Reflections & Observations

An Outrage

   Appian Way would be just another street in Santa Monica, if it weren't for its dazzling location. It veers off Pacific Coast Highway, just west of the McClure Tunnel, runs under the Santa Monica Pier and laps along the beach to the westerly end of Pico Boulevard. 
   During construction of two new City facilities -- the Moss Avenue Pumping Station and the Urban Runoff Reclamation Facility, a portion of Appian from Moss Avenue south was reduced to one lane, and southbound traffic was barred -- at the behest of the contractor. 
   It was generally assumed that the ONE WAY DO NOT ENTER signs would come down and two-way traffic would be restored when construction was done. But the construction crews have moved out and the DO NOT ENTER signs remain in place. 
   According to Lucy Dyke of the City's Traffic Division, the City has no plans to reopen that portion of Appian to southbound traffic. When asked if the City had the authority to make such a change without a public hearing, Dyke said it did. 
   It turns out that both the Pier Restoration Corporation (PRC) and people who live on Appian Way want to permanently bar southbound traffic from PCH. The PRC likes the arrangement because it forces people coming off PCH into the 1550 beach parking lot. Residents like it because it reduces traffic in the neighborhood.
   There are undoubtedly businesses all over Santa Monica which would like to funnel customers right to their doors and thousands of residents who would like to reduce traffic on the streets they live on, but, thus far, the City has not acknowledged, much less responded to their wishes -- because it would be both foolhardy and unreasonable. Yet, in this instance, it has apparently acceded to the wishes of a City agency and a few residents. 
   Appian Way does not belong to the people who live on it. It's a public street which is owned and maintained by the public and -- like all the other streets in Santa Monica -- it must be fully accessible to the public. 
   And it's a crucial piece of the city street system. It's the most direct route to the South Beach and Ocean Park neighborhoods for people traveling south on PCH and it's a uniquely lovely drive -- with its close-up views of the beach and ocean. No street in the city is closer to the sand. 
   If the PRC wants more people to come to the Pier, then it should restore the unique character of the Pier which it managed to eradicate during its ill-advised redevelopment. 
   Appian Way residents -- like all beachfront residents -- have a tougher choice. Traffic at the beach is inevitable and chronic. There has always been too much traffic at the beach and probably always will be -- especially since the City created the Hotel District on that ultra-choice strip of beachfront land that runs south from the Pier to Pico. 
   Given that, people who live on Appian, along with people who live on PCH, Barnard Way and the short streets like Hollister, Pacific and Wadsworth that dead-end at Barnard, can either see the traffic as the price they pay for living in the choicest locale in Santa Monica, or they can move to some less trafficked inland street. What they cannot do and what the City cannot permit them to do is to, in effect, gate a public street. 
   Some of them tried, twice, to gate a public walkway that runs from Appian to Ocean Avenue, but, in both instances, the City immediately removed the gates. 
   Barring pedestrians from a public walkway was a minor inconvenience, barring cars from a vital and gorgeous public street with the connivance of the City is not simply an inconvenience, it's an outrage.