Visionary word pictures of the futuristic Ivy Station Project, as sketched by leaders of the Lowe Enterprises real estate development team, sometimes took on a fairy-tale sheen last evening in Council Chambers.
Unlike tradition, however, these fairy tales came to long, long awaited life around midnight.
The five-member City Council vigorously voted unanimously to approve what will be a massive remake of Downtown, surrounding the Expo light rail station, as Culver City warms up for the September launch of its centennial year.
While established neighbors in the adjacent Arts District wrung their hands and tongues over feared daily street traffic explosions, the Lowe people accented adjustments such as a 12-foot widening of National Boulevard and a muscular emphasis on bicycling and lighter forms of moving from one area to another.
TOD, a transit-oriented-district, is a phrase that long has hung on the perimeter of this project, and is about to become as widely used as, oh, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.
How fitting that in the year of Culver City’s 100th birthday, the farthest reaching facelift in modern times, finally, finally seems ready to transfer from the minds of smart people into reality.
Fifteen years, 5,475 days in the making — cerebrally plotted since well before the 20th century morphed into the 21st.
Three buildings of note –
- A 148-room hotel.
- 200 “residential dwelling units.”
- A giant 58,000 square foot mixed use building that will house badly needed retail businesses and still more restaurants.
- Buildings of maximally varying heights for aesthetic purposes.
- Developers only will consume 47 percent of the allotted space, the balance being open, the first commandment of contemporary architecture.
How anxious are city leaders? Already there have been several groundbreakings, but without any buildings being built or any dreams being fulfilled.
The City Council’s old-fashioned green light clears what historically seemed like hopelessly cluttered lanes to fulfillment of the dreams of brilliant dreamers. Now they have lived to see fruition materialize although there have been so many delays they have learned to harness their hopes.
An architect from Lowe Enterprises sounded one of the evening’s dominant themes – irresistibly appealing open space in the sprawling makeover that will encircle the train station and spill over into historic Downtown. “This is about space between buildings that will let in natural light, natural ventilation,” he said. “The Great Lawn will feature 10,000 square feet of open space.”
Promoting the twin heavyweight access themes of walking to work and choosing alternative forms of transportation – think bicycle – those who think future rather than tradition were crowned the evening’s winners.
Meanwhile…
The controversy over how open parking should be in the crucial 10700 block of Farragut Drive will continue. In a 4-1 vote over Meghan Sahli-Wells’s vehement dissent, the Council approved funding of a $35,000 parking study to determine the degree of parking intrusion into the neighborhood.
