No one will miss the parking structure that used to stand at the corner of First and Grand in Downtown. It was demolished recently to make way for the Grand Avenue Project, which will be rising on the site you see in the image above. I was walking down First earlier this month, on my way to the Disney Concert Hall, and as I rounded the corner onto Grand I was startled to see nothing but clear, blue sky on the opposite side of the street. It’s strange how the disappearance of something familiar can reshape the space around it.

A view of buildings surrounding the Grand Avenue Project site.

The Grand Avenue Project has been in the works for years. The completed project will include a 20-story hotel and a 39-story residential tower with 20% affordable housing, as well as retail, restaurants, and a public plaza. The complex was designed by Frank Gehry, and will be situated in the midst of the Downtown cultural hub that includes the Colburn School, MOCA, The Broad, the Disney Concert Hall and the Music Center.

Even though nobody will be mourning the loss of the parking structure, I thought I’d post a few photos to mark its passing. I’ve been taking lots of pictures of Downtown in recent years, trying to document some of the changes that are taking place. It’s interesting to watch the landscape as it’s going through these transformations.

A view of the demolished parking structure with the Disney Concert Hall in the background.

A view looking down Olive.  The parking structure is on the right.

Stairs on the north side of the parking structure.

Interior of the parking structure.

A view from the top level.

One loss I am mourning is the removal of a number of street trees along the west and north sides of the project site. While the ones on Grand were fairly young, the ones on First were fully grown and provided extensive canopy. I’m sure new trees will be planted once the project is completed, but that’s at least a couple years away, and new development is taking a heavy toll on the City’s urban forest. The folks at City Hall keep talking about how important trees are for sustainability, but they keep getting cut down. If there was a program in place to monitor the urban forest and ensure its growth, that would be one thing, but no such program exists and the City does a lousy job of monitoring the situation. We can have new development and a healthy urban forest, but we need to plan to make that happen.

Trees that used to stand on First Street.

Trees that used to line Grand Avenue.

Here’s an article from Curbed about the groundbreaking for the Grand Avenue Project.

Construction Kicks Off on Frank Gehry’s Next Big Project

I don’t know how long construction is expected to take, but I imagine we’re talking at least a couple years. I was a little concerned by a paragraph toward the end of the Curbed article that talks about financing. Apparently the funding that allowed this project to move forward was obtained last year from a couple of Chinese firms. My concerns may be groundless, but it made me think about the stalled Oceanwide project near the Staples Center. That’s also funded by Chinese money, and while nobody’s sure exactly what’s going on, it sounds like they’re having serious cash flow problems. For years there was a flood of Chinese money fuelling development Downtown, but that seems to be coming to an end. Hopefully the funding for the Grand Avenue Project is rock solid, and things will keep moving forward.