Tag: Building

How a Macy’s parking structure became L.A. latest luxury apartment complex

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An unlikely corner of one of L.A.’s once-famous/now-dead malls is open for business again this week as residents move into luxury apartments on the spot that used to be a Macy’s parking lot.

The Westside Pavilion was one of the city’s premier shopping venues and a cultural touchstone for generations of Angelenos, appearing in movies, television shows and music videos.

1992 photo of interior of Westside Pavilion that was designed like a Paris arcade.

(Randy Leffingwell)

Built on the site of California’s first drive-in movie theater, the center played prominent roles in the 1995 film “Clueless” and the video for musician Tom Petty’s 1989 hit “Free Fallin’.”

But like many other indoor malls, the Westside Pavilion fell out of favor in the 21st century before closing in 2019 to be converted to offices for rent.

Now the former mall also has housing, which is even more in demand than offices these days. New residents will be allowed to start moving in this week.

On a spot once occupied by what the developer called an “absolutely horrible, obsolete” parking structure, there are now 201 luxury apartments — a six-story complex that includes townhouses with front doors that open onto a residential street.

“You have your own stoop,” developer Lee Wagman said of the townhouses. “It’s kind of like a brownstone.”

Developer Lee Wagman of GPI Companies in the rooftop lounge area at the Overland & Ayres apartments.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)

Wagman is managing partner of GPI Cos., the Los Angeles real estate company that built the Overland & Ayres apartments and converted the mall’s former Macy’s building into the West End office complex. The combined cost of both builds was $350 million.

Wagman said the company got the temporary certificate of occupancy for the apartment complex just last week and move-ins can start as early as this week.

The rest of the former mall was in the process of being converted to offices for rent to Google when it was purchased last year by UCLA. The university is turning the old shopping center into a nearly 700,000-square-foot research center that will focus on immunology, quantum science and engineering.

The biomedical research center, which is set to open as early as next year, will be trying to tackle towering challenges such as curing cancer and preventing global pandemics.

The pool area at Overland & Ayres.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)

The new apartments will be convenient for people working at the research center or other nearby job centers, such as UCLA in Westwood, Century City or Culver City.

As has grown more common for buildings competing at at the top of the apartment market, Overland & Ayres has amenities such as a gym with a resort-style pool deck and spa, an outdoor lawn for working out, a sauna and a cold plunge tub.

It has a large rooftop space with both indoor and outdoor lounging, dining areas and gas grills. There is a game room and two event kitchens. The building also includes an outdoor dog park and a spa for pets.

The dog park at the Overland & Ayres Aapartments.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)

Services available to tenants for a fee include personal training and private yoga instruction, dry cleaning pickup and delivery, car washing, dog walking, grocery delivery and housekeeping. Plans also call for commercial tenants along Overland Avenue that would serve the building, such as a restaurant or Pilates studio.

Rents range from $3,800 per month for a studio apartment to $8,500 per month for a townhouse.

The mall makeover is part of a decades-long trend of repurposing dead shopping centers, devastated by the pivot to online shopping.

Once the kings of retail, indoor shopping centers fell out of favor and lost customers to e-commerce, as well as outdoor “lifestyle” centers — places such as the Grove and Westfield Century City, which feature fancy restaurants, entertainment and pleasant spaces to hang out, even if you’re not buying anything.

The kitchen and living room area of a two-bedroom den unit at the Overland & Ayres apartments.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)

The Sherman Oaks Galleria, a legendary indoor mall used in the filming of “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” and “Valley Girl,” is now mostly offices.

Lakewood Center, one of the largest enclosed malls in Los Angeles County, spanning 2 million square feet, has been sold to developers who plan to transform it by adding housing, green spaces and entertainment venues.

“A lot of malls now are going towards mixed use,” said Wagaman, who helped turn an indoor mall in Pasadena into an outdoor mall with apartments more than two decades ago.

It is not just old mall space. Struggling office buildings are also looking at transitioning to residences.

With downtown L.A.’s office rental market struggling with high vacancies and falling values, stakeholders are lobbying for city support to convert high-rises to housing. The hope is that this could help address the city’s persistent housing shortage.

Among the suggested targets for conversion are elite Financial District towers that commanded top rents before the COVID-19 pandemic’s stay-at-home orders shut down offices, leaving many buildings more than one-third vacant.

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Roger Vincent

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September 1, 2025
Americans may aspire to single-family homes, but in South Korea, apartments are king

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SEOUL — For many Americans, the apartment where 29-year-old IT specialist Lee Chang-hee lives might be the stuff of nightmares.

Located just outside the capital of Seoul, the building isn’t very tall — just 16 stories — by South Korean standards, but the complex consists of 36 separate structures, which are nearly identical except for the building number displayed on their sides.

The 2,000-plus units come in the same standardized dimensions found everywhere in the country (Lee lives in a “84C,” which has 84 square meters, or about 900 square feet, of floor space) and offer, in some ways, a ready-made life. The amenities scattered throughout the campus include a rock garden with a fake waterfall, a playground, a gym, an administration office, a senior center and a “moms cafe.”

But this, for the most part, is South Korea’s middle-class dream of homeownership — its version of a house with the white picket fence.

“The bigger the apartment complex, the better the surrounding infrastructure, like public transportation, schools, hospitals, grocery stories, parks and so on,” Lee said. “I like how easy it is to communicate with the neighbors in the complex because there’s a well-run online community.”

Apartment blocks are the predominant housing format in Seoul.

(Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Most in the country would agree: Today, 64% of South Korean households live in such multifamily housing, the majority of them in apartments with five or more stories.

Such a reality seems unimaginable in cities like Los Angeles, which has limited or prohibited the construction of dense housing in single-family zones.

“Los Angeles is often seen as an endless tableau of individual houses, each with their own yard and garden,” Max Podemski, an L.A.-based urban planner, wrote in The Times last year. “Apartment buildings are anathema to the city’s ethos.”

In recent years, the price of that ethos has become increasingly apparent in the form of a severe housing shortage. In the city of Los Angeles, where nearly 75% of all residential land is zoned for stand-alone single-family homes, rents have been in a seemingly endless ascent, contributing to one of the worst homelessness crises in the country. As a remedy, the state of California has ordered the construction of more than 450,000 new housing units by 2029.

The plan will almost certainly require the building of some form of apartment-style housing, but construction has lagged amid fierce resistance.

Sixty years ago, South Korea stood at a similar crossroads. But the series of urban housing policies it implemented led to the primacy of the apartment, and in doing so, transformed South Korean notions of housing over the course of a single generation.

The results of that program have been mixed. But in one important respect, at least, it has been successful: Seoul, which is half the size of the city of L.A., is home to a population of 9.6 million — compared with the estimated 3.3 million people who live here.

For Lee, the trade-off is a worthwhile one.

In an ideal world, she would have a garage for the sort of garage sales she’s admired in American movies. “But South Korea is a small country,” she said. “It is necessary to use space as efficiently as possible.”

Apartments, in her view, have spared her from the miseries of suburban housing. Restaurants and stores are close by. Easy access to public transportation means she doesn’t need a car to get everywhere.

“Maybe it’s because of my Korean need to have everything done quickly, but I think it’d be uncomfortable to live somewhere that doesn’t have these things within reach at all times,” she said. “I like to go out at night; I think it would be boring to have all the lights go off at 9 p.m.”

A general view shows steam rising from office and apartment buildings that define the Seoul skyline. (Ed Jones / AFP via Getty Images)

Apartment buildings light up in the evening as people return home from work in Seoul on March 25, 2021. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

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Apartments first began appearing in South Korea in the 1960s and 1970s, as part of a government response to a housing crisis in the nation’s capital — a byproduct of the era’s rapid industrialization and subsequent urban population boom.

In the 1960s, single-family detached dwellings made up around 95% of homes in the country. But over the following decade, as rural migrants flooded Seoul in search of factory work, doubling the population from 2.4 to 5.5 million, many in this new urban working class found themselves without homes. As a result, many of them settled in shantytowns on the city’s outskirts, living in makeshift sheet-metal homes.

The authoritarian government at the time, led by a former army general named Park Chung-hee, declared apartments to be the solution and embarked on a building spree that would continue under subsequent administrations. Eased height restrictions and incentives for construction companies helped add between 20,000 to 100,000 new apartment units every year.

They were pushed by political leaders in South Korea as a high-tech modernist paradise, soon making them the most desirable form of housing for the middle and upper classes. Known as apateu, which specifically refers to a high-rise apartment building built as part of a larger complex — as distinct from lower stand-alone buildings — they symbolized Western cachet and upward social mobility.

“Around the late 1990s and early 2000s, almost every big-name celebrity at the time appeared in apartment commercials,” recalled Jung Heon-mok, an anthropologist at the Academy of Korean Studies who has studied the history of South Korean apartments. “But the biggest reason that apartments proliferated as they did was because they were done at scale, in complexes of five buildings or more.”

Essential to the modern apateu are the amenities — such as on-site kindergartens or convenience stores — that allow them to function like miniature towns. This has also turned them into branded commodities and class signifiers, built by construction conglomerates like Samsung, and taking on names like “castle” or “palace.” (One of the first such branded apartment complexes was Trump Tower, a luxury development built in Seoul in the late 1990s by a construction firm that licensed the name of Donald Trump.)

All of this has made the detached single-family home, for the most part, obsolete. In Seoul, such homes now make up just 10% of the housing stock. Among many younger South Koreans like Lee, they are associated with retirement in the countryside, or, as she puts it: for “grilling in the garden for your grandkids.”

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This model has not been without problems.

There are the usual issues that come with dense housing. In buildings with poor soundproofing, “inter-floor noise” between units is such a universal scourge that the government runs a noise-related dispute resolution center while discouraging people from angrily confronting their neighbors, a situation that occasionally escalates into headline-making violence.

Some apartment buildings have proved to be too much even for a country accustomed to unsentimentally efficient forms of housing. One 19-story, 4,635-unit complex built by a big-name apartment brand in one of the wealthiest areas of Seoul looks so oppressive that it has become a curiosity, mocked by some as a prison or chicken coop.

Apartment complexes in Seoul on Oct. 5, 2024. Apartments first began appearing in South Korea in 1960s and 1970s, as part of a government response to a housing crisis in the nation’s capital.

(Tina Hsu / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

The sheer number of apartments has prompted criticism of Seoul’s skyline as sterile and ugly. South Koreans have described its uniform, rectangular columns as “matchboxes.” And despite the aspirations attached to them, there is also a wariness about a culture where homes are built in such disposable, assembly line-like fashion.

Many people here are increasingly questioning how this form of housing, with its nearly identical layouts, has shaped the disposition of contemporary South Korean society, often criticized by its own members as overly homogenized and lockstep.

“I’m concerned that apartments have made South Koreans’ lifestyles too similar,” said Maing Pil-soo, an architect and urban planning professor at Seoul National University. “And with similar lifestyles, you end up with a similar way of thinking. Much like the cityscape itself, everything becomes flattened and uniform.”

Jung, the anthropologist, believes South Korea’s apartment complexes, with their promise of an atomized, frictionless life, have eroded the more expansive social bonds that defined traditional society — like those that extended across entire villages — making its inhabitants more individualistic and insular.

“At the end of the day, apartments here are undoubtedly extremely convenient — that’s why they became so popular,” he said. “But part of that convenience is because they insulate you from the concerns of the wider world. Once you’re inside your complex and in your home, you don’t have to pay attention to your neighbors or their issues.”

Still, Jung says this uniformity isn’t all bad. It is what made them such easily scalable solutions to the housing crisis of decades past. It is also, in some ways, an equalizing force.

“I think apartments are partly why certain types of social inequalities you see in the U.S. are comparatively less severe in South Korea,” he said.

Though many branded apartment complexes now resemble gated communities with exclusionary homeowner associations, Jung points out that on the whole, the dominance of multifamily housing has inadvertently encouraged more social mixing between classes, a physical closeness that creates the sense that everyone is inhabiting the same broader space.

Even Seoul’s wealthiest neighborhoods feel, to an extent that is hard to see in many American cities, porous and accessible. Wealthier often means having a nicer apartment, but an apartment all the same, existing in the same environs as those in a different price range.

“And even though we occasionally use disparaging terms like ‘chicken coop’ to describe them, once you actually step inside one of those apartments, they don’t feel like that at all,” Jung said. “They really are quite comfortable and nice.”

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People pose for photos among a field of cosmos flowers in front of high-rise apartment buildings in Goyang, west of Seoul. (Ed Jones / AFP via Getty Images)

None of this, however, has been able to stave off Seoul’s own present-day housing affordability crisis.

The capital has one of the most expensive apartment prices in the world on a price-per-square-meter basis, ranking fourth after Hong Kong, Zurich and Singapore, and ahead of major U.S. cities like New York or San Francisco, according to a report published last month by Deutsche Bank. One especially brutal stretch recently saw apartment prices in Seoul double in four years.

