This Car Deserves a Hand

Would exempting a quirky carwash sign from the Ventura Boulevard Specific Plan mean anything goes on the San Fernando Valley’s main street?

That’s what the Studio City Residents Assn. and the Federation of Hillside and Canyon Assns. fear. They’re appealing a decision last year by the Los Angeles Planning Commission to allow the fiberglass sign--a pink 1957 Corvette atop a yellow sponge held by a giant hand--to remain in front of a Studio City carwash.

Yes, the sign is taller and closer to the property line than the boulevard plan allows. But the Planning Commission took into account that the carwash owner removed two large business signs when he installed the Corvette. And commissioners were swayed by the Corvette’s--how shall we put this?--artistic values, which fit with Southern California’s rich history of eclectic signs.

Indeed, the Corvette-on-a-sponge is right up there with the house-sized doughnut of Randy’s Donuts or, for that matter, the telephone-pole-sized tees and golf balls that ring the Studio City Golf Course. In other words, it’s fun--as the number of people who show up to snap pictures of the Corvette attest.

Rules are rules, counter the homeowners groups; it doesn’t matter what the sign actually looks like. But good design is all about what something looks like. To adhere to the letter of the boulevard plan without regard to what quirky exceptions can contribute is to miss the plan’s point, which is to create for Ventura Boulevard a distinctive sense of place. Cutting out a sign like this spites the plan’s spirit.

Good planning requires not just good rules but good judgment. Far from promoting chaos, the Planning Commission, while not faulting the opponents’ concerns, made a thoughtful, reasonable exception.

Carwash owner Benny Forat, after a little arm-twisting by City Councilman Joel Wachs, has offered to compromise and reduce the size of the sponge. In the spirit of the boulevard plan, homeowner groups should declare victory and drop their no-compromise stance--and their appeal.