MAILBAG - July 19, 2007

Don’t make Main Street a mall

The editorial, “Make Main Street a mall,” July 12, reminds me of the old Monty Hall version of the TV show “Let’s Make A Deal” where either sidekicks Jay or Carol would display a large gaudily wrapped present that contestants could select as one of their choices.

You never knew what was in the box. More often than not, it was a clunker of a gift that was humorous, embarrassing, or of little intrinsic value.

The Independent seems all too willing to buy the packaging without examining the contents in its quixotic quest to transform our downtown area.

Main Street is not the same as Third Street in Santa Monica. Main Street is our major traffic artery through downtown Huntington Beach.

Closing it on a permanent basis would force huge amounts of traffic onto side streets (many of them residential) ill-equipped to handle it.

Not only traffic but parking on outlying streets would be affected. Residential quality of life would plummet regardless of the success or failure of the venture.

Parking and access for the pedestrian mall itself would be problematic at best. There are way too many negative impacts and unintended consequences to deal with at this time.

A more practical solution would be to continue giving Main Street a face-lift while improving conditions that would attract high quality tenants.

Certainly, cleanliness, traffic control, and parking would be high on the list.

We simply don’t know the impacts, good or bad, that the Strand will bring to the area. Much has not been figured out yet, and we cannot afford to act precipitously and jeopardize our downtown economy and residential quality of life on a pedestrian mall gamble until a clearer picture emerges.

Main Street should continue to serve its main purpose as a transportation corridor to Pacific Coast Highway.

Let’s not fall for the gaudy wrapping of something new that has the potential to embarrass us or worse.

TIM GEDDES

Don’t mess with Main Street’s success

The Independent’s editorial, “Make Main Street a Mall,” July 12, makes me wonder what has happened since I earned my journalism degree from Cal State L.A.

We were taught to write editorials using logic and reasoning and to make sure to back up our opinions with facts and statistics.

The Independent’s logic is that of a 5-year-old. They want it because they want it.

First, the paper makes the same assumption many who never ever visit downtown make. Because they don’t visit downtown, there must be something wrong with it.

Anyone who visits can see downtown Huntington Beach is thriving. There is no vacancy problem on Main Street. In fact the opposite is true: more businesses than ever are looking to locate downtown.

Why? Because they see the evidence of a booming downtown.

Tourists from all over the world flock here to experience firsthand the Surf City lifestyle. Residents from nearby cities, counties and states come in droves to escape the desert heat.

Residents from downtown neighborhoods flock downtown in the evenings and on the weekends, both on foot and on their bikes.

Pedestrians and bicyclists are enjoying Main Street, Pier Plaza and the beaches in record numbers.

Second, dozens of downtowns across the country are reeling from the social experiments of the past decades, when downtown pedestrian malls were created willy-nilly. Many of them are now being reopened after decades of downtown decline.

Main streets across the country would do anything to have a downtown as successful as ours.

As Alex Marshall writes in “How Cities Work,” an urban planning classic, “For every gentrified downtown and small town, there are a dozen dead urban districts, semi-abandoned downtowns, and lonesome small towns where Main Street is a collection of shuttered-up shop fronts.”

Let’s not mess with success by trying to cure an illness in a patient that’s not sick.

Our City Council has endorsed the go-slow approach to making downtown more pedestrian-friendly, championed by myself, the HB Downtown Business Improvement District, and city staff.

The success of Surf City Nights is proof that taking small but significant steps is working.

Finally, downtown merchants don’t seem to be afraid that the new developments soon to be in place will harm our historic Main Street and downtown. Like many others, I believe Main Street, where the funky old beach town vibe was born and which helped create the Surf City USA mystique, can more than hold its own.

JOE SHAW

Residents left without protection

Huntington Beach residents who are concerned, as I am, about flood risks and high cost mandatory flood insurance will be shocked to learn that the Coastal Commission’s staff folded at the last Parkside Estates hearing in May and did not even defend its own recommendation, which supported approval of a revised plan.

It is disgraceful that the Coastal Commission and its staff were duped so easily by local no-growth environmentalists who presented nothing new into the record.

The staff report addressed the “illegal fill” issues raised by the opponents of this plan — why didn’t the staff defend its report and its findings? Why wasn’t the staff asked to speak in defense of its staff report?

I am particularly upset because the California Coastal Act requires that the Commission protect people, as noted in Section 30253:

New development shall:

1) Minimize risks to life and property in areas of high … flood … hazard.

Note that protection of the public safety and property from flood is listed as No. 1, ahead of the other four considerations in this section.

By ignoring the staff report’s discussion of the phony “illegal fill” allegations made by the no-growthers, the commission stuck thousands of residents of Huntington Beach with another year at a minimum without the improved flood protections the Parkside project will bring.

It is every bit as likely that next year will be the 100-year flood year as it is that 2107 will be, and we’ll be facing it with no new protections in place.

And for what? To “protect” a farm field that has been a farm field for at least 50 years! There is no wetland on that field. All you have to do is look at it and you can see that — or better yet, look at all the studies Shea has done.

The Coastal Act doesn’t let the commission staff assume the role of Carnac the Magnificent and guess what will be there at some future date — decisions have to be made based on what is there today. In this case, the area can never be a natural wetland again because the surrounding development long ago cut off any natural water supply, and the tide gates have kept the tides out of the area for over a century. None of this will ever change.

The people of Huntington Beach want the commission to do its job to protect the coast, but also to recognize that an equally important part of its job is to approve developments that “minimize risks to life and property in areas of high flood hazard.”

JOHN HEALEY