Renewal Threatens 3 Torrance Landmarks
Customers of the ancient Newberry’s in old downtown Torrance have been sifting the shelves for bargains with added intensity in recent days, aware that the store soon could be a memory.
Up the street at the Torrance Community Theatre, stunned stagehands and actors try to make sense of the news that their performing space also may be gone.
And at the Torrance Supermarket, where the cashiers still know everyone’s name, shoppers grumble about the disruptions that may upset their quiet lives.
The three downtown landmarks are among more than a dozen buildings that might soon be shattered by a wrecking ball.
A $35-million, four-acre redevelopment plan announced last month by a local developer and a major property owner calls for pumping life back into the flagging downtown economy by replacing a number of retail buildings with 175 condominiums.
The project also calls for replacing a dilapidated downtown residential hotel with more than 25,000 square feet of retail space.
The developers, who have not yet filed formal plans with the city, say they want to spend several weeks listening to community reaction before they do so. Once the plans are filed, approval could take six months, with groundbreaking coming six months after that.
Although greeted warmly last month by City Council members and planners as a solid step toward revitalizing downtown’s economy, the residents, merchants and customers of downtown are reacting to the plans with a mixture of anger and resignation.
“I like this place because it’s a little downtown neighborhood where people are friendly and everybody knows everybody,” said Linda Stokoe, who owns Linda’s World, a small crafts shop on Cravens Avenue scheduled for demolition.
Rather than trying to relocate--something Stokoe said would be impossible at her current monthly rent of 45 cents per square foot--Stokoe said she will retire early and leave the South Bay.
“This kind of a project they’re talking about, it’s going to ruin the atmosphere in downtown Torrance,” she said. “I don’t blame them for wanting to make money off their property, but the original idea of redevelopment was that they would fix this up as a downtown area. . . . If you take out these buildings and put in condos, you’re taking out all the memories, all that’s good about downtown.”
John Geyer, owner of MCB Paint and Decorating Center on Marcelina Avenue, put it even more strongly.
“If you put a residential building in the heart of the commercial area, eventually you will kill downtown Torrance,” he said, adding that he intends to launch a campaign against the plan.
But the project’s backers, Gascon Mar Ltd. of San Diego and Sam Levy Investments of Torrance, say the idea behind the project is sound.
“If you go back to the original plans developed for the downtown area, you’ll see that it was always intended to be residential mixed with commercial,” said Allan Mackenzie, a partner with Gascon Mar.
“We have absolutely no intention of demolishing the commercial heart of downtown. We would be killing the goose that lays the golden egg.”
Instead, he said, the three-site project would enhance retail activity in the area that makes up downtown’s true commercial heart while providing sorely needed affordable housing.
Plans calls for refurbishing the historic facade of the Newberry’s store on El Prado and Sartori Avenue while removing the rear of the building to provide more parking. The site then would be divided into space for several smaller retail tenants.
Nearby, the El Roitan/1920 residential hotel and two adjacent city-owned parking lots, which form a crescent-shaped parcel at Cabrillo Avenue and Torrance Boulevard, would make way for a 100-unit condominium complex and 25,000 square feet of new retail space. Units in the complex would cost from $130,000 to $230,000.
Mackenzie said Gascon Mar would build the Torrance Community Theatre a new space in that area to replace the old movie house that it now calls home. The theater company would be responsible for turning the structure into a theater.
The third site, an L-shaped parcel to be created at El Prado and Cravens Avenue, is where most demolition will take place. Occupants now include the market and the theater, a used book store, a Salvation Army thrift shop, a coffee shop, and several offices--all of which would be gone.
They would be replaced by three-story condominium buildings with a total of 75 units costing from $175,000 to $275,000. Mackenzie said the design would blend with existing downtown buildings.
The architectural style would include abundant use of arches, trellises, setbacks, lofts, decks, balconies and curved windows, Mackenzie said. “We don’t want to do something like the Coleman Court building across the street, which is a flat street wall 40 feet high. That is very specifically something we want to avoid.”
Medians uprooted by tree roots along El Prado and Sartori Avenue would be eliminated, Mackenzie said, to allow a return to parallel parking in the area.
As part of their effort to win over downtown’s merchants, residents and customers, the developers plan to open an information center in the next month near one of the project sites.
“We welcome everyone’s comments, and we’re trying to incorporate all kinds of ideas because it’s not going to work if the community doesn’t like it,” Mackenzie said. “Once people understand the project . . . they feel much better about it.”
Volunteers at the community theater say they are investigating how to have their old movie house designated a historic monument. But they hold little hope of success.
“We are going to do what we can, but I think ultimately we are going to have to leave,” said George Adams, who has been everything from director to producer to actor with the group. “I’m depressed about it.”
Joel McCloud, president of the Downtown Torrance Merchants Assn., said he is coming to grips with his remaining qualms about the proposal.
“We need changes downtown, and I respect what they’re trying to do,” said McCloud, who operates a real estate acquisition firm. “If you had an ideal world, it would be great to keep the commercial down here just where it is . . . but it’s awkward to bring enough traffic in here to really justify better retail-type tenancy down here . . . without creating the additional residential space.”
Longtime customers of the area, however, said they doubt they will ever get used to the idea.
“It’s terrible. I think it should stay just like it is,” said James Mouton, 68, who stops by the Salvation Army thrift store on El Prado several times a week. “They want to make a human jungle out of it. All they’re thinking about is the all-mighty dollar, the long green.”
Most said they fear the project will destroy the area’s old-time atmosphere.
“I like it in here. It’s old-fashioned and it just invites you to wander around,” said Wilhelmina Routh as she searched for bargains at the Newberry’s store. “It reminds me of the East, where we had little five-and-dimes where we could find special things. You don’t have that anywhere else around here.”
