MALL—Renovation Planned for Santa Monica Mall

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The owner of Santa Monica Place, a retail also-ran with the emergence of Third Street Promenade, proposes a major renovation of the mall that could include opening up what has been an old-fashioned, enclosed shopping center.

Plans are in the works to use the 650,000-square-foot center to link the Promenade with the Civic Center area, which has lagged behind development activity in other parts of Santa Monica.

“What I’m hoping for is the possibility they would take the entire thing down, put all the parking underground and redevelop it with two-level retail and the third floor would be housing,” said Mayor Michael Feinstein.

Feinstein said a complete overhaul would be the most politically expedient proposal because it could include affordable housing and increased access from Wilshire Boulevard to the Los Angeles city line.

It also would likely be the most costly and, perhaps, least realistic.

Arthur Coppola, president and chief executive of Macerich Co., which bought the mall in 1999 for a reported $130 million, said a complete demolition and reconstruction is unlikely. But he indicated that the renovation would be substantial.

“The one major change I can clearly see is we want to dramatically open up to the area around us,” Coppola said. “It’s not out of the question that we’d literally blow out the entrance to the food court and have a windscreen and maintain the roof.”

City Planning Director Suzanne Frick said the mall’s above-ground parking structure, just east of the center, has broken up the feel of the area and impeded foot traffic.

“Ultimately, our goal would be to connect the Civic Center area to the Promenade and the (Santa Monica) Pier and have a Santa Monica Place become a major focus of that reconnection,” Frick said.

Santa Monica Place was built in a different era, Coppola said, when there was nothing else in the immediate area but a Sears. Coppola said he always intended to do something to update the mall and has been leasing some spaces with that in mind.

“To some degree we are keeping our options open,” he said. “We want to establish a long-term plan and let the merchandise mix be reflective of that plan.”

Rob York, a retail development consultant with the Fransen Co., said the indoor mall has been an anachronism in the area for years.

“Certainly it’s time for some investment in that project,” York said. “Santa Monica Place is potentially a great asset, but has not received the attention over the last several years that it should have.”

The Santa Monica City Council is to vote this week on extending the scope of an urban plan being devised by ROMA Design Group to include the mall. Macerich has agreed to pay any additional expenses to join the plan.

Coppola said Macerich, ROMA and the city will take their time in developing a proposal. While the plan should come together in the next few months, any construction is two to four years away.

That schedule jibes with Feinstein’s dream.

“I’m not stuck on the physical site coming down as much as I am on a viable connection to between the Civic Center and the Promenade,” the mayor said. “I am more interested in them coming up with the best possible vision than I am with getting something done overnight.”

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