Accomplishments

On October 6, approximately 110 participants, including staff and officials from the five cities and interested community members, attended the Westside Cities’ Livable Boulevards symposium at the Pacific Design Center in West Hollywood.  The symposium’s aim was to promote practical solutions for reinventing segments of Westside boulevards as attractive mixed-use neighborhood centers, even as these streets maintain their local and regional transportation functions.  Conference attendees were welcomed by West Hollywood Mayor John Heilman and Linda Briskman, Vice-Chair of the Westside Cities COG and Beverly Hills Council member. A grant from the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG), enabled the Westside Cities to work with the San Francisco-based firm of Freedman, Tung and Bottomley to research and organize the symposium’s speakers.

 

Keynote speaker Gordon Price, a former Vancouver Council member, demonstrated Vancouver’s success at creating a livable, walkable downtown through balancing high density residential development with extensive open space and maintaining the traditional, lively character of the commercial streets.  Central to Vancouver’s strategy was providing multiple transportation choices, including walking, biking, automobile, transit and buses. 

Morning speakers included Brian Taylor (UCLA, Institute of Transportation Studies, Calvin Hollis (Keyser Marston Associates), Dena Belzer (Strategic Economics), Patrick Kennedy (Panoramic Interests) and Michael Freedman (Freedman, Tung & Bottomley).  An afternoon workshop session focused on examples presented by Westside Cities staff of La Cienega Boulevard as it winds its way through the Westside in many forms. Greg Tung (Freedman, Tung & Bottomley) and Neal Payton (Torti Gallas and Partners) provided comment and suggestions for addressing various aspects of revitalizing La Cienega Boulevard.

The Westside Cities achieved its goal for the symposium of kick-starting the conversation and providing the tools for all of our cities to consider their options for creating more livable boulevards.  Future cooperative efforts using these concepts may promote regional improvements along the Westside’s boulevard corridors.

The following resources are available for download:

PDF Files
Livable Boulevards White Paper	Toolkit of Resources
PowerPoint Presentations
Dena Belzer Strategic Economics	Westside Cities staff La Cienega Boulevard Segments
Neal Payton Torti Gallas & Partners, Inc.	Gordon Price Simon Fraser University
Brian Taylor Institute of Transportation Studies	Gregory Tung Freedman, Tung & Bottomley

This page was last modified on 11/16/06