Part of the reason for this is that apartments, with their standardized dimensions, have effectively become interchangeable financial commodities: An apartment in Seoul is seen as a much more surefire bet than any stock, leading to intense real estate investment and speculation that has driven up home prices.

“Buying an apartment here isn’t just buying an apartment. The equivalent in the U.S. would be like buying an ideal single-family home with a garage in the U.S., except that it comes with a bunch of NVIDIA shares,” said Chae Sang-wook, an independent real estate analyst. “In South Korea, people invest in apateu for capital gains, not cash flow from rent.”

Some experts predict that, as the country enters another era of demographic upheaval, the dominance of apartments will someday be no more.

If births continue to fall as dramatically as they have done in recent years, South Koreans may no longer need such dense housing. The ongoing rise of single-person households, too, may chip away at a form of housing built to hold four-person nuclear families.

But Chae is skeptical that this will happen anytime soon. He points out that South Koreans don’t even like to assemble their own furniture, let alone fix their own cars — all downstream effects of ubiquitous apartment living.

“For now, there is no alternative other than this,” he said. “As a South Korean, you don’t have the luxury of choosing.”

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Max Kim

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July 24, 2025
Evicted from her apartment at 68, an artist starts anew in a sunny L.A. fourplex

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After living in her two-bedroom apartment in Los Feliz for more than a decade, Debra Weiss encountered a problem experienced by many renters in Los Angeles: She was evicted.

“I moved into the apartment in 2014, and four years later, my landlord sold it to a wealthy family who bought it at a loss,” said Weiss, 69, who works as a textile artist and was evicted last year. “They knew they couldn’t evict us due to rent control.”

In this series, we spotlight L.A. rentals with style. From perfect gallery walls to temporary decor hacks, these renters get creative, even in small spaces. And Angelenos need the inspiration: Most are renters.

When the landlords put the three-unit complex on the market in 2022, however, they offered Weiss $50,000 to move out — far more than the amount required by law — to make the building easier for them to sell. She declined, concerned it would affect her Social Security benefits, as there is a limit to how much one can earn and still receive full benefits.

Then, last February, the three tenants received eviction notices under the Ellis Act, which allows landlords to evict renters from rent-controlled apartments if the building is being torn down or removed from the rental market. It’s currently for sale for $3.2 million.

As a senior, Weiss was entitled to a full year’s notice because she had lived in her unit for more than a year. Still, she knew she would eventually have to move out of the comfortable 1,200-square-foot duplex, for which she paid $2,670 a month in rent.

Artist Debra Weiss stands in her dining room where she often works as a fiber artist.

When she began looking for another apartment in the area, Weiss quickly learned that she could no longer afford to live in Los Feliz. “The apartments were so much more expensive than what I was used to paying, and they had no parking or a washer and dryer,” she said. (Weiss was paid $24,650 in relocation assistance, which was taxed, due to her age and the length of time she lived in her Los Feliz apartment.)

She also visited some small studios and considered purchasing a TIC, or Tenancy in Common, where buyers purchase a share in a corporation that owns a building. However, to secure a loan, she’d need someone to co-sign. “Even though they are cute, they are tiny and not necessarily in the best neighborhoods,” she said. Another option, a Craftsman apartment near USC, wasn’t in a good walking neighborhood, something that was important to Weiss. It was also dark and hundreds of dollars more a month than her previous apartment. “I’m almost 70 years old and I need light to work,” she added.

Handknitted sculptures, embroidered weavings and a tufted rug adorn the guest room.

When her son-in-law spotted a charming two-bedroom apartment near the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for $2,950 a month on Zillow, Weiss decided to check it out.

“My initial reaction was, ‘I want this,’ ” Weiss said of the fourplex.

The rental had high ceilings, oak floors, ample sunlight, an appealing fireplace, a garage and a washer and dryer. A newly redone modern kitchen felt out of character for the 1930s building, but that didn’t bother Weiss. “The kitchen is a blank canvas,” she said of the all-white cabinets and countertops. “The white background makes all of my stuff stand out,” including ceramics by Mt. Washington Pottery and Altadena artist Linda Hsiao.

Weiss knits a sweater for her granddaughter with yarn she purchased in Japan.

Concerned that the landlord wouldn’t want to rent to her because of her age, she was pleasantly surprised when she got the apartment. “The light is amazing,” Weiss said. “I was initially worried about some of the modern touches like the overhead lighting, but it floods the room with bright light that allows me to work at night.”

Nearly a year after moving in, Weiss has filled the apartment with her stitched collages, quilts and the artworks of others, many of which she described as “trades.” “I like color and pattern and objects,” she said as she pointed out some Japanese ceramics on her buffet and a dress that she crocheted with scraps of fabric, yarn and metal.

In the guest room, a wall hanging composed of three separate weavings in a gingham check pattern is embroidered with a series of characters she based on her 5-year-old granddaughter’s drawings. “It’s about people coming together in chaos and supporting each other,” Weiss said. “I like the pattern; it reminds me of eating together on picnic tables.”

“I like objects,” Weiss said of the many treasures and collections of things that are featured throughout her rental.

On the opposite wall of the guest room above her sewing machine, a series of metal sculptures she knitted with copper and silver hangs alongside cloth dolls and purses. In the corner, a cowl made of macrame, textiles and yarn adorns a mannequin. There’s also a colorful latch hook rug that she made with acrylic yarn that looks more like artwork than a functional accessory.

In her bedroom, a coverlet that Weiss assembled from vintage quilts adorns the bed.

The long hallway ends at the laundry room and is lined with her colorful quilts, some of which are mounted on Homasote board, along with weavings and stitched works, which, like her cooking, are improvisational.

“I work without planning and respond to the materials and see what it becomes,” she said. “I start knitting and see where it goes. I get excited about the material, and then I go for it. “

The hallway in Weiss’s apartment is lined with her artworks.

Much of the wood furniture in her apartment was made by her father, who died 13 years ago.

“I’ve had this since my kids were little, and you can see all the markings,” she said of the hutch in the corner of her dining room. “My dad made it 40 years ago for the Van Nuys house I grew up in.”

It is here, at the dining room table that her father made, that she works, hosts workshops and teaches lessons in fiber art, collage and stitching. Later this year, she hopes to host a sale of her work at a holiday open house in her apartment.

Weiss is an expert in mixing texture, pattern and color in her Mid-Wilshire apartment.

The mixing of colorful Persian rugs, textiles, natural materials, chunky wood pieces and intricately knitted metal sculptures creates a warm balance throughout her apartment.

Bursting with color and pattern, the rooms offer a sense of calm that Weiss appreciates as a woman who raised three daughters alone and has had to pivot during major life changes. Over the years, she has run a clothing company, Rebe, which closed in 2019 due to economic uncertainty, declared bankruptcy and sold her Woodland Hills house. Most recently, she was forced to weather the eviction process.

“I’ve always been an entrepreneur,” said Weiss, who works six to eight hours a day at home and sells her artwork and sewing patterns on her Specks and Keepings website and at L.A. Homefarm in Glassell Park. “I’ll always figure out a way to make money by selling the things that I make.”

Even though the process of having to move was stressful, Weiss is happy with her new home and neighborhood. “I take the Metro bus everywhere and hardly ever drive,” she said. “I go to the Hollywood Farmer’s Market on Sundays. Kaiser is nearby and I can walk to LACMA. Everything worked out perfectly.”

Weiss pulls out a drawer of her flat files cabinet filled with her artwork.

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Lisa Boone

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June 23, 2025
L.A. County to buy downtown skyscraper for new HQ despite a ‘hell no’ from Hahn

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The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Wednesday approved the county’s purchase of the Gas Company Tower, one of downtown L.A.’s most prominent skyscrapers, paving the way for the transfer of thousands of workers and public services out of the city’s civic center.

With a 4-1 vote, the supervisors gave county officials the final green light to move ahead with buying the tower for $200 million.

The approval came over vehement objections from Supervisor Janice Hahn, who warned that the purchase would sound the death knell for downtown’s civic heart and shunt the county’s workforce to a “souless” office tower on Bunker Hill.

“None of you here are going to convince me that this is a good idea,” Hahn said before casting her vote against the purchase with a “hell no.”

County employees are currently based inside the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, a 1960 building named after Hahn’s father, a longtime county supervisor.

The building is one of several county-owned properties considered vulnerable to collapse in a major earthquake. Officials have estimated that it will cost hundreds of millions to upgrade the buildings, making a new, presumably safer skyscraper an appealing alternative to some on the board.

“If we know this building is not seismically safe, then we have an obligation and a responsibility to take action,” Supervisor Holly Mitchell said from the room inside Hahn Hall where the board holds its weekly meetings.

County Chief Executive Fesia Davenport, whose office spearheaded the sale, promised the purchase “will save the county hundreds of millions of dollars” compared with the cost of upgrading the Hall of Administration and other county buildings.

No supervisors have toured the building themselves, according to a county spokesperson, though several of their staff members have visited.

The 52-story tower at 555 W. 5th St. was widely considered one of the city’s most prestigious office buildings when it was completed in 1991. It has nearly 1.5 million square feet of space on a 1.4-acre site at the base of Bunker Hill.

The price is a deep discount from the building’s appraised value of $632 million in 2020, underscoring how much downtown office values have fallen in recent years.

At $200 million, the county would get the Gas Company Tower for about $137 a square foot, a bargain by historical standards. The county also agreed to pay as much as an additional $5 million in closing costs on the transaction.

“This opportunity will not last forever,” Davenport warned, adding that the county could finance the purchase in part from money set aside for capital projects.

Hahn said the transaction was akin to “robbing Peter to pay Paul.”

“The money being used to pay for this purchase is being stolen from the funds that were meant to keep this building alive,” she said from Hahn Hall.

Richard Keating, the architect who designed the Gas Company Tower to appeal to corporate America, said it makes sense for a public entity to take ownership now.

“We’re looking at a decline in need for standard office use, meaning lawyers, architects and accountants are doing things differently” since the pandemic, Keating said. “City and county employees are still hard at work in their office spaces, but they’re tired, old, sometimes decrepit and oftentimes no longer up to code in terms of earthquake” safety requirements.

“It’s a perfect time to take advantage of some of these more or less empty office buildings.”

Moving hundreds of county workers into the Gas Company Tower also stands to lift shops, restaurants and other businesses in the nearby blocks by Pershing Square, he said. “I think it’s a good move all the way around.”

In recent years, the downtown office market has turned against landlords as many tenants reduced their office footprint in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, when it became more common for employees to work remotely.

Last year, the owner of the Gas Company Tower, an affiliate of Brookfield Asset Management, defaulted on its debt, and the property was put in receivership, in which a court-appointed representative took custody of the building to help creditors recover funds they lent to Brookfield. The building has about $465 million in outstanding loans.

Other major tenants in the Gas Company Tower include law firm Latham & Watkins and accounting firm Deloitte. The county will assume the tenant leases as landlord.

When the Gas Company Tower is formally owned by the county, it will be removed from the tax rolls. The building’s property tax bill last year was more than $7.1 million, according to real estate data provider CoStar.

Tenants would, however, be required to contribute to the tax rolls by an unspecified amount through a “possessory interest tax” that can be levied on private companies leasing public buildings. Tenants in privately owned office buildings also commonly pay a share of the landlord’s property taxes.

The building is in good condition with “a remaining useful life” of no less than 35 years, according to a recent property condition report prepared for the current owner that was obtained by The Times.

The report also said the tower and the World Trade Center garage at 333 S. Flower St. included in the deal require about $1.3 million to address urgently needed repairs and deferred maintenance. Additional long-term costs to maintain and modernize the properties were estimated at about $48.7 million over 12 years. Projected costs include roof repairs, refurbishing air conditioning systems and updating the elevators.

The county currently occupies about 16.5 million square feet of office space for 38 departments, which comprises 6.9 million square feet of leased office space and 9.6 million square feet of owned office space, Davenport said in a memo to the board recommending the purchase of the Gas Company Tower.

The county spends about $195 million per year on the leased office space, and the property it owns “is in poor condition and old,” Davenport said. Nearly half of it is more than 50 years old.

By moving staff from both leased office space and aging buildings in poor condition, the county avoids paying rent and the “significant” costs of seismic retrofits and other needed renovations to old buildings such as aging air conditioning, plumbing and electrical systems, the chief executive’s memo said. Funds earmarked for seismic retrofits and other renovations of old buildings will be included in the payment for the Gas Company Tower.

The county inspected the building and will buy it “as-is,” Davenport said. The Department of Public Works reviewed a seismic report for the tower and agreed with its findings. A county spokesperson said the findings will remain confidential until the deal closes.

