Long Beach may not have flying cars in the next two or three years, but the City is planning a number of housing and residential developments for the future of the city.
Those construction plans were shared with the public on Tuesday at an event hosted by the Long Beach Business Journal and titled “Building a Better Long Beach.”
As members of Long Beach’s municipal government and other attendees settled into their seats inside the Beverly O’Neill Theater, the lights dimmed, and a film began to play on the projectors.
The large auditorium screens displayed images of iconic Long Beach landmarks, accompanied by upbeat music. Following the short video, Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia took to the stage to begin the program.
[aesop_image img=”https://signal-tribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Developments-1-1.jpg” credit=”Sebastian Echeverry | Signal Tribune” align=”right” lightbox=”on” caption=”Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia speaks about the building developments planned throughout the city at a “Building a Better Long Beach” event on that took place on Tuesday, June 6.” captionposition=”left” revealfx=”off”] The presentation gave the mayor an opportunity to showcase many of the construction projects that are either complete, in mid-construction or planned for the future. These undertakings varied from affordable-housing projects to high-end commercial buildings.
Garcia started his presentation by saying the unemployment rate in Long Beach was 4.7 percent— compared to 5.2 percent in December last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The mayor said that there are approximately 9,000 new jobs in development since the 2007 recession and that some of those jobs are a result of the ongoing construction labor happening throughout Long Beach.
The mayor continued by discussing some of the residential units that are either complete or are in the planning stages. These projects include senior housing and living spaces for low-income families.
“We are building affordable housing for all levels of affordability,” Garcia said.
He believes the housing plans currently in development are financially feasible for low-income working families, seniors, previous and current homeless veterans and recent college graduates.
Garcia told the Signal Tribune, shortly after the event, that the City isn’t planning on expanding more into the east side of Long Beach. He said that portion of the city stands as a suburban environment. He said that focusing housing projects in the downtown area of Long Beach will improve the city’s economy.
During the event, the mayor stated that government officials across the country are discussing the impacts of urban “density.” In housing terms, this means that the population in cities is increasing, according to Garcia.
“We know that we are not building enough housing in the state of California,” Garcia told the Signal Tribune. “We are going to build into downtown and the center of the city.”
The mayor said this increase will bring people deeper into Long Beach and that could help small businesses in the area.
The mayor said he was most excited for a housing project that would impact students from California State University, Long Beach. The project, known as the CSULB Downtown Village, will house approximately 1,100 students and staff. The facility will include classrooms, living spaces and art galleries.
“I’m excited about all of [the projects], but the Cal State Long Beach Village is the one I’m most excited about because I want to bring back the students downtown,” Garcia said.
Garcia also stated the Blue Line of the Metro will have a station right outside of the village. A billion-dollar renovation to the transportation service will include new trains, faster travel speeds and increases in security. The mayor told the audience to expect more patrols by the Long Beach Police Department on the Metro in the upcoming month.
Alongside housing projects, the City is also developing retail buildings to help modernize the area commercially. A project the mayor said took “decades” to finally develop is the 2nd & PCH shopping center. The project is slated as a high-end retail and dining development. It consists of 244,000 square feet of retail space. Construction on the project will start by the end of this year, according to Garcia.
He also mentioned updates for the Queen Mary Island installation planned to be adjacent to the iconic ship. The project is 65 acres of waterfront and will serve as an entertainment and touristic attraction for the City. Queen Mary Island will harbor 2,400 feet of boardwalk peppered with cafes and bars.
The mayor also mentioned that the auditorium could host concerts from the Long Beach Symphony— he compared it to the Hollywood Bowl.
“There are a lot of people coming to this city,” Garcia said. “These are really exciting times for our small businesses.”
Sounds great as long as everyone acknowledges that increased density without increased city services, police, fire, health and infrastructure will destroy our already fragile quality of life. Been there and done that!
Mayor Garcia is running for his re-election next year. You will not hear him mentioning parking. That’s because he supports city policies that are actively choking off the parking. You will hear him say it’s his “belief” a lot. That’s because the plan is based upon wishful thinking, not data or professional parking planning. The plan is to push people into walking and biking even though over 75% of Long Beach currently works outside of Long Beach and our transit isn’t adequate to get people where they need to go. We agree that biking, walking, and transit are good things but there needs to be a transition period to provide adequate parking until their no car nirvana kicks in. Don’t think it will only be downtown; they recently lowered the parking standards in Midtown without data, too, and newer city plans do not include residential parking protections. There is a parking study coming for our area but only due to three lawsuits from our community parking group LB TAPS (LBparking.com for more info). Recently while talking about the upcoming project to remodel Broadway, residents asked if they had data to show the effect on residential parking. Mayor Garcia responded by saying that a parking study will provide data but they are still breaking ground this fall. That parking study won’t be concluded until late 2018! If the Mayor does start promising parking improvements before the election, it’s too late for him to be believed without some concrete action.