South Bay : DRIVE-OUT

The South Bay’s only remaining drive-in movie theatre, the Vermont Drive-In, may be replaced by an 18-screen indoor movie complex. Pacific Theatres has unveiled plans for the complex, which officials say could open as early as summer of 1997.

Citing the location near two freeways, the Harbor and the San Diego, Chan Wood of Pacific Theatres Corp. said, “There is a major demand for more movie theatres in that area.”

Residents of the surrounding neighborhood, however, have expressed a different view. Some feel it would be a hangout for truants from Gardena High School, located across the street. Aileen Araki, who lives nearby, said, “I know Gardena would love to have a theatre, but 18 is just to many.”

The Vermont Drive-in, on Vermont Avenue near Artesia Boulevard in Gardena, was built in the mid-1940s.