If the county elects to complete a seismic retrofit and other improvements to the Gas Company Tower, it can realize a future return on its investment by selling the building when the market recovers, Davenport said.

Southern California Gas Co. said in September that it is planning to move from its longtime headquarters in its namesake tower, where it has been a primary tenant since the building was completed, to another skyscraper a block north at 350 S. Grand Ave.

The utility signed a long-term lease for nearly 200,000 square feet on eight floors in the Grand Avenue building on Bunker Hill often known as Two California Plaza, its new landlord said, and is expected to move by spring 2026 after building out the new offices. SoCalGas will also have an office on the ground floor to serve customers.

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Rebecca Ellis, Roger Vincent

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November 6, 2024
Gov. Newsom issues executive order aimed at lowering electric bills

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With Californians angry about their skyrocketing electric bills, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order on Wednesday aimed at giving them some relief.

The governor’s order directs the state Public Utilities and Energy commissions to find ways to try to lower power bills in the future, or at the minimum to stop them from rising so quickly.

Among the actions he asks for is a closer review of how utilities are spending money to stop transmission lines from sparking wildfires. State officials say those wildfire mitigation costs now make up about 13% of customers’ monthly electric bills.

“We’re taking action to address rising electricity costs and save consumers money on their bills,” Newsom said. “California is proving that we can address affordability concerns as we continue our world-leading efforts to combat the climate crisis.”

The governor issued the executive order days before Tuesday’s election, in which kitchen-table economics is a top concern.

California now has the second-highest electric rates in the country after Hawaii. Residential customer bills have risen by as much as 110% in the last decade.

In just the past three years, bills for customers of the three biggest for-profit utilities — Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric — have increased by 20% to 50%. Those most recent rate increases were reviewed and approved by Newsom appointees at the state public utilities commission.

The executive order is just one of Newsom’s recent moves aimed at reducing soaring energy costs. In August, he and Democratic lawmakers released a suite of energy-related bills just days before the legislative session ended. That same month the governor ordered lawmakers to return to Sacramento for a special session to debate a bill that would require oil refineries to increase gasoline reserves in an attempt to prevent price spikes at the pump.

The governor’s staff say Newsom is committed to the state’s ambitious climate goals, which include having 100% clean electricity by 2045. But he has become concerned as electric rates have risen to cover the cost of the state’s fast construction of solar farms and other renewable power, they say.

Newsom’s executive order asks his administration to look for “underperforming or underutilized programs” that are paid for by electric customers that could be ended. It says any unused money in those programs should be returned to customers.

In addition, the order asks the state’s Air Resources Board to determine how the California Climate Credit could be increased. Most Californians’ get the credit twice a year on their electric and gas bills. The credit is funded by the state’s cap-and-trade program, which attempts to reduce harmful emissions.

The order also directs the state Public Utilities Commission to pursue all federal funding opportunities that could reduce electric costs.

An early plan by Newsom’s office for the executive order that was reviewed by The Times asked the public utilities commission to look into alternative ways of financing the building of electrical lines and other infrastructure. Currently, building infrastructure is a key way for utilities to boost their profits because they bill the cost back to ratepayers over many years, tacking on annual interest that is typically 10.5%.

Consumer groups say that lowering this rate could result in significant savings for customers.

The governor’s executive order released Wednesday didn’t include that provision. His staff said the directive to find other ways of financing infrastructure wasn’t included in the executive order because it would require legislative statutes to be changed.

In August, Newsom backed away from an earlier plan he had to lower the infrastructure interest rate after criticism from the big utilities and electrical workers’ union, according to a report by the Sacramento Bee.

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Melody Petersen

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October 30, 2024
Mattel is revamping its work spaces as employees return to the office

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Mattel, the toy maker behind major brands such as Barbie and Hot Wheels, is upgrading its real estate holdings, moving its studio operations and design center into new homes.

The company, headquartered in El Segundo, is planning to move its studio operations to a recently renovated 60,000-square-foot building by 2025. Mattel signed a multiyear contract to lease the office space at 831 S. Douglas St.

Mattel is planning to move its studio operations to a recently renovated 60,000-square-foot building by 2025.

(Courtesy of Continental Development Corp.)

The building, located near Mattel’s current headquarters on Continental Boulevard, includes studios the company will use to shoot photos and videos to promote its products, as well as a patio that has fire pits and barbecue and kitchen areas. The building is close to other amenities including restaurants, an upscale athletic club, hotels and stores. For the last 30 years, Mattel has housed its studio operations on its campus, which includes multiple buildings.

The real estate deal is part of Mattel’s efforts to revamp its office space as the company aims to bolster productivity and creativity in the workplace along with attracting new employees. As workers start returning to the office after the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses are trying to make the office more attractive for employees who have been accustomed to working remotely.

The interior of a building Mattel is moving its studio operations to by 2025. Mattel signed a multiyear contract to lease the office space at 831 S. Douglas St.

(Courtesy of Continental Development Corp.)

The industrial building, part of Continental Development Corp.’s Continental Park campus, was recently transformed to include a studio production area to meet Mattel’s creative needs.

“Employers have strived to provide reasons for their employees to want to come back into the office and interact with their peers, said Bob Tarnofsky, executive vice president of real estate at Continental Development. “The amenities that they provide are far greater than what we saw typically pre-COVID.”

As employers rethink the future of work, it’s not uncommon for businesses to sign shorter-term leases, Tarnofsky said. Mattel, however, signed a long-term lease. He declined to say how much Mattel paid for the lease and how long it lasts.

A patio with fire pits is among the amenities of the building.

(Courtesy of Continental Development Corp.)

This year, Mattel also announced it will be moving its design center, which has been located on Mariposa Avenue for more than three decades, to a newly renovated building in 2026. The center, where employees design the hair, clothing and other parts of toys, will be housed in a 167,767-square-foot office space known as Grand + Nash at 2160 E. Grand Ave. Mattel purchased the space for $59 million from New York Life Insurance.

“We are embarking on a significant interior modernization of our headquarters building at 333 Continental Boulevard, infused with the same design principles and inspired by office modernization efforts at Mattel offices around the globe,” David Traughber, Mattel’s senior vice president of finance and head of global real estate, said in a statement.

The buildings that currently house Mattel’s studio operations and design center are leased facilities the company will be vacating.

As of December 2023, Mattel had approximately 33,000 workers in more than 35 countries worldwide, according to the company’s annual report. The company has roughly 2,000 workers in El Segundo and offers its employees a hybrid work environment.

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Queenie Wong

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October 30, 2024
‘Only Murders in the Building’ Season 4 Finale: MVPs, Fit Lords, and More Murders

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Mallory Rubin and Ben Lindbergh crack the case to recap the Only Murders in the Building Season 4 finale. They discuss how this season’s central mystery measures up to past seasons, the (at times overly) self-referential aspects of the series, and how it sets up Season 5 (1:46). Later, they award a handful of superlatives, including favorite episode, smartest red herring, best (or worst!) podcasting moment, the season’s fit lord, and much more (22:54).

Hosts: Mallory Rubin and Ben Lindbergh
Producer: Kai Grady
Additional Production Support: Justin Sayles

Subscribe: Spotify

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Mallory Rubin

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October 29, 2024
Southern California’s hottest commercial real estate market is for tenants that aren’t human

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Where Wilshire Boulevard begins in downtown Los Angeles, thousands of miles of undersea fiber-optic cables disappear into an ordinary-looking office tower.

One Wilshire is the mother of all data centers in the West, a discreet terminus for major digital links between Asia and North America that help sustain the world’s bottomless need for data storage and computing power.

Once a workplace for lawyers and other white-collar types, the mid-century office building‘s 30 floors are now stuffed with cables, pipes, coolers, generators and other equipment needed to support online functions that power the economy and our private lives at unmatched speed. (If you could get inside — and you can’t — the building’s internet connection would give you a split-second jump over others when tickets for the World Series or a concert went on sale.)

“We’re all consumers of data centers,” whether its scrolling social media on our smartphones, watching streaming services such as Netflix on TV or ordering a dog food delivery on our our laptops, said Maile Kaiser, chief revenue officer of data center operator CoreSite, the largest tenant in One Wilshire. “Any content that we make is stored in a data center.”

City Hall is framed by windows at an office space that has been stripped and is available to be used as a data center at One Wilshire in downtown Los Angeles.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

The digital transformation of One Wilshire, which is nearing completion with the recent departure of one of the last conventional tenants, is part of a larger real estate boom underway across Los Angeles County.

As artificial intelligence and cloud storage hoover up more and more space on the nation’s computer servers, real estate developers are racing to build new data centers or convert existing buildings to data uses. The need is so great, they’re having a hard time keeping up with demand as businesses in search of secure spots for their servers rent nearly every square foot that becomes available. Large-scale backup generators to keep the 24-7 operations running in the event of a power failure are in short supply.

Construction of new data centers is at “extraordinary levels” driven by “insatiable demand,” a recent report on the industry by real estate brokerage JLL found.

Electrician Oscar Rivas works on a new generator system on the third floor of One Wilshire, a high-rise office building that has been almost entirely converted into a data center in downtown Los Angeles.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

“Never in my career of 25 years in real estate have I seen demand like this on a global scale,” said JLL real estate broker Darren Eades, who specializes in data centers.

The biggest drivers are AI and cloud service providers that include some of the biggest names in tech, such as Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Oracle.

With occupancy in conventional office buildings still down sharply following the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and property values falling, data centers represent a rare ripe opportunity for real estate developers, who are pursuing opportunities in major markets like Los Angeles and less urban locales that are served by plentiful and preferably cheap power needed to run data centers.

“If you can find a cluster of power to build a site, they’ll come,” Eades said of developers.

Construction is taking place at an “extraordinary” pace nationwide and still not keeping up, the JLL data center report said. “Vacancy declined to a record low of 3% at midyear due to insatiable demand and despite rampant construction.”

Development increased more than sevenfold in two years, with the pipeline of new projects leveling off in the first half of 2024, a potential signal that the U.S. power grid cannot support development at a faster pace.

Satellites and antennas are perched on the rooftop at One Wilshire.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

But when projects currently under construction or planned are complete, the U.S. colocation market, in which businesses rent space in a data center owned by another company for their servers and other computing hardware, will triple in size from current levels.

With the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November 2022, artificial intelligence-driven products and platforms became ubiquitous seemingly overnight, JLL said. The huge amount of computing power required by generative AI is having the greatest impact on data storage, followed by continued cloud growth.

Real estate investors and landlords are being drawn into the market because demand from tenants is high and they are likely to renew their leases after shouldering the costs of setting up data centers.

“They invest in their space and in your space and they tend to stick around longer,” said Mark Messana, president of Downtown Properties, which owns offices in Los Angeles and San Francisco. “As we all know, the office market is struggling a little bit, so it’s nice to be able to have some data customers in the mix.”

Rents at One Wilshire, for example, can be double what they are at newer downtown office high-rises, according to real estate data provider CoStar.

Servers, power lines and cooling equipment have almost completely taken over the building that was once a prestigious address for businesses. There are electric conduits running up stairwells and racks of cables hanging from ceilings. Two elevators were removed so the empty shafts could hold water pipes used to help keep the temperature cool enough for the heat-producing servers.

Crypto.com Arena is seen from the rooftop of One Wilshire.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

The recent departure of a law firm that had been in the building more than 50 years cleared out five floors that will quickly be re-leased to data tenants, said Eades, who represents the landlord.

Challenges in the rapidly expanding data center industry include finding trained workers to staff facilities around the clock, seven days a week.

“These are high-paying, high-demand jobs,” Eades said, with employers scooping up computer science and engineering majors out of college.

The job can take a toll on workers, though. There are long hours in enclosed buildings with limited contact with the outside world, and working night shifts “can be challenging for employees to endure,” the report said. Thirty percent of data center workers quit in the last year, citing unhappiness with their work/life balance, the JLL report said.

Filling second- and third-shift jobs can add an additional month or more to the hiring process because of applicants’ reluctance to work off hours, even when they pay more than day jobs, according to the report.

Southern California suffers from a shortage of new data centers, as new users enter the market daily and demand continues to grow, JLL said. That’s spurring development in smaller markets in Los Angeles County such as Vernon, which has its own power plant that provides electricity at cheaper rates than are found in surrounding cities.

Monterey Park, which is served by Southern California Edison, is also “a hot area,” Eades said, where two new developments will be announced in the next month or so.

Power demand for computing is growing so intense that it threatens to strain the nation’s electrical grid, sending users to remote locations where power is plentiful and preferably cheap.

Data center developers are working in Alabama, the Dakotas and Indiana, “traditionally states that wouldn’t have data centers,” Eades said.

