••• We’ve known for a while now that the owner of the La Cumbre Plaza lot once home to Sears has been working on a plan to redevelop it; now we know with what. A preliminary housing development form was submitted two four-story buildings with 443 apartments total. The developer has until May 19 to submit a formal application. P.S. The big mixed-use development (with up to 700 apartments) on the Macy’s lot is called The Neighborhood at State & Hope, and there’s a website about it.
••• A Pilates Reformer studio called Body Tonic has opened in the Funk Zone at 224 Helena Avenue.
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••• The Historic Landmarks Commission’s December 18 agenda has a few items of note. First up: The 1923 Craftsman house at 228 E. Figueroa Street (Santa Barbara/Garden) is “proposed for demolition to be replaced by a multi-unit residential project,” details of which are unknown. The City’s Architectural Historian found the building qualifies as a historic resource, but a firm hired by the developer is arguing otherwise. Worth considering, it seems to me, is that “the property is adjacent to a historic Structure of Merit at 224 E. Figueroa Street [second photo below], and across the street from three historic Structures of Merit at 223A E. Figueroa Street [third photo], 223D E. Figueroa Street, 223F E. Figueroa Street.” Walk the block and you’ll see that they clearly add up to a sum greater than the parts.
••• Second, 517 Chapala Street (Haley/Cota), currently the Carzoid auto dealership, is no longer slated to be a hotel. Instead, “The project consists of a proposal to demolish the existing automobile dealership with 1,300 square feet of office space, merge the two lots, and construct a new 15-unit multi-story residential apartment complex [….] No vehicle parking is proposed pursuant to [delusional state law] AB-2097.” (Parking downtown is only going to get tougher….) As for the design, it could be worse, but it surely pales in comparison to the standout buildings on either side.
••• Third, the car wash at 524 N. Milpas Street (Haley/Cota) is proposed to be demolished, and the lot combined with 518 N. Milpas Street (La Pachanga). The explanation: “Listed on the Historic Resources Inventory, [518 N. Milpas was] constructed in 1925 by Elmer Whittaker in the Spanish Colonial Revival style. Proposal for a lot merger and to demolish the non-historic car wash building at 524 N. Milpas Street and non-contributing portions of the building at 518 N. Milpas Street to construct a new 23-unit multi-story residential apartment complex […] incorporating the historic façade on 518 Milpas into the project. The project includes 20 covered vehicle parking spaces onsite and three uncovered parking spaces offsite. Project is adjacent to historic Structures of Merit at 514-516 N. Milpas Street, and all the buildings from 502-516 are Structures of Merit at they were all built together as a commercial street front.)” Moreover, the “unit mix includes four studios, two one-bedroom units, three-three story townhomes, 14 two-bedroom units. Units ranging in size from 487 sf. to 2, 080 sf. with an average unit size of 924 sf. Two of the units will be designated for moderate inclusionary housing. Two of the units will be designated for very low income inclusionary housing.”
••• Fourth, the commercial office building at 12 E. Carrillo Street (State/Anacapa)—”originally constructed in 1927 for the Santa Barbara Chamber of Commerce”—will be converted to 12 residential units.
••• Two more shops have opened at The Post: The Great (with “more than just clothing—a curation of collectibles from small businesses, accessories, apothecary, treasures for your home or clothing for a new baby”; pictured below) and Maygel Coronel (women’s swimwear and other apparel). Also, Organic Oren, an L.A.-based food delivery service, will have a dedicated pickup spot at the shopping center. I was surprised to see on the website that the company doesn’t use onion in any of its dishes, and it only uses garlic in two. Are alliums something that people are avoiding now?
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No onions or garlic are generally considered for an anti-inflammatory diet, particularly if solving for IBS, SIBO or other. Interesting nonetheless..
Great round of updates for end of year, thank you!
As a cook- people say they are allergic to onions A LOT. I wonder if Brittany’s reply is the reason people use it vs saying their diet doesn’t allow onions?
In my experience, folks who don’t like or have an aversion to dogs/cats, fish/seafood, onions/garlic, gluten, alcohol + the like, frequently state simply “I am allergic…” Rather than going into detail that they’d rather not share e.g. “I think dogs/cats are a smelly bother.” or “I’m an alcoholic who chooses not to drink.”, they say that they’re allergic. It generally puts an end the discussion.
I hope the buildings under consideration for demolition will be saved.
If we save every kit craftsman home in SB, we will not have any new housing to keep housing costs in check. Tough decisions need to be made and not every 100 year old building should be saved, but I do believe we have to keep the character of the city and be respectful of history. Not an easy task, but thoughtful housing should be the priority followed by other interests.
I agree with Jared that not everything can be saved, but I think there’s still plenty of vacant/underutilized lots in downtown that are better candidates for multi-family new construction. We all benefit from the HLC until it affects something we own ourselves, and then it’s bureaucratic overreach. So I commiserate with the owners as well. :)
Re: alliums
It may seem crazy but some folks just can’t eat ‘em without experiencing serious gastric distress that can last for days. Going out to eat can often be like avoiding land mines, and embarrassing, to boot: “Hello. Could you please tell me exactly which items on your menu do not contain any onions?” “ Yes ma’am. Anything on our menu with any kind of delicious-sounding sauce will have onions. You can have a burger, ordered without the onion rings.” Yes, that’s an exaggeration but you get the idea. It’s frustrating.
* Supplements such as Akkermansia and digestive enzymes are unfortunately minimally helpful.
Alliums are definitely to be avoided in my house! They cause my husband gastrointestinal distress and they make me feel like I have a UTI.
The LA ‘ization of SB continues on every level Beyond sad
Sad but true
Kim, I couldn’t agree with you more! While perusing the menu RH Firehouse restaurant, they’ve actually named a salad the “Mulholland Drive”. What’s next, the Rodeo Drive risotto?
Parking is the nemesis of these apartment projects. It is incredibly expensive and torpedos viability. The state law abandoning this as a requirement actually made housing projects feasible again. And even then, only in some cases here. If we are serious about building housing, the thinking needs to change – even more than it has, due to rising costs. People can only pay so much for rent or you get a community with a bunch of people with trust funds, which is not a community but a club. Also, the City of SB is losing millions of dollars per year on their parking program. Why? Because there is a huge surplus of parking downtown. They built too much. When they finished the Granada garage, the last structure, parking was already on the decline. The Independent even chimed in at the time, saying something like it being a requiem or ode for the car. Things are changing fast. You don’t build for yesterday and not even for today. You build for Tomorrow. Same problem with the airport. They built it for yesterday so that today, yesterday’s tomorrow, it is a under-built, inadequate, mess. In that case, they didn’t build enough. Many people don’t want more housing here but what we need is smart housing. We don’t want LA traffic or congestion. However, since less parking or no parking also means less cars or no cars with these projects, it actually ends up being less like LA, not more. So the state law may be our friend. It causes shifts in how people live and infrastructure, amenities, i.e. livability, will follow. Let’s build a sustainable community. Tomorrow is coming.
Crazy that they’re going to demolish the car wash and the panchanga fichera bar (where you have to pay six dollars per song to dance with a lady), for another apartment building. That with the one over at Capitol hardware and the other one by 7-Eleven is going to make an already disastrous running the gauntlet driving down Milpas Street to be an absolute mess. From the 18 wheelers in the middle turn lane to cars to big on the right shoulder, its a hard drive They are truly destroying this area with so much construction already, these things are going to be a nightmare. Not to mention the blockage of Alisos Street bringing massive 18 wheelers and increased traffic down our small residential street now. That was such a poor idea.