In a significant victory for Westside slow-growth forces, a developer has scrapped plans to tear down the aging Santa Monica Place mall and replace it with a 10-acre complex of high-rise condos, shops and offices that critics said would overwhelm the city's downtown.
The project, which was expected to cost hundreds of millions of dollars, had been closely watched because it was one of the largest of several high-rise complexes proposed or underway on the Westside, which is undergoing the biggest development boom in 25 years.
Mall giant Macerich Co., which has owned Santa Monica Place for seven years, said it was formulating a more modest renovation plan for the Frank O. Gehry-designed center that would remove much of the roof and open the center both to the Third Street Promenade and to the ocean, a block to the west.
Macerich officials acknowledged in interviews that they were humbled by widespread community disdain for the grandiose plan they presented in late 2004. At the time, the prospect of three 21-story condo towers drew cries of derision from residents, who said the buildings would wreck the coastal community's low-rise ambience and exacerbate traffic and congestion.
"We misread the community," said Tracey Gotsis, the mall owner's senior vice president of marketing. "We had big visions for this project."
The visions have been drastically scaled back, she said, in an effort to "wipe the slate clean" and reflect the community's "expectations and desires for this property." Those include creating a better mix of unusual shops, moving the ground-level food court to a third-floor patio overlooking the ocean and providing a stronger connection to the promenade and the rest of the outside world.
Opponents of the original plan say they hope the developer offers a project that fits the community rather than overshadows it.
Diana Gordon, a spokeswoman for the Santa Monica Coalition for a Livable City, said her group was "gratified that Macerich has gotten the message that residents want development in keeping with the size and scale of the current mall and that it has abandoned plans for luxury residential towers."
The Santa Monica Place project is one of several controversial developments roiling the Westside.
Community activists are battling separate proposals for more building on the stretch of federal land between Westwood and Brentwood.