A company called CalEthos plans a data center near the south shore of the Salton Sea in California’s Imperial County. Electricity for the data center’s servers would come from the geothermal and solar plants built near the site in an area that has become known as Lithium Valley. That data center would cover land the size of 15 football fields and require power that could support 425,000 homes.

Data centers have long been big power users. But the specialized computer chips required for generative AI use far more electricity because they are designed to read through vast amounts of data.

The new chips also generate so much heat that even more power and water are needed to keep them cool.

By 2030, data centers could account for as much as 11% of U.S. power demand — up from 3% now, according to analysts at Goldman Sachs. Last week a deal was announced to reopen the infamous Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania in order to power Microsoft’s data centers performing cloud computing and artificial intelligence programs.

The plant, the site of he nation’s worst commercial nuclear power accident in 1979, was closed five years ago because it was losing money. Microsoft has agreed to buy power from the plant for 20 years if regulators approve its revival.

“There will always be a need for a data center,” Kaiser said. “Everybody loves to create their content now, whether it’s a photo or a video or online shopping, we’re all doing it. Now we’ll see what we do with AI.”

Times staff writer Melody Petersen contributed to this report.

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Roger Vincent

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September 27, 2024
Pilot program offers Long Beach homeowners up to $250,000 in low-interest loans to build ADUs

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Eager to boost the supply of affordable housing, city officials in Long Beach devised a program that could help a limited number of homeowners build an extra unit on their land.

But before they could launch it, they had to decide what to call it.

“We’ve been playing with a name for a while,” Mayor Rex Richardson said, noting that a news release touting the program had been delayed days because of christening purposes. “We’re building the bike as we ride it.”

Long Beach officials settled on the self-explanatory “Backyard Builders Program,” hoping a partial solution to a dearth of affordable housing lies in the unused spaces of city homeowners’ property. It’s a concept widely supported by advocates of low-income housing although some argue that the city’s version should have included more tenant protections.

Long Beach’s pilot program uses one-time funding that will provide as many as 10 homeowners low- to zero-interest loans of up to $250,000 to build Accessory Dwelling Units, or ADUs, on their lots. Those units would have to be rented out to lower-income individuals or families for a minimum of five years.

Interested applicants can apply at https://www.longbeach.gov/lbcd/hn/aduloan/.

“Long Beach has been a leader on ADU production,” Richardson said. “And we’ve done all the things we need to do … to make it easy for people to develop ADUs in their backyard.”

Claremont McKenna College’s Rose Institute confirmed in an April report that Long Beach was among the most ADU-friendly cities in the state, having issued 1,431 ADU permits between 2018 and 2022. While that total trails larger cities like San Diego (2,867), Long Beach produced 317 permits per 100,000 residents.

An ADU, as defined by the city’s Community Development Department for this pilot program, must come with independent facilities that include a living room, sleeping area, kitchen and bathroom.

In addition to agreeing to the temporary rent limit, property owners must live on site and have less than four units already on their land.

The units may be rented to anyone earning 80% or less of the Los Angeles County median income, which translates into $77,700 for an individual, $88,800 for a two-person family, $99,900 for three people and $110,950 for four, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Regional Planning.

But the program gives homeowners an extra financial incentive to rent these ADUs to recipients of Long Beach’s housing choice voucher program, which provides a portion of the rent for those who fall into extremely low income, very low income or low income categories.

Building an ADU has grown more expensive in recent years, with labor and material costs jumping 11% and 9%, respectively in 2021 and 2022, while construction labor costs rose 34% between 2018 and 2023.

The loan covers up to $250,000 in planning, permitting and construction costs, though Kelli Pezzelle, a Backyard Builders community program specialist, doesn’t anticipate the loans needing to be that high.

The interest on the loan will remain at 0% as long as the owner rents the ADU to a low-income recipient. A stipulation for loan qualification is that the owner must rent the home to a voucher recipient for a minimum of five years or a nonvoucher, lower-income tenant for seven years.

The loan’s interest rate will jump to 3% if rented to someone who doesn’t meet the income limits after the five- or seven-year period. An owner would incur a $2,500 monthly penalty if the ADU is rented to a nonqualified tenant ahead of time.

The possible removal of low-income tenants concerns Long Beach Residents Empowered, or LiBRE, an advocacy group that pushes for the creation and preservation of affordable housing and renter protections.

“We’re happy that the city is investing in affordable housing and trying to reduce the housing shortage,” said LiBRE’s Project Director Andre Donado, via a phone call. “Every single renter, however, is at risk of eviction after five years.”

Donado also hoped the city would consider offering relocation assistance of $4,500 to low-income renters displaced through no fault of their own in all cases.

The city offers $4,500 or two months rent if a landlord demolishes or substantially remodels a building, but only one month’s rent in other cases.

“I think there are several positives with the program, and we’d like to see it made permanent, with some adjustments,” Donado said.

The pilot’s loans are significantly larger than the up to $40,000 in aid provided by California Housing Finance Agency’s ADU Grant Program, which doled out $125 million to help homeowners cover permitting and planning costs before running out of funds.

The city believes that house-rich, cash-poor homeowners, particularly seniors, could take advantage of the loan to build an ADU and create passive income. The program estimates that the ADUs built with its loans would generate more than $1,000 monthly for owners who rent to voucher holders.

“You may be a grandma or someone who’s got way too much backyard, and you want to be a part of the solution, but it may be hard for you to navigate or identify financing,” Richardson said.

To that end, the city is expected to appoint a project manager to help loan recipients choose an architect, builders, planners, contractors and others needed throughout the planning and construction process. That manager will work as an intermediary between the property owner and the general contractor.

One caveat for interested property owners is that a qualified renter cannot be a relative or a caregiver for their household.

As for the loan, payments will be deferred during the building process up to two years.

Richardson said since the program is based on loans that will be repaid over time, it will be self-sustaining. If it’s deemed a success — meaning that ADUs are built and rented to lower-income tenants — he said the city would consider looking for more revenue streams to expand the project.

The city is hosting a series of Zoom webinars to gauge interest in the program and answer questions.

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Andrew J. Campa

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September 19, 2024
Fire threatens Southern California ski resorts. Will they make it to winter?

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A number of Southern California’s most popular ski resorts are under threat from wildfires that are burning across the mountains that skiers glide down.

At the Mountain High Resort in Wrightwood, staff desperate to save the popular skiing spot turned on snowmakers to keep flames from the Bridge fire at bay.

The fire, which has charred 49,000 acres in the Angeles National Forest, exploded in size late Tuesday, burning homes and sending flames barreling through the trees toward Mountain High’s chairlifts. Despite the harrowing visuals captured on the resort’s cameras, all the main lifts and buildings survived with “little to no damage,” the resort wrote on social media Wednesday.

“Thank you to all the employees and fire fighters for their hard work. Our hearts go out to the Wrightwood families that may be suffering. We are with you!” the resort wrote in the post.

Ski resorts in the Big Bear region, meanwhile, were hoping to remain standing as the Line fire raged nearby, putting the mountain community on edge. The blaze, which started last week, has already charred more than 34,000 acres and was 14% contained Wednesday.

Crews were staging equipment on the hills at Snow Summit and Bear Mountain and trying to create defense perimeters around buildings, chairlifts and other improvements, resort spokesman Justin Kanton said as he sat in his office on the property, socked in by smoke.

At Snow Valley in Running Springs, which was closest to the fire’s front line, workers were using snowmaking guns to saturate the grounds in an attempt to keep embers from taking hold, Kanton said.

The resorts have suspended operations until further notice.

A nine-year resident of Sugarloaf, just south of Big Bear City, Kanton, 44, said he enjoys the bountiful nature and the varied weather. But he says he’s seen large fires encroaching on the peaceful community with increasing frequency.

“It’s one of the few places in Southern California where we actually get four true seasons,” he said. “Unfortunately it looks like, more and more, we’re starting to have a fifth season, which is fire season.”

Big Bear Mountain Resort, which operates the Snow Summit, Bear Mountain and Snow Valley resorts, reported its snowiest February on the mountain since at least 2000. The snowy winter, which helped plants grow, was followed by a hot and low-rainfall summer, which dried them out.

As Kanton sat in his office Wednesday, he watched as ash particles rained down from the sky. Usually, he can see across to the north shore of Big Bear Lake from his window, but on this day his view was obscured by haze. The west end of town was under an evacuation order, and the rest was told to prepare to evacuate if conditions worsened.

Kanton said he was prepared to leave town if needed and would probably head to Palm Springs to stay with friends. There’s currently just one way out — down winding Highway 18 into Lucerne Valley — so he hopes, if it comes to that, people will be patient and not panic.

“These things can escalate pretty quickly, especially given the weather conditions we’ve had,” he said.

Big Bear Lake City Manager Erik Sund is hopeful the fires that have burned in the valley in recent years, including the Radford fire in 2022, will help mitigate the current blaze by cutting down on available fuel for the flames.

He’s still concerned about the damage to roads, though, given that all routes in and out of town have been shut down except for Highway 18. In addition to creating a potential choke point in an emergency, the closures hamper residents who commute to work and tourists who want to take advantage of Big Bear’s hiking trails and other attractions.

“After this fire gets behind us, the next thing we’ll be doing is assessing all of those things,” he said. “Because before you know it, it’ll be winter, and we’ll want to welcome visitors.”

Times staff writer Hannah Fry contributed to this report

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Alex Wigglesworth, Summer Lin

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September 11, 2024
SoCalGas to move from its longtime headquarters in downtown Los Angeles

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Southern California Gas Co. is planning to move from its longtime headquarters after signing the largest office lease of the year in downtown Los Angeles.

SoCalGas will leave its namesake Gas Company Tower at 555 W. 5th St., where it has been a primary tenant since the building was completed in 1991, and move a block north to another skyscraper, at 350 S. Grand Ave.

The utility signed a long-term lease for nearly 200,000 square feet on eight floors in the Grand Avenue building on Bunker Hill often known as Two California Plaza, its new landlord said, and is expected to move by spring 2026 after building out the new offices. The gas company will also have an office on the ground floor to serve customers.

The Bunker Hill neighborhood has been a bright spot for office leasing in what has been an extended period of declining occupancy in downtown’s financial district since the pandemic ushered in a movement toward allowing employees to work from home.

Bunker Hill has benefited from having a mixture of building types, including offices, apartments and hotels, as well as being one of the city’s main cultural destinations with such institutions as Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Broad Museum and Colburn School of music.

“We are somewhat of an island in downtown,” said landlord Shaul Kuba, whose company CIM Group owns Two California Plaza. “There is so much culture, with a daytime and nighttime population.”

The building is part of an office, hotel and retail complex that dates to the 1980s, a period when Bunker Hill, a former residential neighborhood, was being remade from the ground up in a process of “urban renewal” meant to transform blighted neighborhoods.

With the arrival of SoCalGas, Two California Plaza will be home to two major Los Angeles institutions. City National Bank is already headquartered there and currently has its name affixed to the top. As part of the lease agreement with SoCalGas, its name will replace City National, Kuba said.

The new offices will be about two-thirds the size of SoCalGas’s current space in the Gas Company Tower. A spokeswoman for the utility, Erica Berardi, did not address why the company is moving but said its current lease expires at the end of 2026.

“SoCalGas is excited to maintain our headquarters in downtown Los Angeles, where we have a long history as one of the area’s largest tenants,” she said.

The lease is the largest in downtown Los Angeles this year, according to analysis from Raise Commercial Real Estate.

The utility’s roots in downtown date to the 1800s. It is the largest gas distribution utility in the United States, serving about 21 million customers across 24,000 square miles of Central and Southern California.

In a separate transaction, the Gas Company Tower is in the process of being sold. The county of Los Angeles has tentatively agreed to buy the prominent office skyscraper near the historic Millennium Biltmore Hotel for $215 million in a foreclosure sale that could take months to complete.

The Board of Supervisors must still approve the purchase, and the county has begun the due diligence process of examining the property for possible structural problems or other issues before finalizing the transaction.

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Roger Vincent

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September 11, 2024
Sale of massive Skid Row homeless housing portfolio approved by judge

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The sale of one of Los Angeles’ largest collections of homeless housing was approved by a judge Wednesday, marking a final step in averting a catastrophic loss of permanent shelter in Skid Row.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Stephen Goorvitch said the $10-million purchase price for 17 buildings to be paid by Beverly Hills developer Leo Pustilnikov was in the best interest of formerly homeless tenants and L.A. taxpayers who had been financing the portfolio’s maintenance and repairs for 16 months.

“This is a solution that is the product of collaboration, hard work and checks and balances,” Goorvitch said. “Only time will tell whether this will be a success story, but I am optimistic.”

