Irvine Firm to Design NoHo Arts District

An Irvine-based company has signed a contract with the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency to develop a streetscape design plan for the NoHo Arts District, agency officials said.

Working with the community in a series of public meetings, Urban Design Studio will design a streetscape plan for Magnolia Boulevard between Tujunga Avenue and Cahuenga Boulevard and Lankershim Boulevard between Chandler Boulevard and Camarillo Street.

In the contract, signed Aug. 3, the Community Redevelopment Agency agreed to pay Urban Design no more than $88,455 for performing the consulting services.

The first public meeting is scheduled for the evening of Sept. 12. The place and time have not been determined.

At the meeting, the design studio will conduct a visual preference survey, a process in which the public is given ballots and asked to rate images of various trees, lights, benches and signs, among other streetscape elements, Urban Design owner Mark J. Brodeur said.

The design firm will then present the choices at a meeting of the Arts Subcommittee of the Project Area Committee, an elected citizens group for the 750-acre North Hollywood Redevelopment Area.

“The visual preference survey is probably the most important way for people to help us to determine the final concept for the streetscape project,” Brodeur said. “The reason this process is so valid is because it creates a consensus.”

Brodeur estimated that the concept phase would take five to six months to complete. Other contracts then have to be settled for final construction phases. Usually with projects that Urban Design sees to completion it takes about three years before the physical streetscape elements are in place, Brodeur said.