A Green Hollow Perspective
By Elin Schwartz | December 17, 2011
In 2007, after the Los Angeles City Council voted to designate the Barry Building as an historical cultural monument, I was given the responsibility of acting as a neighborhood liaison by Councilman Bill Rosendahl.
Since then we have been engaged in a continuing dialogue about how to achieve a responsible development, sensitive to the needs of both Brentwood residents and business interests. The City process is an arduous one for all parties.
Integral to this process is the Project Developer’s obligation to conduct an environmental review of potential impacts. Part of that review process includes presenting project alternatives, one of which is required to be a serious effort to preserve the Barry Building.
At the request of the BHA, the Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR), released earlier this year, was analyzed by a land use attorney and traffic engineer, who found the DEIR to be inadequate. Here is a brief distillation of the major areas of concern:
1) Inadequate and Inaccurate Analyses of Traffic Impacts
~Flawed trip generation calculations that fail to consider adjacent intersections and artificially reduce a potential 2,400 net additional car trips to 1,500.
~ Failure to address the many impacts of cut-through traffic and congestion.
~Exiting vehicle management in conflict with the CVS driveway and westerly congestion.
~Failure to analyze the impact of increased traffic on emergency response.
2) Inadequate Analysis of Construction Impact:
~ Equipment staging and resulting sidewalk and/or lane closures.
~ Haul routes.
~ Construction crews’ parking.
~ Noise levels.
3) Inadequate Analysis of Project Alternatives, including Building Preservation
Of the DEIR’s approximately 2,000 pages, 67 are devoted to the discussion of four alternatives to the developer’s project. Of those 67 pages, Alternative 4 (the Preservation Alternative) – which the DEIR concedes to be the Alternative with the fewest negative impacts -- is given ELEVEN pages.
With the Final EIR due to be released any day now, it is my hope that these deficiencies will have been corrected and that the result will be a project that works within the constraints of an already over-taxed infrastructure, recognizes the historical designation of the Barry Building, and balances the true needs of the community with the goals of the developer.
For more information:
downsizegreeenhollowsquare.org
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