Goorvitch on Wednesday approved the sale of an additional building, the New Genesis, to KE Ventures, an entity affiliated with a Washington D.C.-based multifamily developer, for $2.1 million. Both deals are scheduled to close next month. Along with the earlier transfers of 11 other properties to nonprofit landlords, all 29 buildings previously controlled by the Skid Row Housing Trust have found new owners.

The trust was once considered a national model for taking old single-room occupancy hotels and small apartment complexes in Skid Row and rehabilitating them into supportive housing for homeless residents. But in February 2023, the nonprofit announced it could no longer pay its bills after years of leadership problems and financial challenges. The decision left its 2,000-unit portfolio in disarray as tenants, many of whom were elderly, disabled or dealing with drug addiction, faced broken plumbing and heating, vermin infestations and other terrible conditions.

Mayor Karen Bass, City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto and other city leaders pushed for a court-ordered receivership last year to oversee the portfolio and search for new owners. Without urgent action, they said at the time, more than a thousand people could be forced to the streets and a critical source of homeless housing would be abandoned.

The process has been costly and faced missteps. The first receiver chosen, Mark Adams, resigned under pressure after just three months after struggling with financing and management. The Times reported that the city did not fully vet Adams — who had hosted a political fundraiser for the city attorney and had a history of problems in other receiverships involving low-income tenants — before recommending him for the role.

The city’s bill for the receivership is at least $37 million, though some of that amount is expected to be repaid once the sales approved Wednesday close.

Identifying new owners has been challenging, for some of the same reasons that the trust failed. Many buildings are aging and need extensive repairs; federal housing subsidies haven’t covered growing monthly costs to operate them; the tenant population has grown more difficult as leasing practices prioritize those with mental health and addiction needs. Kevin Singer, the current receiver, said in recent court filings that some of the properties had such negative value that they couldn’t be given away.

Because of these problems, city leaders had originally pitched taking on the most troubled buildings and spinning them off to nonprofits that would demolish them and build new homeless housing in their place.

But that plan faltered in the spring as city and state budgets dried up. A deal for some of the remaining buildings with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation broke down in April amid concerns about the charity’s track record in Skid Row, disputes over providing tenants with social services and the foundation’s assertion that conditions in the buildings were worse than they had believed.

Pustilnikov, who had long been interested in the properties, emerged as a buyer in the aftermath. The developer is better known for his plans to leverage a state law to build 3,500 new apartments in Beverly Hills, Redondo Beach and other wealthy Southern California communities. His attempt to amass a large downtown portfolio alongside two wealthy investors a decade ago fell apart amid litigation.

Pustilnikov has said that he’s stepping in to prevent worsening conditions in Skid Row and that he’s learned the complexities of financing and managing affordable housing in the neighborhood. He’s committed to maintaining social services for tenants, a key demand of Bass and the city.

“I would like to thank the city, county and state for their efforts in protecting this vulnerable population and I look forward to continuing to work with the mayor, City Council and County Board of Supervisors in turning around these challenging and neglected properties,” Pustilnikov said in a statement.

No formal opposition emerged to the sale, which Goorvich said was a significant factor in his approval following a 90-minute hearing in which he questioned city lawyers and the receiver. Goorvich said he was persuaded this decision would avoid an outcome that would threaten vulnerable tenants’ housing and that the city had sufficient regulatory authority to ensure the new owners would improve the properties.

“To put it in colloquial terms, something is better than nothing,” the judge said. “But I think this is a good something.”

Ann Sewill, general manager of the Los Angeles Housing Department, said after the hearing that she’s been impressed with Pustilnikov’s attention to the properties since he’s been engaged in the deal. She said he’s attempted to visit tenants units across the portfolio, asked detailed questions about building operations and has worked collaboratively with the city.

“We have a clear-eyed view of how to put these buildings back into financial and physical viability,” Sewill said.

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Liam Dillon

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August 7, 2024
A woman died after an L.A. rehab closed last year. Why was it forced to shut down in the first place?

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Jasmine Richardson had been struggling with methamphetamine and fentanyl addiction for more than a decade, but she got sober after completing a six-month program at the Teen Project’s Freehab center on Sunland Boulevard in Sun Valley.

That was right around Thanksgiving last year, and it was the first time the 33-year-old had been clean in years. Still, she wasn’t ready to leave the Freehab just yet; homeless since 2020, she wanted to spend at least a year in the 74-bed rehab facility before finding temporary housing. Then she hoped to move her teenage son up to L.A. to live with her, and to pursue her dream of becoming a veterinarian tech.

All of that was cut short Dec. 4, when the Los Angeles City Fire Department shut down the facility over what it said were building and fire code violations, officials said. The group of 43 women, whose ranks included survivors of human trafficking, substance abuse and homelessness, had a few hours to pack up their belongings and find a new place to stay.

Richardson’s mother, Janet Dooley, picked her up from Freehab and brought her back to Dooley’s home in Huntington Beach. Eight days later, Dooley found her daughter dead from an overdose of meth and fentanyl.

Jasmine Richardson when she was attending middle school in Montana in the 2000s.

(Janet Dooley)

“I believe that if the place hadn’t closed,” Dooley said, “she’d still be alive today.”

More than six months after the closure, questions about why it was forced to shut down are at the forefront of a lawsuit filed by the Teen Project, the nonprofit that operated the Freehab, against A&E Development Co., the facility’s landlord. The nonprofit alleges that A&E breached its lease and failed to maintain conditions that adhered to building codes, regulations, permits and ordinances, resulting in the rehab’s shutdown.

The organization is seeking at least $5 million in damages.

On a GoFundMe page created to raise money for a new treatment facility, the Teen Project blamed its landlord’s “refusal to ensure building’s upkeep” and the Fire Department’s “unwillingness to compromise, and exerting their power, even if it cost our girls their lives.”

According to safety violation notices from the L.A. City Fire Department obtained by The Times, the Freehab had been ordered multiple times since at least September to get a fire permit to operate a residential care facility, hire fire watch personnel, install automatic fire sprinklers throughout the building and obtain a valid permit for the fire door connecting the Freehab and the adjacent building.

The organization was notified via both email and mailed letters addressed to the Sun Valley facility, according to the notices.

The alleged safety issues apparently go back even further. According to Fox 11, LAFD Assistant Fire Chief Kristine Larson told the Freehab’s staff in December: “In 2020, this building was required to have sprinklers, and it does not have sprinklers; therefore, it is unsafe to be occupied for overnight use.”

Lauri Burns, executive officer of the Teen Project, said via email that she found out about the alleged violations a week before the closure.

“They said they weren’t shutting us down and they would give us ample time to fix things, and then they returned one week later and shut us down without notice,” Burns added.

Burns said after learning about the violations, the Freehab complied with nearly all of the requirements and paid around $7,000 a week to have a fire watch on-site at all hours. She said they weren’t able to install sprinklers because that process would take at least a month and require permits and inspections.

Case manager Priscilla Nunez helps put together items in the dining area of the new Teen Project facility in April in Van Nuys.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

In its Jan. 31 lawsuit, the Teen Project alleges that A&E failed to address rat and maggot infestations at the Freehab, ignored unauthorized trailers and homelessness in the Freehab’s shared parking lot and didn’t repay the Teen Project for replacing HVAC systems and other amenities.

Because of A&E’s “inability to provide a useable/safe space to lease for its intended purpose,” the lawsuit states, the Freehab was forced to shut down.

“The residents under The Teen Project’s care were traumatically displaced from their safety net, and horrifically resulted in the relapse and death of a young woman only a few days later,” according to the lawsuit.

In court papers, A&E disavowed responsibility for the shuttering of the Freehab, saying “the facts and the law are clear that the A&E is not responsible for ensuring the Premises could be used as a rehab facility.” A&E argued that the Teen Project “voluntarily vacated” the Freehab after the Fire Department and the California Department of Health Care Services revoked permits to operate the rehab facility.

After the Freehab’s shutdown, A&E said, it received a notice from the Teen Project demanding that A&E bring the Freehab up to code. But according to A&E, the lease required it to fix problems only if they were raised within six months of the start of the lease. The Teen Project terminated its lease on Jan. 19 after the conditions to operate the Freehab weren’t met.

The LAFD said in a Dec. 5 statement after the Freehab’s closure that the agency “will continue to provide guidance to the building owner and lessee regarding required compliance with the fire violations and change-of-use permits to ensure the safety and security of the tenants and the property.”

“The California Department of Health Care Services is responsible for ensuring this type of facility is in compliance with the fire code and questions regarding the status of this facility’s license to operate should be directed to them,” according to the statement. “They are also responsible for rehousing any displaced residents.”

LAFD spokesperson Karla Tovar said that a fire code change in 2020 required sprinklers in the type of building that housed the Freehab. The alleged violations were found during a fire inspection and “much research was done with many other agencies before the facility was closed,” she said.

In response to the Teen Project’s allegation that LAFD’s actions somehow contributed to the overdose death of one of the Freehab’s clients, Tovar said in an emailed statement:

“The LAFD is committed to preserving life, protecting property, and safeguarding our communities. Ensuring that buildings operate according to fire and life safety regulations is a matter we take seriously for residents, patrons, employees, and owners.”

A spokesperson from the California Department of Health Care Services confirmed that the Freehab was deemed noncompliant with the fire code. The agency said it was able to get 32 of the 43 women into other treatment centers across L.A. However, Richardson told them she wanted to go home to be with her son, her mother said.

The Teen Project, whose name was born out of “teenagers exiting foster care to homelessness and trafficking,” according to Burns, opened a new facility in June called the Van Nuys Sanctuary. At least 10 of the women who stayed at the Freehab reached out and asked if they could get a spot at the new center, according to Teen Project program director Melissa Coons.

“They have a safe place to be and we really try to make this place look like a home versus an institution,” she said. “We’re really excited to get back to helping the girls in the community.”

Richardson’s problems began in middle school, when she became depressed and started self-medicating with marijuana, Dooley said. It snowballed after she turned 18, when her father died and she later turned to meth. Richardson, her ex-boyfriend and her son lived with Dooley until well into the pandemic, when Dooley said she had to evict them.

Yesenia Sanchez was in the Teen Project program for substance abuse and now works as a cook at the new facility.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

“Things got worse and worse, and I had to get them out because I couldn’t live like that,” Dooley added.

After the Freehab closed, Richardson didn’t know what to do. According to her mother, she thought about going to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. She texted employees from the Teen Project to see if she could get into temporary housing.

On Dec. 11, Dooley dropped Richardson off near the courthouse to handle a legal matter but didn’t hear from her for a few hours. Richardson came home late and said she had been with friends. Dooley got up for work around 3 a.m., and when she came home five hours later, she discovered that Richardson had overdosed.

“Jasmine was incredibly upset and scared” when the Freehab closed, Coons said. “Originally, she wanted to stay with us for a year, and she never really wavered from that.”

Tom Wolf, a recovering fentanyl and heroin addict who founded the Pacific Alliance for Prevention and Recovery, said that structure and routine are especially important in early recovery. Significant emotional events, such as a death in the family, job loss or a breakup can result in relapse.

“These folks were displaced, and even if they were offered shelter or housing in another program, they were displaced from friendships, the support systems and the structure of that specific program,” he said. “If you take all of those things away at once from someone after years of homelessness, it would be easy to go back onto the street and buy fentanyl for $5 and relapse.”

Yesenia Sanchez, 31, struggled with addiction to alcohol, but she has been sober for more than two years after completing the Freehab’s six-month program. She started out as an intern in the kitchen before becoming a full-time cook at the facility.

She wasn’t working the day the Freehab was forced to shut down, but once she heard about the closure, she scrambled to help the women find other places to stay. Some of them, she said, had to go back to living on the streets.

“That was really hard because those were the girls we were helping every day, and we just didn’t have enough time,” she said.

Casey Anderson, another former Freehab client, relapsed almost immediately after the facility closed down. Anderson first started abusing Ritalin as a teenager before getting addicted to meth. She was homeless for more than a year and slept in various parks in Lancaster before deciding she needed to get help.

Casey Anderson outside her sponsor’s home in Simi Valley.

(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)

Anderson started living at the Freehab in June 2023 and was two weeks away from completing her program when the facility closed.

“It was heartbreaking,” she said. “We all felt safe. We all felt like we had a place to go and then all of a sudden, it was taken from us.”

Anderson didn’t think she would need to go into another program after the Freehab’s closure. Instead, she reverted to living with her parents in Lancaster and quickly got hooked on drugs again. In early April, she contacted one of the program directors from the Teen Project to get on the waiting list for the new Van Nuys facility, where she moved June 6. There were eight women in the program as of June 25.

She is sober again and is hoping to get back to pursuing her dream of becoming a preschool teacher. In the meantime, she recently got a job working as a registered alcohol and drug technician.

“I thought I was ready to leave, but I wasn’t,” Anderson said. “I only had two weeks left, but it turns out I actually needed more. I probably would’ve known that if we had more time to work on it.”

