Praise of Cities That Banned Mini-Malls

I want to congratulate the city councils of Beverly Hills and West Hollywood. They have shown the wisdom and courage to ban mini-malls.

Perhaps Sam Hall Kaplan has had some influence in these decisions due to his many articles on the awful impact mini-malls have here in Los Angeles. It gives me hope that maybe someone on our City Council will have the guts to tackle this growing problem.

Kaplan was correct when he stated that these mini-malls are turning our streets into highways lined with pit stops. In fact, they are making Los Angeles a rather unpleasant place to live.

It seems to me our streets would be safer, more attractive and comfortable if commercial developers were sensitive to the need to encourage pedestrian traffic. Instead, their mini-malls suffocate us with parking lots and suffer us to live with ugliness.

There are those on the City Council (Zev Yaroslavsky and Michael Woo) who have given lip service to the mini-mall problem but, of course, have done nothing.

I don’t take much comfort knowing that maybe 10 to 15 years from now someone on the City Council, or maybe our new mayor will do something about the mini-mall problem. By that time it will take several generations to undo what has occurred in the city due to our present officials’ nonfeasance.

ROBIN ADLER

Los Angeles