CityWalk Talk

I’d really like to set the record straight once and for all as to who actually created the visual design style for CityWalk (“Fantasies of a City High on a Hill,” by Nicolai Ouroussoff, April 9).

As stated in your article, Jon Jerde was hired in 1985 by the Walt Disney Co. I was hired for two years as a full-time creative design consultant by Walt Disney Imagineering (WDI) beginning in 1987. Teamed with writers Jim Steinmeyer and Tony Morando, my first major project for WDI was Disney Island, a themed retail/restaurants/entertainment center for Walt Disney World. Our concept (for which I was the lead designer) was a boardwalk street lined with a nostalgic pop culture mix of neon, billboards and mismatched architectural styles.

In 1988, we performed a series of elaborate audiovisual presentations of this project at WDI; I recall Jon Jerde observed at least one of our presentations. Later, despite my vigorous protestations to the opposite, we were informed by Disney’s financial analysis geniuses that such a concept could not be built and operate at a profit. The Disney Island project was shelved and is currently in the WDI archives.

Jon Jerde left Disney and was hired by Universal in 1989. He applied the Disney Island concept to CityWalk and it was built. Years later, while working at Universal, a friend and collaborator on the Disney Island project discovered that I had never seen CityWalk. He took me there just to see the expression change on my face.

Although I have never received my proper public credit for CityWalk’s design vision, I at least feel vindicated that I was absolutely right in regard to our concept’s financial feasibility and my intuition that the public would enthusiastically embrace my original visual themes and concepts.

WILLIAM STOUT

Pasadena

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Ouroussoff’s critique of the CityWalk expansion reminded me of the time when I spotted a CityWalk billboard on Westwood Boulevard. It seemed a sad irony to be luring people to a fake “city shopping street” from a real one.

Ouroussoff says that Los Angeles is “famously” without Main Streets, but this famous impression is wrong. The L.A. area is dotted with main streets serving many communities, from Pacific Avenue in Huntington Park (slogan: “more shops than a shopping center”) to Fairfax Avenue to 3rd Street in Santa Monica. Fortunately, people finally seem ready to value and repair other decayed main streets, like Hollywood Boulevard.

CityWalk may be a cleverly designed shopping mall, but it should never be confused with a real main street.

NATHAN LANDAU

Berkeley

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Ouroussoff states that the Southdale Center, built in 1956 on the outskirts of Minneapolis, was the nation’s first mall. I think you’ll find that dubious distinction actually goes to the Northland Mall in the Detroit suburb of Southfield, which was built in 1954.

ROBERT O’BRIEN

Huntington Beach