Manhattan Beach Ca Development And Redevelopment

City officials are moving ahead with plans to reinvent Sepulveda Boulevard in an attempt to give an identify to the two-mile stretch of road that runs through Manhattan Beach. A design has been approved that calls for landscaping medians and adding new entryway signs and flags and banners. The first phase of the $1-million project is scheduled to begin in March.

The city is scheduled to hold a closed meeting Tuesday to continue negotiating the proposed purchase of a portion of the old Metlox Pottery site, the last piece of undeveloped property in downtown Manhattan Beach. The 66,000-square-foot parcel has been vacant since Metlox declared bankruptcy in 1989. The city purchased a 63,000-square-foot parcel owned by the pottery company for about $2.3 million last summer.

The defeat of a special measure Tuesday in Manhattan Beach paves the way for a former pottery plant site to be transformed into a 40-room hotel, offices and shops. The measure, which would have set aside the parcel next to the ocean for public use, was defeated by a margin of nearly 5 to 3. City officials will now await the soon-to-be completed environmental impact report on a proposed 90,000-square-foot development before making a final decision on what to build on the lot.

The Manhattan Beach City Council has agreed to conduct a study aimed at increasing the number of parking spaces in the city's bustling downtown shopping district. The council is examining the possibility of adding another level to a structure on 12th Street and the feasibility of purchasing a neighboring residential lot that could be converted into an additional parking facility.

"I hope they'll come in droves," said Scott Beck, nodding his head toward the giant buildings in the lot just east of the tanning salon he manages. "We'd have them in and out in 15 to 20 minutes. They can come in on their lunch breaks."

In an attempt to exercise more control over the manner in which downtown Manhattan Beach is developed, the city has purchased the remaining portion of the former Metlox pottery site--the last large piece of undeveloped property in downtown. The City Council voted to purchase the 66,000-square-foot northern half of the property for $3.1 million. The city bought the 63,000-square-foot southern parcel for $2.3 million last summer. The parcel has been vacant since Metlox declared bankruptcy in 1989.

City officials are planning to turn the northern half of the old Metlox Potteries site in downtown Manhattan Beach into a temporary parking lot in time for the summer parking crunch. The city completed the purchase of the property in January and has not decided what to do with it yet. City officials said the temporary parking lot will generate money for the city until a decision has been made on what to do with it.

City officials plan to spend $1 million to spruce up the two-mile stretch of Sepulveda Boulevard that runs through Manhattan Beach to give the busy thoroughfare a new identity and generate more business. The plan calls for landscaping medians, new signs, decorative flags and banners, aesthetic lighting and underground utilities, according to Director of Community Development Richard Thompson.

The McMartin Pre-School in Manhattan Beach, from which a torrent of child sex abuse allegations sprang nearly seven years ago to touch off the longest and costliest criminal trial in U.S. history, has been purchased by a developer who wants to tear it down. Arnold Goldstein, a Hermosa Beach real estate broker who bought the property in February, said he wants to begin demolishing the preschool soon to build an office building. "Who needs that monument anymore?"