Located at the western end of the Los Angeles metro area, along the Pacific Ocean, the City of Santa Monica is preparing the first major update to the Land Use and Circulation Elements (LUCE) of its General Plan in more than 20 years. HR&A serves on the consulting team advising the City's planning, particularly with respect to economic and fiscal issues. The updates, which will soon come before the Planning Commission and City Council, include a number of new measures to accommodate growth and enhance the city's economic competitiveness, while also protecting established neighborhoods, preserving community character, and addressing externalities of growth, particularly traffic congestion. This will be accomplished by concentrating future growth in commercial areas, while implementing new design and preservation regulations in the neighborhoods.
The LUCE will balance strong recent job growth with incentives for new housing across the affordability spectrum, and develop complete mixed-use neighborhoods that reduce vehicle trips, including new neighborhoods in the city's eastern, former industrial corridor. Innovative circulation management techniques will be tied to completion of the new Exposition Light Rail line from downtown Los Angeles, including two station sites along a route that parallels the Santa Monica Freeway, and the western terminus station adjacent to the City's downtown and historic Santa Monica Pier. An overall circulation system objective for no net new PM peak hour vehicle trips over the 20-year planning horizon will be accomplished by encouraging use of alternative transportation modes and very aggressive transportation demand management.
HR&A recently completed a detailed analysis of the City revenue and service cost implications of the proposed LUCE, and each of five alternative growth management scenarios that were evaluated in an Environmental Impact Report. This analysis considers the net impact of incremental growth to the City's General Fund and its Redevelopment Agency, particularly its Earthquake Recovery Redevelopment Project enacted after the disastrous 1994 Northridge earthquake. HR&A's analysis is intended to help City leaders, residents and businesses to ensure that the LUCE achieves fiscal, as well as environmental and social, sustainability.