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Summer Lin

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August 6, 2024
Los Angeles County agrees to buy downtown skyscraper

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The county of Los Angeles has tentatively agreed to buy the Gas Company Tower, a prominent office skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles, for $215 million in a foreclosure sale.

The price is a deep discount from its appraised value of $632 million in 2020, underscoring how much downtown office values have fallen in recent years.

The Board of Supervisors must still approve the deal, which county real estate officials quietly but aggressively negotiated. If completed, the purchase could move workers and public services out of existing county offices, including the well-known Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, which dates to 1960, according to multiple people familiar with the transaction who requested they not be named in order to discuss the confidential negotiations.

The county has begun the due diligence process of examining the property for possible structural problems or other issues before finalizing the transaction, which could take two to three months to complete, the sources said.

In a statement to The Times, the county said that it had submitted a nonbinding “letter of interest” for the tower.

“Because we are seeing once-in-a-generation price reductions for commercial real estate in the downtown area, as responsible stewards of public funds, the County is doing its due diligence and evaluating the possibility of acquiring property in the Civic Center area, such as the Gas Company Tower,” the statement said.

Supervisor Janice Hahn, who is the daughter of longtime supervisor Kenneth Hahn, said in a separate statement to The Times that she is not fully on board with the acquisition.

“I am uncomfortable with the County moving forward purchasing this skyscraper until I understand the CEO’s full plan which I have yet to see. I am definitely against moving County services away from Los Angeles’ only Civic Center,” she said.

The Gas Company Tower represents “a generational investment opportunity to acquire a trophy asset at an exceptional basis,” Andrew Harper, a broker with the real estate firm JLL, said in May when JLL was hired to market the property. JLL declined to comment Tuesday on the pending sale.

The 52-story tower at 555 W. 5th St. was widely considered one of the city’s most prestigious office buildings when it was completed in 1991. It has about 1.4 million square feet of space on a 1.4-acre site at the base of Bunker Hill.

In recent years the downtown office market has turned against landlords as many tenants reduced their office footprint in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, when it became more common for employees to work remotely.

Last year, the owner of the Gas Company Tower, an affiliate of Brookfield Asset Management Ltd., defaulted on its debt and the property was put in receivership, in which a court-appointed representative took custody of the building to help creditors recover funds they lent to Brookfield. The building has roughly $465 million in outstanding loans.

Elevated interest rates have weighed on prices by making it difficult for building owners to refinance debt and pushing them into quick sales or foreclosures. Some downtown L.A. office tenants have expressed concern in recent years that the streets feel less safe than they did before the pandemic and have left for other local office centers including Century City.

The Gas Company Tower was renovated in 2023 and the tower currently is more than half leased to tenants including Southern California Gas Co., financial consulting firm Deloitte and law firm Latham & Watkins, according to real estate data provider CoStar.

Office vacancy in downtown Los Angeles was more than 30% in the second quarter, real estate brokerage CBRE said, more than triple the level typically considered to be a healthy balance between tenant and landlord interests.

Falling office values downtown are catching the attention of buyers seeking to grab property at a low point in the market, said Petra Durnin, a real estate analyst at Raise Commercial Real Estate who is not involved in the deal.

“Unfortunate situations can create opportunities for others with the cash,” Durnin said. “Downtown has been through boom and bust cycles before and always reinvented itself.”

A nearby 52-story office tower formerly owned by Brookfield at 777 S. Figueroa St. is set to be sold at the significantly discounted price of $120 million, or $117 a square foot, the Commercial Observer reported. It came close to selling for about $145 million a few months ago but the deal fell apart.

In its statement to The Times, the county said it was eyeing the Gas Company Tower as an alternative to seismically retrofitting its downtown properties. The county owns 33 facilities that engineers say are vulnerable to collapse during a major earthquake, including the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, which has been the headquarters of Los Angeles County government for six decades, home to the offices of hundreds of employees and the five county supervisors.

Last year, the county pledged to upgrade all 33 vulnerable buildings within the decade, an ambitious undertaking that experts say would cost hundreds of millions of dollars.

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Roger Vincent, Rebecca Ellis

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August 1, 2024
Nixon fire in southern Riverside County spreads rapidly, forcing evacuations

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The Nixon fire near Aguanga in southern Riverside County exploded in size after the vegetation fire ignited Monday afternoon, growing to almost 4,000 acres by Tuesday morning, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

Photos and video from the scene showed some buildings destroyed by flames, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many were damaged and if they were homes. About 2,000 buildings were under evacuation orders and warnings, according to Tawny Castro, a spokesperson for Cal Fire’s Riverside County unit.

Firefighters responded to calls around 12:30 p.m. Monday about the blaze near Richard Nixon Boulevard in Aguanga, not far from Palomar Mountain and Riverside County’s border with San Diego County.

Within a few hours, the fire saw explosive growth, hitting 1,000 acres by 5 p.m. before almost tripling in size by 8 p.m., according to Cal Fire.

It had swelled to 3,750 acres as of Monday morning with no containment. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

Further norther in Kern County, the Borel fire continued to expand in and around Sequoia National Forest, growing to 57,306 acres Tuesday morning, according to federal officials. It was 17% contained.

The massive Park fire burning in Butte and Tehama counties, which has become the state’s fifth-largest wildfire in recorded history, continued to grow overnight, hitting 383,619 acres as of Tuesday morning, with 14% containment, according to Cal Fire.

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Grace Toohey

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July 30, 2024
Carmel-by-the-Sea, a town with no addresses, says the time has come to add house numbers

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After decades of resistance, Carmel-by-the-Sea is about to address some of its residents’ biggest frustrations.

Quite literally.

The moneyed little town, where homes and businesses have no street addresses, soon will have numbers assigned to its buildings, forgoing a cherished local tradition after too many complaints about lost packages, trouble setting up utilities and banking accounts, and other problems.

The Carmel-by-the-Sea City Council approved establishing street addresses in a 3-2 vote earlier this month, with proponents citing public safety concerns and the need to abide by the state fire code, which requires buildings to be numbered.

“Do we need to wait for someone to die in order to decide that this is the right thing to do? It is the law,” said Councilmember Karen Ferlito, who voted in favor of addresses.

Rather than street numbers, residents in the town of 3,200 have long used directional descriptors: City Hall is on the east side of Monte Verde Street between Ocean and 7th avenues. And they give their homes whimsical names such as Sea Castle, Somewhere and Faux Chateau.

There is no home mail delivery. Locals pick up their parcels at the downtown post office, where, many say, serendipitous run-ins with neighbors are an essential part of the small-town charm.

For more than 100 years, residents fought to keep it that way, once threatening to secede from California if addresses were imposed. They argued that the lack of house numbers — along with other quirks, such as no streetlights or sidewalks in residential areas — added to the vaunted “village character.”

“We are losing this place, day by day and week by week, from people who want to modernize us, who want to take us to a new level, when we want to stay where we are,” Neal Kruse, co-chair of the Carmel Preservation Assn., said during the July 9 City Council meeting at which addresses were approved.

Carol Oaks stands in front of her home, which is named “Somewhere” and has no formal address. Carmel-by-the-Sea will soon number its homes and businesses.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

The debate over street numbers has simmered for years and intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic, when people began shopping online more frequently and struggled to get their packages delivered.

Some residents and tourists worry that if they have an accident or a medical issue, emergency responders will have trouble finding them. Others have had trouble receiving mail-order prescriptions and medical equipment.

“This is a life-and-death situation in my life and my family,” resident Deanna Dickman told the City Council. “I want a street address that people can find on GPS and get there, and my wife can get the medication she needs.”

Dickman said her wife needs a shot that comes through the mail and must be refrigerated. If she can’t get it delivered, she has to travel to an infusion center and get her medication every 30 days “so she can breathe,” Dickman said.

Dickman once had her own temperature-controlled medication “tossed over a fence a block away.” The property owner was not home, and it spoiled.

Resident Susan Bjerre said she once needed oxygen delivered to her house for someone who had just gotten out of the hospital. The delivery driver could not find the residence, so she said: “I will be in the street. I will wave you down.”

“This is going to sound really snarky, but I think people who oppose instituting an address system don’t realize how inconsiderate they are to everyone else,” Bjerre said.

Another speaker, Alice Cory, said she worried that implementing addresses in Carmel-by-the-Sea — long a haven for artists, writers and poets — “would just make us another town along the coast.”

In the one-square-mile town, “the police know where everybody is,” and fire officials get to people quickly because there are so few streets, she said.

“Let’s keep it that way, and let’s keep the sweetness of this little town, because people know Carmel for a reason,” she said.

Neal Kruse, center, with Karyl Hall and her dog, Bubbles, chat with a resident at the Carmel Preservation Assn. booth at a farmers market. Kruse and Hall worry street addresses will hurt the town’s character.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

Emily Garay, a city administrative analyst, told the council that while local authorities might be familiar with Carmel-by-the-Sea’s unconventional navigational practices, other emergency responders — such as the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection or Monterey County’s contracted ambulance provider — might struggle to quickly figure out where people live.

The California Fire Code requires buildings to have and display addresses. But Carmel-by-the-Sea has not enforced the provision.

“I believe, as a professional firefighter for over 37 years [with] a lot of experience in emergency response, that if the question is, ‘Is it more advantageous to have building numbers identified?’ Yes, absolutely,” Andrew Miller, chief of the Monterey Fire Department, told the council.

Residents opposed to street addresses have said they fear that numbering houses would lead to home mail delivery — which, in turn, could trigger the closure of the Carmel-by-the-Sea post office.

In January, David Rupert, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service told The Times that the post office had “been serving the local community since 1889” and there were no plans to close it. (The lobby for the post office was red-tagged this spring after a septuagenarian crashed her red Tesla through the front windows.)

Garay said addresses would not trigger home delivery.

Before voting against addresses, Mayor Dave Potter said he was “concerned about the fact that we’re kind of losing our character of our community along the way here” and that it had become the nature of the community “to fight over little things.”

But Ferlito said she had received “piles of emails from residents” who wanted addresses and worried about being found in a crisis.

“If we’re saying we will lose our quaintness because we have an address, I think that’s a false narrative,” she said. “This is more than quaintness. This is life emergencies.”

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Hailey Branson-Potts

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July 20, 2024
Historic building in Italy damaged by parkour tourists

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Jumping from building to building in an ancient city might seem like a dream for those who practice parkour — a sport that involves making it past obstacles — but it can cause damage to historic buildings.A London-based parkour group, Team Phat, visited the ancient Italian city of Matera, running, climbing and leaping through its streets and over its precious structures.One of the freerunners caused a segment of a historic building to fall off, sending both himself and the building part crashing to the ground.Matera, a city of stone which dates back to the Paleolithic era, is located in the Basilicata region in Southern Italy.In 1993, it was granted UNESCO World Heritage status and was the European Capital of Culture in 2019.A video of parkour stunts in the ancient city was posted by Team Phat on YouTube two months ago, along with a caption explaining that they were “in the beautiful city of Matera” where one of their members, Devon McIntosh, “had a scary fall that could have been really bad.”The video shows the freerunner jumping off a building and attempting to use a stone ledge to help him get to another building across the street. But the ledge could not withstand his force and dramatically broke off.An off-camera member of the team suggests that they “hide the evidence” and McIntosh shows his injury to his leg.The video has attracted many critical comments on social media. “This city is a UNESCO heritage site for a reason,” wrote an Instagram user named Bruno Burke. “We should enjoy our discipline as much as possible, but we should also watch where we step, not only for safety but also for respect of culture and history.”Misbehaving visitorsMany of Matera’s districts and habitable caves were renovated in the second half of the 20th century, as the city regained its charm and became a popular Instagrammable hotspot.Unsurprisingly, international cinema also pays the occasional visit. The 2021 James Bond movie, “No Time to Die” features an exciting car chase through Matera’s streets.The well curated remains of the ancient cave churches, fortified farmhouses and districts make Matera a city of universal value, according to UNESCO.CNN has reached out to Matera’s police force for comment on the parkour incident.Team Phat’s behavior has raised further questions about the conduct of travelers at sites of architectural beauty. At the start of the video, one of the Team Phat members said: “As some of you know, we’ve been banned from Venice and we can never go back.” In March 2023, a Team Phat member jumped into a canal in Venice, following which Mayor Luigi Brugnaro commented on X: “This ‘subject’ should be given a certificate of STUPIDITY…. We are trying to identify him to denounce him and his companion that made the stupid video for social media.”On April 25, entry fee tickets were introduced in Venice. Brugnaro said: “Venice is the first city in the world to start on this journey which could become an example for other fragile cities that must be preserved.”In March, a historic district in Kyoto, Japan, announced that it is banning tourists from entering, following local frustrations about visitors’ poor behavior and failure to follow Japanese customs and etiquette.

