harbor Commissioner. ER