40-Story Complex OKd for Downtown ‘Stack’ Area
A new downtown Los Angeles high-rise that would contain offices, a hotel, condominiums and shops under a single roof received the approval Wednesday of the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency.
Known as Gateway Center, the 40-story, $160-million complex will go up at Figueroa and Temple streets, in the southeast quadrant of the Hollywood-Harbor Freeway interchange--downtown’s famed “stack.” The developer said work will start on the project, which will include a 1,210-car parking garage adjacent to the Harbor Freeway, next February.
Redevelopment agency planners, in recommending approval of the complex’s design drawings, said the structure will serve as a distinctive downtown landmark. Donald Spivack, chief of the agency’s central business district redevelopment area, noted that the proposed tower represents a major investment in a part of the business district--the northwestern portion--that “has not had a lot of private attention.”
Predicting that Gateway Center will have a major impact on future development in the central business district, Spivack said it represents a drastic departure in mixed-use development because the structure’s various components will be “stacked one on top of the other.”
When completed, Spivack said, the complex will have a daytime population of about 2,500 people--workers, hotel guests and residents. It is expected to generate 1,200 traffic trips during rush hours--an impact that he said is “within acceptable limits for that part of downtown.”
Under the redevelopment agency-approved design, the building’s 40 stories will be housed in a “crystal-like” spire, with the first 21 stories devoted to office space. Above the offices will be a full floor of restaurants and meeting rooms and 11 stories for 220 luxury hotel rooms and, above that, six floors of condominiums. In addition, there will be retail space on the ground floor.
In all, the tower will have 1.1 million square feet of mixed-use space, making it comparable in size to Crocker Center in downtown’s Bunker Hill redevelopment area.
Gateway Center is being designed by Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa. The Los Angeles project is his first in the United States.
Kurokawa, in a statement released by the developers, said he conceived of the center “as an image of brilliant crystal dramatizing the Los Angeles skyline with a silhouette that changes as the sunlight moves across the building.”
The complex will be surrounded by Japanese-style gardens, including reflecting pools and other Asian landscaping. There also will be a 9,000-square-foot athletic club near the hotel entry.
Jack Naiman, president of The Naiman Co. of San Diego, one of the developers, said the idea of the project is to “attract the most successful companies--those that appreciate and protect the value of their human resources.”
Joining Naiman in developing the center are Aoki Corp. of Japan and TSA International Ltd. of Hawaii.
At 40 stories, the tower will fall far short of Los Angeles’ tallest building--downtown’s 62-story First Interstate Bank Building. Although the name of the new structure is similar, it is not to be confused with Los Angeles Gateway, proposed for a narrow strip of downtown land owned by Caltrans on the west side of the Harbor Freeway. Though plans were first announced nearly two years ago, construction has not started on that project.
