City Council Sends Town Square Back for Redesign

By Gene Williams
Lookout Staff

June 20, 2011 -- In what seemed like a replay of the previous week’s Planning Commission meeting, the City Council said last week that designs for Town Square have gone off track in a misguided move toward historic preservation.

By unanimous vote, the council on Tuesday directed City staff and designers to revise the plans for the one-acre park project, which seeks to transform City Hall’s front yard into a community gathering place.

“I think it’s a lost opportunity if we proceed with this current design,” Councilmember Pam O’Connor said, adding that the current design is “pretty dull.”

Council’s action also directed staff to continue with plans and building documents for the project’s big sister, the Palisades Garden Walk – a six acre park across the street from City Hall on the former RAND site.

Although the Garden Walk is the larger of the twin projects, it garnered less comment and almost no criticism Tuesday, as councilmembers and citizens seemed generally pleased with its direction.

Instead, the discussion focused on disappointment with Town Square.

The project sparked controversy this month following a May Landmarks Commission decision, which placed a number of site elements off-limits to redevelopment.

Although, councilmembers did not comment directly on the commission’s recent action – following advice they were given by the City Attorney – it was clear that they thought project designs were better before the commission intervened.

Councilmember Terry O’Day commented with a blend of diplomacy and candor. After praising the commission, he went on to express his dismay over the recent changes.

“Unfortunately, the changes that occurred recently in that Town Square area felt to me like we lost that space,” O’Day said. “We lost the use of it.”

Members of the public were less guarded in their criticism.

“It got compromised,” Genise Schnitman said. “It had shackles placed on it by an overly heavy-handed, injudicious and not well discerning notion of preservation.”

Even the Town Square’s designer, James Corner, was less than enthusiastic about the latest drawings.

When asked by Mayor Richard Bloom for an opinion, the internationally recognized landscape architect replied that the design is “competent” and “good” but “not great.”

“It’s not fresh. It’s maybe too open. It’s not too well linked to the park on the other side,” Corner said.

“It’s maybe not as progressive as another group in Santa Monica would aspire to be,” he said.

Corner asked for the council’s direction about how to proceed. Councilmember Gleam Davis sought to give him that direction.

“We didn’t go through this to get a competent design,” Davis said. “We went through this to get a spectacular design.”

Historic preservation should not be the project’s primary goal, Davis said.

“We don’t have to be so honoring of the past that we, sort of, wrap ourselves up in Saran Wrap and say this is how it’s going to be forever,” said Davis – who earlier commented that preserving “half-dead palms” is not the best way “to honor” City Hall.

Earlier, Landmarks Commissioner Nina Fresco said the commission was simply trying to give the designer information he needed to do his job.

Fresco explained the events that led to the current designs.

In December “it became clear to us that the design team did not have the tools it needed to be responsive to the historic landscape of City Hall and its character defining elements,” Fresco said.

“We were able, by doing a supplemental determination, to provide the design team with these tools which led to the approval of the design that is before you tonight,” she said.

Although City Hall and its surrounding grounds have been under landmark protection since 1979, the landmark documents didn’t spell out which features on the grounds are worthy of protection.

Landmarks commissioners became aware of the omission late last year and called for a study.

Subsequently, the commission marked a number of features to be set aside for preservation – including City Hall’s lawn, rose garden, the cement pathway leading to its front steps, its rectangular planting beds and the site’s overall symmetrical layout.

That sent Corner back to the drawing board in May to make some hasty revisions.

During his slide presentation, Corner showed how the project evolved through four different design iterations.

The first design showed a central concrete plaza flanked by trees at opposite sides. A rectangular water feature running through the center and a cable trellis overhead connected the site to the Garden Walk across the street.

After months of meetings with the public and various boards and commissions, the next two iterations softened the design to include more greenery and less trellis.

Then, following a meeting with the Landmarks Commission in May, the design took a sharp turn toward preservation.

Corner showed how his latest design iteration fits neatly over the existing site plan, preserving its geometric layout and many of its elements – including a portion of the lawn and the central rose garden, which is now framed inside the water feature.

Critics complain the plan subverted months of public dialog that went into earlier visions of the project.

“It’s lost trees. It’s lost elements that would take it out of the ordinary into the extraordinary,” said Parks Commissioner Richard McKinnon. “And it’s lost the power of the imagination that brought us all to the point of support.”

The project will reappear before the Architectural Review Board and Landmarks Commission in the months ahead, but the City Council will have the final say.

Councilmembers agreed that it is important to respect City Hall’s historic character, but said that what’s on the site now doesn’t work as a public gathering place.

“The only people I can remember seeing hanging out in front of City Hall recently were angry taxi drivers,” Councilmember Kevin McKeown said, apparently referring to protests against City-imposed limits on taxi franchises.

Tuesday’s council discussion came less than one week after the Planning Commission expressed similar dismay with the Town Square designs. ("Planning Commission Unhappy With Changes to Town Square Project," June 10, 2011)