Once Nameless Strip Is Hermosa Valley Greenbelt

After a flood of suggestions and a flurry of debate--Is it a parkway or a greenbelt or just green?--the Hermosa Beach City Council has officially named the long anonymous, woodsy strip bisecting the city.

From now on, the 20-acre pathway will be known as the “Hermosa Valley Greenbelt”--an amalgam drawn from a list of 81 names solicited from the community.

“I don’t like it at all,” groused outgoing Mayor June Williams, who wanted to call the path a “parkway.”

“Every time I think of the word greenbelt , I think of the money it cost to buy the thing--7 1/2 million green ones.”

But Williams was outvoted 4-1 by those who shared Councilwoman Etta Simpson’s view that “parkway” sounded more like a roadway than a park.

There were choices aplenty, including the ambitious (“World Peace Park”), the metaphysical (“Wave Length Greens”) and the downright slick (“Fast Lane of the Hip Strip”).

One respondent wanted “Jack Woods Walk,” for a former mayor. Another suggested the breezy “Free Style Aisle.” Another liked the whimsical yet sensitive “Feeling Green.” From the jogging contingent came “Funrun.”

But debate has long been part of the verdant pathway’s tradition. Formerly owned by the Santa Fe Railway, the land is being sold to the city for $7.5 million. From the outset, the transaction has been fraught with controversy, including questions about whether the land would remain undeveloped, complaints about the price and concerns about the practice of allowing unleashed dogs to play there.

Several of the suggested names--”Choo Choo Park,” for example--referred to the path’s history as a railroad right of way. One money-conscious resident wanted to name it the “Greenback.”

But not one noted the dog leash issue, which was settled earlier this month with a municipal vote to enforce the city leash laws there.

“There were some off-the-wall comments” as parks commissioners compiled the list, said Community Resources Director Alana Mastrian-Handman. “Some thought we should name it ‘Doo-Doo Parkway,’ something like that.”

But in the end, the only reference to pets was to the kind rarely seen on the path: One recommendation was to name it “Galloping Way.”