Retail of Two Cities : Glendale, Westwood Want to Bring the Shoppers Back

High-profile shopping districts in Glendale and Westwood are in dire need of rejuvenation, and the cooperation of private developers is key to their revival.

Despite its prime location near the Glendale Galleria, more than a third of the store locations along a prime part of Brand Boulevard were vacant. Brand is one of the city’s main arteries.

To help revive the street, construction crews this month began work on Glendale Marketplace, a downtown shopping and theater complex with a $50-million price tag.

About $34 million of those costs will be covered by a development team headed by the Beverly Hills-based Regent Properties. The other $16 million is a subsidy from the Glendale Redevelopment Agency.

The two-story, 160,000-square-foot project, scheduled for completion in March 1998, is being erected on Brand at Broadway.

Regent signed up for the project after the city agreed to help finance it. The city agreed to build a new parking structure and to pay land acquisition costs and the relocation expenses of the tenants.

“This is the quintessential public-private partnership,” said Douglas Brown, a partner at Regent Properties. “This blighted area will be converted to a bright new urban village.”

The project will include restaurants, kiosks and shops. It will be anchored by a multimedia site that combines a Good Guys consumer electronics shop, a Tower Records, an Old Navy clothing shop, a Linens ‘n Things store and a four-screen Mann Theaters complex.

Movie theaters have been one of the obstacles to a deal designed to revitalize Westwood Village.

For decades, Westwood was a thriving retail and restaurant district known for movie premieres. In the late ‘80s, a gang-related shooting and other crime scared off many shoppers and moviegoers. The recession of the early 1990s was an additional blow.

To help revive the area, developer Ira Smedra in February 1996, proposed building a $100-million project that would feature a 16 movie-screen theater.

His three-story Village Center Westwood project would be topped with towers and domes and house shops and restaurants. It would be built on a five-acre site owned by Smedra that is bounded by Glendon and Weyburn avenues.

Some neighborhood groups believe that the 4,700 theater seats envisioned in the proposal would draw too much traffic to the area. The complex would raise Westwood’s total theater seating level to more than 10,000--far above city limits of 6,000 seats.

Responding to those concerns and to the suggestions of a community panel convened by Councilman Michael Feuer, Smedra is drawing up alternative plans. But for the project to go forward, he would probably still need the city to lift its seating cap.

Feuer won’t take a position until a community panel studies Smedra’s revised proposals.

Some Westwood Village merchants support Smedra’s efforts.

And Macy’s, the biggest retailer in Westwood, is hoping that Smedra and the city of Los Angeles will reach an agreement.

Sales at the department store, situated on Weyburn, have been lackluster, and there have been rumors that Macy’s wants to sell the site.

“At this point in time, it is our intention to stay,” said Michael Steinberg, chief of Macy’s West, the San Francisco-based division that manages the company’s western stores. “We would like to be part of a revitalized Westwood Village.”

George White can be reached via e-mail at george.white@latimes.com