Inglewood officials are working on a full rewrite of the city map for the first time in nearly 40 years, laying out how they want the city to grow and change for the next two decades.<\/p>\n
Along part of Manchester Boulevard, city planners are setting up an option for developers to rebuild rows of small storefronts with a mix of homes and commercial space. On La Brea Avenue, south of Centinela Avenue, they envision the possibility of dense housing and business blocks as high as six stories.<\/p>\n
Jerome Johnson, an Inglewood local, said he\u2019s lived through three decades of change in the city. He recalled watching a \u201craggedy market\u201d at the corner of La Brea and Centinela make way for the two-story shopping center that\u2019s there today. He said the potential developments around the intersection could be a catch-22.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a shortage of housing,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cBut you don\u2019t want it to turn into New York City.\u201d<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s all part of the ongoing process for Inglewood\u2019s new general plan<\/a>, the foundational guide that governs things like what kind of buildings can be built where in the city and how they need to look. A draft land-use plan will go before the Inglewood City Council on Tuesday, then go into the environmental impact review process.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is really a historic milestone for the city,\u201d Bernard McCrumby, Inglewood development services director, told The LA Local.\u00a0<\/p>\n McCrumby said planners are aiming to<\/a> open up room for new housing and to revitalize some of the city\u2019s flagging business corridors, without changing the city\u2019s existing residential blocks or sacrificing the grocery stores, barbershops and local restaurants that make neighborhoods tick.<\/p>\n \u201cThe stadiums and arenas are here, they\u2019re not going anywhere,\u201d McCrumby said. \u201cNow we can plan around those.\u201d<\/p>\n The last time the city did a full update of its general plan was 1987, when horses were still racing at Hollywood Park and the \u201cShowtime\u201d Lakers were winning championships at the Forum. Edward Vincent Jr., the city\u2019s first Black mayor, had only been in office for four years.\u00a0<\/p>\n The city has made intermittent updates to its planning guidelines since then \u2014 notably remapping a band of Inglewood along the Metro K line<\/a> before it opened \u2014 but city documents indicate planners spent the past couple years working on a comprehensive rewrite.\u00a0<\/p>\n The new update to the general plan<\/a> could set the city\u2019s direction until 2050. <\/p>\n Planners hope to change some of the city\u2019s commercial corridors into mixed-use zones that allow for housing and businesses alongside each other or even stacked on top of each other.<\/p>\n Those zones could go in place along Century Boulevard and Arbor Vitae Street as well as Manchester, Centinela and La Brea.<\/p>\n The rest of the update, McCrumby said, is aimed at lining the city\u2019s zoning regulations up with state law and the city\u2019s current reality on the ground.<\/p>\n City staff held several community meetings over the last year as they put together the draft and still aren\u2019t done gathering feedback.\u00a0<\/p>\n The next year will see at least one more community meeting and a 45-day public review period, according to city documents. McCrumby said that, with the anchor of the land-use map in place, planners will continue to work on the rest of the general plan, targeting final City Council approval of the plan and accompanying environmental impact report next spring.<\/p>\n You can get all the details on the general plan at nextlevelinglewood.com<\/a> and attend the City Council meeting at 2 p.m. on Tuesday to give a public comment.<\/p>\n