Main Street problems? See for yourself

My wife and I went down to Main Street one Sunday afternoon. When we

first got there I met one of the merchants who was complaining about

how filthy our Downtown was. I was kidding him that he must be

exaggerating.

We took off to inspect all of Main Street from the third block to

Pacific Coast Highway. What a filthy sight -- trash in the street and

all over the sidewalks, cigarette butts by the hundreds in front of

Starbucks and the Sugar Shack Cafe, sidewalks that look like they

haven’t been cleaned for ages and trash in the shrubberies. What a

shame that this great city can’t find a way to keep our downtown

clean.

You go to Laguna Beach, Dana Point, San Juan Capistrano, Seal

Beach and so on and they all make our downtown look like the worst

kept Downtown of all.

Somebody from the city has to take some action with the merchants

about this problem. Most people that I talk to Downtown mention that

they have given up on trying to get this handled.

You go to In-N-Out on Beach Boulevard and its property is

spotless. Why can’t the merchants help with the clean-up in front of

their own businesses?

We have these gorgeous resorts and not four blocks away we have

this downtown that looks awful.

So many residents have told me that they won’t go down to Downtown

because of this and other problems.

Also when are we going to close Main Street to cars? How

disgusting to be eating on the sidewalk and sucking exhaust fumes in

with your food. That Sunday there were motorcycles revving their

engines all the way down the second block and into the third block.

The merchants are under the wrong impression if they think that

this scenario is appealing to visitors. Put up barricades at the

start of the second block and at the north end of the third block and

let’s make this a pedestrian walkway for a pilot period. Everybody is

making this such a big deal that nobody wants to take the ball and

run with it. I’m sure the police chief and the fire chief can figure

out the traffic flow. They did it for the car show this weekend so

why can’t it be done for the pedestrian walk.

Just think about the possibilities that could happen if the cars

were banned. For one, how about more seating area for the outside

diners? Moving them off the sidewalk and toward the middle of the

street would free up the sidewalks so the pedestrians would buy more

products from the merchants that are worried about the street being

closed. Walkers will buy more products than drivers that just are

cruising. This makes so much sense that I cannot believe it is not

being handled.

Also maybe Councilman Dave Sullivan is right. We certainly didn’t

see many families down there. Just all the rough looking people you

can imagine. Not a very good image for the city.

We were there for about a hour and did not see one police officer

walking the street.

* BILL DEMAREST is a Huntington Beach resident. To contribute to

“Sounding Off” e-mail us at hbindy@latimes.com or fax us at (714)

965-7174.