MATERA, Italy —

Jumping from building to building in an ancient city might seem like a dream for those who practice parkour — a sport that involves making it past obstacles — but it can cause damage to historic buildings.

A London-based parkour group, Team Phat, visited the ancient Italian city of Matera, running, climbing and leaping through its streets and over its precious structures.

One of the freerunners caused a segment of a historic building to fall off, sending both himself and the building part crashing to the ground.

Matera, a city of stone which dates back to the Paleolithic era, is located in the Basilicata region in Southern Italy.

In 1993, it was granted UNESCO World Heritage status and was the European Capital of Culture in 2019.

A video of parkour stunts in the ancient city was posted by Team Phat on YouTube two months ago, along with a caption explaining that they were “in the beautiful city of Matera” where one of their members, Devon McIntosh, “had a scary fall that could have been really bad.”

The video shows the freerunner jumping off a building and attempting to use a stone ledge to help him get to another building across the street. But the ledge could not withstand his force and dramatically broke off.

An off-camera member of the team suggests that they “hide the evidence” and McIntosh shows his injury to his leg.

The video has attracted many critical comments on social media. “This city is a UNESCO heritage site for a reason,” wrote an Instagram user named Bruno Burke. “We should enjoy our [parkour] discipline as much as possible, but we should also watch where we step, not only for safety but also for respect of culture and history.”

Misbehaving visitors

Many of Matera’s districts and habitable caves were renovated in the second half of the 20th century, as the city regained its charm and became a popular Instagrammable hotspot.

Unsurprisingly, international cinema also pays the occasional visit. The 2021 James Bond movie, “No Time to Die” features an exciting car chase through Matera’s streets.

The well curated remains of the ancient cave churches, fortified farmhouses and districts make Matera a city of universal value, according to UNESCO.

CNN has reached out to Matera’s police force for comment on the parkour incident.

Team Phat’s behavior has raised further questions about the conduct of travelers at sites of architectural beauty. At the start of the video, one of the Team Phat members said: “As some of you know, we’ve been banned from Venice and we can never go back.”

In March 2023, a Team Phat member jumped into a canal in Venice, following which Mayor Luigi Brugnaro commented on X: “This ‘subject’ should be given a certificate of STUPIDITY…. We are trying to identify him to denounce him and his companion that made the stupid video for social media.”

On April 25, entry fee tickets were introduced in Venice. Brugnaro said: “Venice is the first city in the world to start on this journey which could become an example for other fragile cities that must be preserved.”

In March, a historic district in Kyoto, Japan, announced that it is banning tourists from entering, following local frustrations about visitors’ poor behavior and failure to follow Japanese customs and etiquette.

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June 20, 2024
Cal State L.A. encampment is shut down days after takeover of building with administrators inside

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Dozens of officers in riot gear from multiple agencies descended Monday afternoon on a pro-Palestinian encampment at Cal State L.A. to dismantle the camp and force protesters to leave after tensions escalated last week.

About 1:20 p.m., police issued a dispersal order in English and Spanish, and the remaining protesters in the encampment, a group of about 10, left voluntarily, said university spokesperson Erik Frost Hollins.

It was the last major pro-Palestinian protest encampment at a Los Angeles college.

Officers, who included those from the LAPD, California Highway Patrol and multiple Cal State campus police departments, did not use any weapons to remove protesters and made no arrests, Hollins said. Campus security and police blocked all road entrances to campus, although exits were open, and the campus was accessible by foot.

Using forklifts and large dumpsters, crews took down the painted and graffitied wooden boards that encircled the encampment and hauled them away. Many were painted in the red, green, white and black colors of the Palestinian flag and bore phrases including “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” and “Google LASD gangs.”

Students launched the camp on May 1 to demand that Cal State L.A. and the California State University system disclose its investments, “divest from companies that financially and materially support genocide, defend the Palestinian people’s rights of resistance and return, and declare that the genocide in Gaza and occupation of Palestine is illegal under international law,” according to a statement from the Students for Justice in Palestine at Cal State L.A.

Hollins said that, since the encampment launched, Cal State L.A. President Berenecea Johnson Eanes had visited it twice and held several conversations with protesters.

While other universities, including USC and UCLA, moved in relatively quickly to shut down pro-Palestinian encampments over the spring, the one at Cal State L.A. was tolerated for many weeks. For the most part, it hasn’t been a site of heated controversy or clashes involving students, campus officials or police.

But the nature of the relationship between the university and protesters changed Wednesday, Hollins said, when several dozen protesters barricaded themselves inside the student services building, with some administrators inside, for more than nine hours. The Students for Justice in Palestine group said that administrators were free to leave, with escorts, whenever they desired. The group said it communicated that message directly and via Instagram. About 60 staffers were in the building for roughly two hours before exiting. Around a dozen, including Eanes and Hollins, voluntarily remained behind.

Hollins said there was no specific event on Monday that spurred the university to call in police but said officials had been talking about taking the encampment down since the building occupation.

On Monday afternoon, Eanes said in a campus-wide email that “those associated with the encampment engaged in unlawful acts that put staff and students” at risk during the building occupation, “including assault, vandalism, destruction of property, and looting.”

“The only acceptable option for the safety of the entire campus community was for the encampment to disband and disperse. We will not negotiate with those who would use destruction and intimidation to meet their goals,” she wrote. “It does not escape me that public employees serving a public mission at a public university in one of the region’s most under-resourced communities have been victimized by those claiming to protest injustice.”

Eanes said the campus, where classes have been virtual since the middle of last week, would continue virtually on Tuesday. The university is in its summer session, which ends Aug. 10.

On Monday, the Cal State L.A. chapter of Faculty for Justice in Palestine said it had remained concerned for weeks that the peaceful encampment might be compromised as negotiations stalled and frustrations mounted.

“While the protest of June 12th produced a turning point for the encampment, we propose that timely, good faith negotiations with the students over their divestment demands is the best route to a resolution,” the group said in a letter posted on Instagram. “We also recommend that you communicate more clearly with the encampment students about a timeline and process for decampment, rather than resort to an unannounced possible sweep that is likely to produce trauma, harm, and violence as it has at other universities.”

An Instagram post by Students for Justice in Palestine at Cal State L.A. showed a video of what appeared to be activists talking to police in riot gear who were gathered outside the camp’s barricades. “We have to do whatever they say,” a voice from the camp says in the background. “Can we leave?” an activist says to police as the activist looks out at law enforcement. “Yes!” several officers say in unison. “I want you to go,” an officer says. “I want less of you in there.”

The encampment was nearly dismantled by 5:30 p.m. Its removal revealed graffiti covering the wall below the “Olympic Fantasy” tile mural near the heart of campus, with slogans such as “Gaza lives” and “Stop funding genocide.”

The student services building, the site of last week’s occupation, remained closed off with police tape. Tables and chairs were turned over on its patio, and graffiti remained across its ground-level windows.

A campus security worker not authorized to speak to media said officials would clean up the building area after the camp materials were fully removed. They said they weren’t sure whether that would happen Monday.

Onlookers, including students and neighborhood residents, expressed surprise at the encampment’s removal and the police presence Monday.

“I did not agree with what the camp stood for, but I walked by it many times,” said James Wheeler, who walked over to the encampment area — cordoned off with yellow police tape — while a helicopter flew above.

“These were mostly peaceful students,” Wheeler said, “and their protest was nothing like the conflict or controversy you have seen at other colleges, aside from the one time they went to occupy the building.”

A student who said she knew members of the encampment said the police response was “way overblown” considering it was about 10 activists who voluntarily left the scene. “They sent in all these police cars, these riot police, blocked off the streets, all for nothing. It’s out of control,” said the student, who declined to share her name.

In her letter Monday, Eanes said the university would “need to confront the aftermath of sheltering inside [the student services building], the anger at the destruction of student spaces they worked so hard to create, and the grief of feeling less safe on a campus we all cherish.”

Hollins said, during the sit-in, one employee had “something thrown at their head,” while another was pushed into the door and then out of the way as protesters forced their way into the building.

Protesters vandalized the building heavily, Hollins said, and the university is still investigating to determine whether there should be arrests. Protesters covered their faces and took other steps to hide their identities, which complicates the investigation, they said.

Activists defended their actions.

“The defense of the sit-in and the Solidarity Encampment will continue despite heavy police pressure from the University Police Department, the Los Angeles Police Department, and the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department until CSULA ends its financial and material support for genocide,” the group said in a statement last week.

Times staff writer Angie Orellana Hernandez contributed to this report.

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Jaweed Kaleem, Jaclyn Cosgrove

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June 17, 2024
Illegal hostels are popping up in L.A. neighborhoods, to some residents’ ire

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In a mostly quiet neighborhood of older homes and small apartment buildings, some residents have drawn their own no-go zones around what might sound like a crash pad for traveling backpackers: hostels.

At least two of them have popped up on West View Street in Mid-City Heights in the past few years, with more in surrounding neighborhoods.

Residents say they’ve seen strangers smoke marijuana and drink alcohol outside the newly built buildings. They say the properties draw drug deals and a frequent police presence. A few months ago, a woman ranted in the street outside one of the properties for hours, at times alleging someone stole something from her.

Adriana Marcial said one night her husband caught two men having sex in front of the home they share with their two children. When he startled the men, she said they left and entered one of the hostels.

“About a year ago, we stopped walking through there,” said Marcial, 38. “You get that vibe of feeling unsafe.”

Long associated with backpackers and young travelers, hostels typically offer cheap dorm-style beds and a shared kitchen. They can be a social place to meet people from around the world and, at times, the start of an alcohol- or drug-fueled night.

In Europe, such facilities often are located in bustling corners of the city. But in Los Angeles, hostels are opening for business within residential neighborhoods they’re not allowed in, drawing the ire of some Angelenos who say a revolving cast of characters has brought an increase in noise and crime.

With beds as cheap as $25 a night, the properties also serve as an option for people struggling to make ends meet, providing a relief valve in an expensive city where thousands sleep on the streets.

According to the Department of City Planning, hostels are banned in low-density residential neighborhoods like Mid-City Heights. The budget-stay properties can operate in high-density residential neighborhoods like parts of Koreatown, but need a special permit to do so.

A recent Times search of an online booking site found seven Los Angeles hostels advertised in low-density residential areas where the planning department says the facilities aren’t allowed.

The numbers could be greater. According to an October motion from Councilwoman Heather Hutt, there were at least 28 illegal hostels operating in Council District 10 alone. The district includes Koreatown and parts of South L.A., as well as Mid-City Heights and the larger Mid-City neighborhood.

Some people who stayed at one hostel described it as a quiet, affordable place as they traveled L.A. or sought a full-time job. Others were students or had low-wage work.

“Everyone here is trying to get by,” said Chris Smoot, who had been staying in a West View Street hostel for three weeks. The 44-year-old was trying to find work and establish permanent housing so he could bring his family out from Florida.

Hutt’s motion paints a more ominous picture, saying neighbors have complained that a variety of crimes are “radiating from these properties” —including battery and drug use — and that the police department has experience “heightened” calls for service.

In approving the motion in December, the City Council ordered multiple departments to create a plan to crack down on illegal hostels, which the motion said two departments have been unable to do so, in part because of jurisdictional issues.

The council also established an enforcement task force specifically for Mid-City.

Devyn Bakewell, a spokeswoman for Hutt, said the task force’s work is ongoing and that the city attorney has issued “citations to certain addresses and has put several locations on notice about illegal land use.”

In Mid-City Heights, residents say officials should have — and still need to — act faster, noting at least one hostel still appears in operation.

Neighbor complaints also extend to two other newly built buildings that house short-term residents, which they say shouldn’t be in a neighborhood with children.

One is a sober-living home owned in part by a man named Nathan Young, according to his attorney Marc Williams. Young and others were sued last year by insurance company Aetna, which alleged they ran sober-living homes in Los Angeles and Orange counties that were “little more than drug dens.”

In a statement shared by Williams, Young denied Aetna’s allegations and said the sober-living home in Mid-City Heights is “dedicated to housing families with a parent in addiction recovery” and it has been successful in rebuilding lives.

Neighbors say they’ve seen people from the facility drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana in public and one neighbor said he saw what appeared to be a Nazi SS flag draped from a window on the site.

Young said they had the offensive flag taken down immediately after hearing of it and that “idea that we encourage the use of drugs and alcohol is ridiculous and diametrically opposed to our mission.”

The other property is leased by a homeless-services provider who previously provided housing on site to people exiting jail and prison, according to the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which funded the program.

LAHSA said that this use stopped in September and that the service provider, Abundant Blessings, told the agency that a County Department of Mental Health-funded program has operated on site since.

