Venice Beach: Space Is the Place

Steve Stajich
Mirror contributing writer

   ABC's "Nightline," or, as I like to call it, "Uncle Ted's Bedtime Nightmares," was doing its level best to scare the bejesus out of viewers last week with frightening predictions about the future related to research from the CIA. Remember the CIA? They used to be everywhere, or so we thought. Or, later, so we hoped. (That describes the political life arc of many of us: 1968: CIA evil; 1998: CIA needed). 
   Now it looks like the CIA is shaping itself as a kind of watchdog for Planet Earth. They are monitoring trends, and that always lead to predictions. Or marketing. It depends on whether you're monitoring upheaval in African nations, or auditing the "Lucky card" bar-coded purchases of consumers. 
   The CIA is predicting wars based on water shortages, and many more problems linked to overpopulation in certain areas on the planet. Too many people needing essentials at the same time. Chaos, violence, interruptions in cable service. 
That's why I heartily endorse what was done to improve the boardwalk and public areas at Venice Beach. Because things are getting crowded everywhere, and the improvements at the beach, while they've come at the sacrifice of other things, are generally in the interest of maintaining a feeling of space and openness and freedom. And that's why we go to the beach, isn't it?
   Why do we ever leave our homes, filled with all those wonderful electronic boxes and distractions? To get "out." And, while out, to have a strong sense of being "out." As we continue to overdevelop and overpopulate and pave over, a park (in this case a beach park) will become more and more a psychological place. The statement "I need a park" will come as easily as "Do you have any Prozac?" The first will become the organic, poetic health food version of the second. 
   On a weekday morning, on my first visit to check out the beach since the improvements were officially declared "done," I saw several women with their toddlers and babies. Children need some sense of a larger "out there" somewhere. Something that encourages their developing ability to walk with plenty of forgiving grass and sand to tumble down upon. Anything that public spaces can do to serve that need would seem to me to be for the better. 
   Too often, local governments (not necessarily ours) perceive the concept of "improvement" as filling public space with contemporary-looking obstacles. Contrast that mentality with Bill Attaway's wonderful mosaic monument at the beach, which is beautifully sited. The mosaic work is playful and positive-feeling, a complete success that speaks to all ages. 
   To walk, and think. To Rollerblade, and think. To ride a bike or run or sit and think. This is the gift of space. Of course, when thousands of others have the same exact idea, your mind is filled only with thoughts of not crashing into someone else. A true improvement for the pathways at the beach might be something that makes them, over time, less popular and accessible. Like filling more and more of the space with hotels for the rich. Oh, wait, that program is already underway. 
   But this is our public space at the beach; the parts not yet controlled by corporate hotels. So what was done was to make the area feel larger and more open. And to add new construction that serves a purpose without blocking or denigrating the beach itself. Like simple but design-forward rest rooms that feature engraved quotations from "beach" writers like Charles Bukowski and Jim Morrison on the outer walls. Is it a great tribute to Bukowski to be quoted on the wall of a restroom? Many of his biggest fans would say it's perfect. 
   Was something lost? There's a marked loss of "funk," that indefinable quality of realness that certain things have and then lose. When you take something as funky as Venice beach and then swath the area in modern improvements, there's going to be a significant adjustment in texture. And that has happened. But I think the price was worth it. The area feels more inviting simply by being more open.  It feels like it's for all people by being more clearly defined as a public space, so, in that sense, it's all a little more democratic. And what is Venice if not an expression of a democratic free society going about it's free kite-flying, tattoo-wearing, bong-selling business?
   Efforts to adjust for the change, like the poetry quotes and some tile memorials to mural art, will feel too processed for some long-time beach people. But I would advise those people to focus their concern on the more worrisome elements moving in. There's an A&W "All- American Food Stand" that is strictly "CityWalk" in it's faux- 50s design and execution. This must sound insane, knowing the eclectic blend of facades at the beach, but the A&W stand really makes you take pause: Is it a small infection that will be contained, or is it the warning sign of a flood that might engulf Venice beach?
   The old "pavilion" is gone, only a few token graffiti walls remain. But now that section of the beach, and the blue sky above it, is opened up. And nearby is an area that will for years encourage people to observe and participate in the public display of skate and skate board skills. That's society gathering, in peace, to just enjoy itself. A "pavilion" of a different a kind, don't you think?
   Whether, from planning to execution, all the work at the beach was done carefully enough to satisfy everyone is something for locals to chew on in the years to come. But it was done with care, and I think that caring is clearly, and often beautifully, apparent. When you are there, it feels as though the work was done by people who were, in some way, truly involved in the area, in Venice, in the scene that is the beach. Can we ask much more of public work? I don't think so. Could the "Arts and Crafts World Music" shop turn down that stereo blasting "soothing" Mayan meditation tunes? Probably. But then, it wouldn't be the beach. 

This Week's "Know Your News" Quiz

(1) General Motors is using the energy crisis as an excuse to
   (a) halt production of zero emission 
   vehicles.
   (b) equip its cars with "energy-saving" 
   Firestone tires.
   (c) bring back the Chevy "U-Pedal-It" 
   mini-car.
   (2) That Jesse Jackson's revelation surfaced as African-Americans were planning to demonstrate at the inaugural is
   (a) one creepy coincidence, hey Dub?
   (b) something called "Republican 
   serendipity."
   (c) just the beginning, folks.
   (d) all of the above.
(3) A proposed $12 billion expansion of LAX would
   (a) add 45 new Starbucks stands to the 
terminals.
   (b) increase air and noise pollution.
   (c) not improve the selection of 
   magazines.

Answer Key

(1) (a) How "green" was my valley?
(2) (d) Profiles in Courage.
(3) (b) Brave New World.