Torrance Beach Neighbors Raise Voices Against Noise

Residents who live near the Torrance Beach parking lot say it happens every summer.

On warm Friday and Saturday nights, the sigh of breaking waves on a sandy shore is interrupted by the blare of car stereos, the crash of breaking bottles and the laughter of teen-agers hanging around the parking lot.

“Kids use the parking lot for a play area and a meeting area and they play excessively loud music,” said Virginia Jones, who has lived across the street from the lot for 25 years. “It even jars the windows and the doors, the music is so loud.”

Loitering After School

Torrance police patrol the lot, but neighbors say that has not eliminated the problem, which sometimes includes noise and loitering after school.

Several residents are so upset about the noise that they have asked the city of Torrance to take over the lot, which is operated by the Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors. The county provides maintenance and staffs the entrance from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Police responding to complaints about noise and loitering usually warn the youngsters and send them home, said Torrance Police Sgt. Ron Traber. If police find someone drinking, they will make an arrest or order the person to dispose of the alcohol, he said.

“The attitude of the individual and conduct dictate to the officer what action to take,” Traber said.

Next month, the City Council will discuss problems at the lot, which runs alongside Paseo de la Playa between Paseo de la Concha and Paseo de Suenos.

Torrance City Manager LeRoy Jackson said he will recommend that the city not seek responsibility for the parking lot, saying there is little else the city can do to address the problems of noise and loitering.

Jones, president of the Torrance Beach Homeowners Assn., said her group will meet early next month to discuss what solutions it will recommend to the council. She said she has no preference on who operates the lot.

She suggests that the county increase staffing or close the lot after school when teen-agers tend to loiter there.

Jones said the problem has existed for several years and that she has made several complaints to Torrance police and city officials.

Racing in Lot

She said she has seen youngsters race cars up and down the parking lot and nearby streets. She said she has seen some teen-agers defacing walls and verbally abusing elderly residents.

“It’s a beautiful area and it’s for the public,” she said. “We just want to straighten these things out.”

Chris Klinger, deputy director of the Department of Beaches and Harbors, said the county installed a heavy steel-pipe swing gate in August to keep teen-agers out of the lot at night. The lot previously had a wooden gate that youngsters often broke to get past, he said.

The county contracts with a company to staff the lot, where visitors pay $4 to park all day. The lot closes at 8 p.m., and the metal gate is locked.

However, the gate has not eliminated the problem, Klinger said. Cars often remain in the lot after the gate is locked and people continue to gather there late into the night, he said. Cars can exit over metal spikes in the pavement that prevent cars from entering.

“We’ve been doing the best we can,” Klinger said. “We are working closely with the Police Department. . . . “

Traber said most of the complaints about the parking lot are received during the summer. It is not uncommon for a patrol car to be summoned to the lot two or three times in one night, he said.

Those responsible for the problems are teen-agers and young adults in their early 20s, most of whom live in Redondo Beach and Torrance and on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, Traber said.

Intermittent Problem

“They make a little noise, do a little dope and it’s disruptive,” he said, but the problem is intermittent.

“It’s not as bad as you would think,” he said, “but I still sympathize with the people who live there.”

The noise and loitering on the lot is “crazy” on the weekends, according to Luis Gonzalez, 19, a Torrance resident and avid surfer, who blames much of the activity on local high school kids who have nothing better to do on weekends.

Still, Gonzalez complains that the Torrance police have been heavy-handed in regulating the parking lot. “They harass us for nothing,” he said.

Keiko Traynor, who has lived across the street from the parking lot since she moved from Maryland three years ago, said she was awakened at 3 a.m. recently by loud music coming from a car in the lot.

Traynor, who said she has never complained to the police, said she doesn’t mind the noise during the day, but “not all the time.”

Norman Kuska, who has lived across from the lot for more than 25 years, said he knows his neighbors have complained, but he thinks the noise is “par for the course.”

“It doesn’t bother me like it bothers other people,” he said. “But I think that they have to keep it under control because it can get out of control.”