A spokesperson with the mental health department said they found no record of a department program operating at the address and that the department does not have a relationship with Abundant Blessings.

Alex Soofer, executive director for Abundant Blessings, declined to comment, including to say what his organization currently uses the property for.

Barbara Matson lives behind that property with her husband and 8-year old daughter. Last year, she said, she awoke around midnight to a man throwing furniture.

“I am free,” Matson recalled the man screaming and using profanities. “I wasn’t sure if . . . he might jump over my fence.”

Matson said she no longer hosts backyard birthday parties for her daughter.

The uses Mid City-Heights residents cite as concerns exist in a type of housing that’s grown increasingly common in some Los Angeles neighborhoods where single family homes sit on lots the city has long zoned for a few more units.

There, developers are knocking down small, old houses and building multistory box-like structures with as many as five bedrooms. At some developments, there are two new duplexes on a lot, while others have a new single-family home on one side and a duplex on the other.

In some corners of South L.A., landlords specialize in renting these new properties to large families on a permanent basis.

Near USC, the housing style is used for student housing and has led to concern developers have displaced long-term residents.

Some in Mid-City Heights said since the new buildings went up in their neighborhood they’ve noticed an increase in strangers — some of them aggressive — walking the streets, but don’t always know where they come from. They also say they’ve found more syringes, condoms and other trash.

With more duplex developments underway, neighbors have concerns. They said they would welcome it if people looking for a permanent home moved into the buildings, but want temporary stays ended.

“We are being oversaturated,” said Roxana Brusso, who has owned a home in the neighborhood since 2008. “The city is asking us to sacrifice our safety, quality of life and property values.”

Marcial put it this way: “You just never know who is coming. Maybe it’s not always bad people, but it’s not always good people.”

The city has taken some action against the West View Street hostels.

In 2023, the Department of Building and Safety cited a newly built duplex for use as an unapproved hostel and the building appears to no longer be used as such, according to neighbors.

On the other side of the street and a few doors down, LA Modern Hostel received the same citation more than a year ago. Two Times reporters booked beds there in early May.

Located at 2125 S. West View St., the hostel sits inside a white single-family house with gray trim. Built in 2021, the three-story box sits on the front of a 6,000 square-foot lot. In the back is a duplex, built the same year.

Written reviews on the website Hostel World are mostly negative and describe a difficult check-in process, with one person saying they never got inside and were forced to “walk all night.”

Another reviewer described a dirty bathroom and a room where “it seemed nobody had personal hygiene skills.”

So far this year, city records show police were called to the address to investigate reports of two disturbances, a theft, an instance of vandalism and a battery.

In a three-day span last year, police responded to reports of an assault with a deadly weapon, a prowler, a burglary and a disturbance.

LAPD Officer Hector Marquez said issues — including loitering, theft allegations and disputes — have spilled into the neighborhood from the property and disrupted residents’ quality of life, but there’s been no evidence of violent crime.

On a recent Thursday, the hostel was calm. At check-in, a worker told Times reporters there were no drugs, alcohol or weapons allowed. Smoking was to be in the back of the lot — in an outdoor common area behind the duplex.

Inside the single-family house at the front of the property, there were six numbered rooms across two floors. Room 2 had four bunk beds accommodating eight twin mattresses, some which had towels or sheets draped to carve out privacy.

At the back of the lot behind the duplex, people lingered outside for hours on black patio furniture. As the night progressed, some returned from work, with one man dressed in a button-down shirt and khakis finding solace in a cigarette, dragging it with a worn expression. Other guests discussed sports betting over Modelos and marijuana blunts.

Past midnight, a group gathered inside in the ground floor common area. Some read, while others watched videos or tackled schoolwork.

In several emails, a man identifying himself as the property’s owner thanked The Times for its reporting and said his “tenants” have agreed to close the “boarding house” before a June hearing date and convert it into family living.

According to the planning department, boarding houses — defined as a dwelling unit with no more than five guest rooms — are allowed in many low residential zones like Mid-City Heights. A hostel, according to city code, is any dwelling unit that is advertised as such or listed with a “recognized national or international hostel organization.” There’s no stated guest room limit.

The person who checked Times reporters into LA Modern Hostel — which had six numbered rooms, has hostel in its name and is advertised that way on websites like Hostel World — did not respond to a voice mail and text seeking comment.

In a brief interview in the outdoor common area, a man who described himself as a music producer and declined to give his name said his stay has been quiet and relatively affordable. But he added if someone built a hostel next to his house, he — like some Mid-City Heights residents — would wonder who was passing through.

There may have been a second hostel on the same property.

One of the units in the duplex between the common area and LA Modern Hostel has been advertised as LA Modern Hostel 2 — located at 2123 S. West View St.

A year ago, someone who lived in a nearby house with a similar address posted video from their security camera on Nextdoor. In the video, a man rings the doorbell and says he’s there to check into LA Modern Hostel 2.

The Nextdoor poster tells the man he has the wrong address and is on West Boulevard, not West View.

The man insists he’s correct and threatens to report the poster, who closes the door, prompting the man to repeatably bang on it.

“I am calling the police!” the man yells. “Open this f——- door!”

While appearing to call the police on the phone, the man repeatably calls the poster a gay slur in a raised voice, interspersed with expletives. He then leaves.

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Andrew Khouri, Anthony De Leon

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May 21, 2024
On a Hollywood studio lot, a new New York comes to life

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Last summer, when the Hollywood writers’ strike had shut down film and television production, a crew of scenic painters at the legendary Fox Studio Lot took advantage of the lull to mess up New York City.

Work had recently been completed on a new set of façades meant to mimic Manhattan streets, but the result was too pretty and clean. Even the smooth gray concrete curbs looked suspiciously fresh.

“After the curbs were perfectly poured, we had a gentleman with a jackhammer come in here and chip away at them,” said Gary Ehrlich, president of studio operations. “It was slightly heartbreaking to see.”

Today, the curbs are suitably beaten up, with dings and black smears as if tires had been rubbing against them for decades. Fire escapes look corroded and other metal fixtures such as banisters have been coated to look old or rusty, while walls appear water-stained. A patina of age has settled over this faux city.

A film crew gets ready for a shoot at the new New York set at Fox Studios in Los Angeles on March 26, 2024. The new set that is different from conventional backlot façades because it has stages inside the New York “buildings” where filming can take place.

The painstaking besmirchment of New York Street was one more twist in the long saga of one of filmdom’s most famous outdoor sets. Looming near the front gate like an adult-sized playhouse, an earlier version of the set and now the new one have long served notice to visitors that they have arrived at a movie studio that is itself a leading character in Hollywood lore.

Its lineage is suitably rich in Hollywood flavor: In 1967 Fox was preparing to shoot the film version of “Hello, Dolly!,” a Tony-award winning musical set in 1890s New York City that ran for years on Broadway. The script included a spectacular outdoor parade with thousands of extras, and studio executives determined that it would be impossible to shoot on location in New York because the city had changed too much.

Fox production designer John DeCuir, who had already won Academy Awards for his design of “The King and I” and “Cleopatra,” came up with a streetscape that required more than 500 workers to labor for four months to build. The $2.25-million price tag made it the most costly movie set built to date, the UPI news service reported at the time.

It required more than 300,000 feet of board lumber and 22 miles of telephone wire strung between poles, the way it was in old New York. A painted 11-story office building façade obscured the view of the Century Plaza Hotel looming next to the lot, according to Barbra Archives, which chronicles the career of “Hello, Dolly!” star Barbra Streisand.

Barbra Streisand marches with a band in a scene from the 1969 romantic comedy “Hello, Dolly!” filmed on Fox’s New York set in Century City.

(John Springer Collection / Getty Images)

Dominating the street was a replica of an elevated train station and a steam locomotive acquired from a sugar plantation in Hawaii, where it had been used to transport workers.

On July 16, 1968, the Valley Times reported, “The parade stretching one-fifth of a mile and comprised of 675 persons in 16 units passed through a crowd of 3,108 film extras” in period costumes. Among the performers were the UCLA marching band and the Budweiser Clydesdales. The director was actor-dancer Gene Kelly.

As impressive as the set was, it was intended to be temporary, said Michael Whetstone, a production designer who worked on building the new version of New York Street.

“It was supposed to be torn down but wasn’t because it was too expensive” to remove, he said. At the time the studio was reeling from financial setbacks including a $30-million loss on “Hello, Dolly!,” according to the New York Times.

Maintenance and prop makers James Scobie, left, and Norm Greene, work on the façade of the new New York set at Fox Studios .

The set enjoyed a second, money-making act in the years that followed as Fox rented it out for use on pictures that included Warner Bros.’ comedy “Up the Sandbox,” starring Streisand, and MGM’s musical “New York, New York,” starring Liza Minnelli and Robert De Niro. Among the television shows that used it were “Charlie’s Angels” and “Moonlighting,” while Bruno Mars, Lady Gaga and other musicians used it for music videos.

But a few years ago, with the set showing its age, the studio started considering its replacement, Ehrlich said. “It had been exposed to the elements for five decades and was past its useful life.”

Fox tapped Culver City architect Nathan Moore of House & Robertson Architects to design something sturdier.

Construction required 49 tons of rebar and more than 1,000 cubic feet of concrete. The set is held up by 260 tons of structural steel and backed inside with 4,400 square feet of catwalks. Lighting and other electrical functions are supported with 21,000 square feet of conduit and wire, allowing productions to hook up to house power instead of rolling in generators. The set also had to comply with building codes and be tracked by city building inspectors.

The new New York Street was made to look like the city in the mid 20th century, a decision that required detailed craftsmanship such as window heads and sills that would have been carved out of wood in years past but were instead fabricated out of plastic foam and finished with plaster. Windows were installed to be easily replaced so productions can break them when scenes call for it.

Whetstone oversaw the project and, as part of his research, made several trips to New York, spending long hours on foot trying to get a sense of how light plays on buildings at night.

“I was literally walking Lower Manhattan from 10 p.m. to 4 in the morning taking pictures,” he said.

Where the original “Hello, Dolly!” set was based on a commercial section of 1890s New York suitable for a parade, Fox elected to make the new set feel like a neighborhood from a later era.

“It’s more Lower Manhattan, more Bowery,” Whetstone said. “Definitely the Lower East Side.”

A film crew member waits to set up for a shoot at the new New York set.

While the set is “a default vision of New York City,” said Whetstone, it also is intended to stand in for any major city. Through the years, Fox’s New York Street has subbed for Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Pasadena.

Even though improving camera technology through the years has made it easier to shoot on location, there are reasons filmmakers keep shooting on studio lots, said Jason E. Squire, entertainment podcaster and professor emeritus at USC School of Cinematic Arts.

As filming equipment and cameras got lighter and more portable, the more free-flowing New Wave cinema that emerged in the late 1950s and ’60s employed provocative camerawork.

“This liberation led to people shooting off the studio lot,” Squire said. “Filmmakers wanted to get away from the studio.”

But it has remained expensive to shoot a large-scale production in the real world with all the vehicles, equipment and personnel required to be transported and managed on-site.

“One of the key decisions early in any production is whether to build sets on a lot or shoot in a real location,” Squire said. “That depends on how intricate the sequences are going to be, how intimate. It’s a judgment call and a money call, and the money usually wins.”

Shooting behind studio gates also prevents uncomfortable collisions between fantasy and reality.

“On the lot you don’t have interference from civilians,” Squire said. “You can control traffic, you can control lighting. All of the equipment is at your beck and call.”

Whetstone recalled having to flee location shooting in downtown L.A.’s Arts District when working on Season 1 of “New Girl,” a Fox television comedy starring Zooey Deschanel that premiered in 2011.

“We started out shooting in downtown Los Angeles, and by the end of our fifth night shoot we had angered so many of the neighbors around in the community that we ended up building downtown L.A. on the Fox lot,” Whetstone said.

Gary Ehrlich, president and general manager of studio operations at Fox Studio Lot, shows off the scaffolding for lighting inside one of the buildings in Fox’s new New York Street set.

The makeover of New York Street is in addition to a planned $1.5-billion upgrade of the Fox Studio Lot announced last year by Fox Corp. that is to include more soundstages and offices. Fox Corp. retained ownership of the lot when Walt Disney Co. bought most of 21st Century Fox’s entertainment assets in 2019.

The upgrades come as the real New York mounts an aggressive effort to lure TV and movie producers from L.A. by building new studios and soundstages.

On New York Street in Los Angeles, Fox also was able to transform the set behind the façades, adding 4,000 square feet of interior space that makes it easier to meld outdoor and indoor action. The studio declined to reveal exactly how much the new multimillion-dollar set cost, but Fox wants it to stand for another half-century at least.

“This project was approached not just as temp architecture but as something more permanent,” Whetstone said. “We want this to last a long time.”

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Roger Vincent

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May 17, 2024