Santa Monica Pier Renewal to Retain ‘Funky’ Character

Lee Slotsky lifted his 10-month-old daughter, Danielle, to his shoulder and nodded at the ornate horses twirling around the merry-go-round Sunday in the carrousel building at the Santa Monica Pier.

“Look how beautiful they are,” Slotsky said. “Every one of those horses is handmade. I’ve been coming here for 25, 30 years and, even when the place was closed, I’d rub the stuff off the windows and look inside. I’ve got a lot of memories from this place, and my kid will have the same memories I have.”

Santa Monica city officials are hoping Danielle will, indeed, be able to share her father’s memories. A $12-million project aimed at rebuilding the historic but decaying pier began last week, when a crane was moved into place to help reinforce the end section of the wooden structure, weakened in the fierce winter storms of 1983.

Work to replace about 45,000 square feet of the southeast part of the pier will begin in October or November, and another 400 linear feet of seaward pier ripped away in the same bad weather will be replaced late next year.

In addition, city and state officials Friday cut the ribbon to officially open Carrousel Park, a $1.3-million playground of pavilions, ramps, walks, merry-go- rounds and landscaping connecting Ocean Front Walk to the pier.

The park, the first major improvement to the pier since it was built in 1911, was developed to draw more parents and children, Pier Manager Judith Meister said.

“Hopefully, it will create sort of a family atmosphere,” she said. “In the past there hasn’t been a lot for children to do.”

The city hopes state and federal agencies will pick up most of the estimated $12-million tab to restore the attraction. The Santa Monica Pier Restoration Corp., a nonprofit group, was set up to oversee the project.

The goal is to dress up and expand the gift shops, food stands, arcades, carnival booths and restaurants on the pier, which on clear days affords a sweeping view of Santa Monica Bay from Malibu to the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

Fisherman’s, a Seattle-based restaurant chain, will move into the abandoned Moby’s Dock restaurant at the ocean end of the pier this fall and city officials are looking for someone to take over Sinbad’s, a large red-brick building and reopen it as a theater, restaurant or cabaret.

But Meister said the idea is not to clean the place up too much. Nor does the city want to entice expensive shops and restaurants.

Instead, Meister envisions a place where people with low and moderate incomes can take their children without blowing the weekly paycheck. She likes the pushcart vendors selling ice cream and tacos, and the spontaneity of “Zero Gravity,” a group of young men who engage in a form of stand-up break dancing which member Steve Daniels calls “pop-locking.”

“We don’t necessarily want to change the character of the pier so much as we want to give the people more choices of things to do,” Meister said. “We want to make this a pleasure pier. The Santa Monica Pier is funky, and we want to keep it funky.”

Despite the gradual decay and storm damage, more than 3 million people trample the sand and walk the pier every year, Meister said.

City officials are hoping it will someday resemble the way things were in the glory years of the 1920s, 30s and 40s, when the pier was one of the most fashionable and festive gathering spots in Los Angeles.

But it’s already more than satisfactory to Derrick McClendon, who said he visits every two weeks with his wife, Janice, and daughters, Lakretia, 7, and Sonora, 8 months.

“This is really nice for the kids,” he said while gazing over Carrousel Park, only mildly discouraged that problems with an electric generator had put several of the rides out of commission.

“I like it here,” he said. “I’ll be back.”