Mall Makeover Spurs Critics

Even in its heyday, the Beverly Connection mall was overshadowed by the Beverly Center, its behemoth neighbor across La Cienega Boulevard. But the Beverly Connection had several claims to fame: It was the site of California’s first Starbucks, which opened in 1991, and home to landmark Rexall Square Drug, hailed as the “world’s largest drugstore” when it opened in 1947.

Now the Starbucks is closed, along with the AMC movie theater, the Daily Grill restaurant and Bookstar. This weekend, Ralphs will shut its doors -- at least temporarily. Even the Rexall has been taken over by the Longs drugstore chain.

The Beverly Connection is a casualty of a retail boom of the last few years in the Hollywood-Miracle Mile area, where the new Grove shopping center about a mile east at Farmers Market, and to a lesser degree the Hollywood-Highland complex a few miles north, have taken away business.

With the mall now a shadow of its former self, developers are proposing a radical, $125-million makeover that is already generating opposition in the community. The owners want to turn the Beverly Connection into a mixed-use development by building a 177-unit assisted-living center with a unit for those with Alzheimer’s disease and 62 luxury condominiums.

Residents, however, say the area simply can’t take another major development -- especially after the Grove and recent expansions of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

The looming fight underscores the growing pains that occur as developers try to add housing to commercial districts around the city.

The Beverly Connection project is part of a growing trend in urban planning of mixing retail and residential space, especially in business districts. Hollywood has seen several mixed-use complexes rise in the last few years, including one at Sunset Boulevard and Vine Street that offers a restaurant and Borders bookstore on street level with apartments above it.

The area around the Beverly Connection, just south of West Hollywood and east of Beverly Hills, is made up of residential streets lined with apartments and Spanish Colonial houses, with rows of trendy cafes and shops along Beverly Boulevard and 3rd Street.

But residents complain that over the last 30 years, the area has become a central hub, dotted with low-rise towers spreading from the Beverly Center and Cedars-Sinai. The Grove, the highly popular outdoor shopping center filled with restaurants, a movie complex, specialty shops and a Nordstrom store, has added to congestion, they say.

“Traffic is murder here,” said Bernie Meller, 65, who has lived in the area since 1969 and was shopping at the Longs Drugs on a recent weekday. “It’s already terrible. We used to be in the Beverly Center area. Now we’re in the Grove area.”

Some community groups are mobilizing for a fight.

“We’re not afraid to take the city on. We’re tired of them ruining this community,” said Diana Plotkin, president of the Beverly Wilshire Homes Assn., an 800-member group.

“The concept of assisted living -- good idea. Alzheimer’s clinic -- great,” said Harald Hahn, president of the Burton Way Homeowners Assn., which includes about 200 households. But he doesn’t want to see the complex significantly expanded. “Do it within your present entitlement,” he said.

The two associations have hired a land-use consultant, are pushing for an environmental impact report on the proposed project, have collected 500 letters of opposition and have written letters lobbying Councilman Jack Weiss, whose district includes the center. Weiss has not taken a position on the project, his office said.

The site’s owners say residents’ worries are understandable but unfounded.

“As far as it goes, this is pretty low impact. We’re replacing a movie theater with 60 residential units,” said Richard Ackerman, a partner in Apollo Real Estate Advisors. Apollo bought Beverly Connection in 2003 for $108 million and now owns the venture with Vornado Realty Trust.

Ackerman said the project actually would reduce congestion because residents wouldn’t come in and out as many times a day as movie-theater patrons. He also said the construction would serve a need in the area, near Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, for housing for the elderly.

The senior living complex would go above where the Old Navy store sits, near 3rd Street. The condo would rise above the former movie theaters.

The developers plan to significantly redesign the Beverly Connection, which has long been criticized for a confusing parking situation that forced pedestrians to walk across car entrances and exits.

But the increased development, critics say, is altering the neighborhood. Thirty years ago, the area was still dotted by oil wells. The Beverly Center land was a small amusement park. The area’s landmark was the Rexall drugstore, a modern, curved structure that Jimmy Durante and Dorothy Lamour helped open.

Some people say the change would be good.

Stephen Kramer, president of the Miracle Mile Chamber of Commerce, said his organization supports the project and believes developers have been working diligently to accommodate residents and their concerns.

“I understand there may be some effect in the immediate neighborhood,” said Kramer, who also is a member of the Mid-City West neighborhood council, which includes the areas of the Burton Way and Beverly Wilshire homeowners groups. “I don’t think it’s going to be disastrous.”

But other residents expressed concerns about the proposed buildings’ height, more than double the current 45 feet in some places. They also mentioned traffic worries.

Cesia Miller, 75, who moved to the area in 1966, said she was against the new center, mainly because she thought it would generate traffic.

“This is going to be a madhouse. We’re jammed up here as it is,” she said as she shopped at the Beverly Connection’s Ralphs, where she has bought her groceries since it opened.

The Beverly Connection’s owners already have permits for changes, including moving some stores and building a tunnel entrance to the parking structure. Those improvements are expected to be completed about December. Other elements of the plan are expected to go before the Los Angeles Planning Commission in October.

Leila Aboutaj, 27, an employee at the Beverly Connection’s Men’s Wearhouse, said upgrades weren’t likely to make her come to the area for her own shopping.

A resident of Beverly Hills, she prefers to shop in Century City.

“To be honest, this is not my favorite place to go shopping,” she said, citing the traffic. “This is very stressful, just coming in here.”