Thank you for publishing the perspective of Jen Rush, Blue Plate Santa Monica on 6/8/23. She needs more paying customers on Ocean Ave. In other words, she needs more foot-traffic and she needs people to want to walk around Santa Monica.
I do not run a retail operation in the city of Santa Monica, and as a mother of currently little kids I'm not out in the evenings as much as I would like. But I have commuted from home to work between NoMA and DTSM every day for 4+ years without a car, walking past the Blue Plate restaurant locations hundreds of times. I also get to social events, shopping, and appointments without a car. I frequent the Expo Line, BBB routes 1, 9, 18, ride my bike, or walk.
If we're wondering why there isn't more foot-traffic in Santa Monica, I can tell you why I've found it harder and harder to be a pedestrian here. I can tell you it's very frustrating: Santa Monica with its weather and public transit should be a dream to be a pedestrian! But it's simply not. Why? The proportion of negative experiences on the street to positive experiences is way too high. We've got streets and alleys clearly meant to keep car traffic flowing fast (way too fast), contact with the mentally ill or extremely poor is crushing, and dodging sidewalk scooter riders is exhausting (with the miles I cover and the time I spend walking, I personally have up to three incidents with a sidewalk scooter rider a day!).
Jen is probably right that the politicians and the policy makers are behind a desk and don't see what's really going on. I'd also like to add that these folks PLUS their implementers and deliverers of these policies are spending too much time behind the wheel of a car and therefore don't understand what it's like to be a pedestrian, beyond the walk from the parking garage or parking spot to a Santa Monica destination!
I want to see Santa Monica thriving, too. I want to have far, far, far more positive experiences on the streets of Santa Monica than negative. For that, we need a lot more productive people walking the streets. Yes, productive people take the train! And we need more productive people out of their cars and onto the buses, trains, and sidewalks (at walking/running-speed please). This is going to come from continuing the great public transit we have here in Santa Monica, enforcing (whether through technology or personnel) the law against motorized scooters being ridden on the sidewalk, designing streets to be safer for humans not in a vehicle, and getting more housing right here in Santa Monica!
Blue Plate's customers will come in their own personal vehicles (it's post-streetcar greater Los Angeles, after all), but a lot will come from the nearby neighborhood, walk over from their workplace, as yes take the train! Let's not forget about making the experience of those people who will bring the all-so-important foot-traffic less miserable.
Lauren Akmaeva, Santa Monica
