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land.aping as well as some decent signage Whal you need now are more explicit stan- dards in those areas, it's been my ex. perience throughoul the counlry that both to get developer cooperation and to sustain your regulations in court you need a published set of design standards. Then everyone knows the ground rules from day one. The standards don't have to be ab. solute givens. They could be performance standards that say, for instance, what func- tions the parking lot landscaping is sup- posed to serve. There might be five or 10 or 100 ways to handle that function in an ap- propriate visual manner. At a minimum, you have to have some overall policies that relate to such things as traffic control, parking lot landscaping, and curb cuts. Just as important as an)thing else is to define what you won't tolerate, Even if you don't have a clear-cut purpose for what's going to happen in those intervening areas, at least say what you don't want -a bunch of sleazy motels, for example. Then you can let the market respond. Let them bring some creative things to the table. Curls. Because of the variety of ar- chitectural styles on the boulevard, we've talked about trying to create a common theme by landscaping the median with new turf and trees. That way we could create a unified corridor, with a similar set- back on both sides. The whole and its parts Hamilton. Before you do that, I think you need to look at the strip boundary to boundary in terms of its functional concen- trations. Then you can develop landscape and sign standards for specific areas. The kind of landscaping you want in a pedestrian environment may be different from the kind you want in a section that's oriented to the automobile, Having the lame standard for the full length of the strip doesn't make sense to me. Moreover, it seems to me that your zon. lng doesn't reflect the functions you want to encourage, either in the pedestrian area around the civic center or around the new auto centers. I'd like to see you develop a specific plan-as California law allows- for the whole length of the boulevard. The plan would give you something to work with when you deal with developers on new projects. It also might be a way of encouraging new housing near the core-- rental apartments, for instance, or housing for the elderly. That would help the pedestrian function. C'utts, One specific, plan kind of scares me. We've talked about a specific plan for the auto center and a specific plan for the downtown. And the idea has occurred to me of doing a specific plan for the whole corridor. But then I thought, "That's a hell of a specific plan!" But if you're talking about doing it in increments, that would make some sense. Hamilton. You don't need to think of it as one plan. It could be a series of plans but with an overall structure to them. For ex- ample, the 18-mile Metro Rail corridor in L.A. is one specific plan area with a whole series of different segments for each of the stations. But having one specific plan gives us a continuity of public policy and regula- tions and objectives, Ryan. The canopy that you're putting up on one block is illustrative of the prob- lem of trying to plan in perhaps too uniform a way. True, you need an overall structure, but don't let it dominate so that it becomes monotonous. The canopy is a good way to communicate to the world that Downey has something good going on and that it recognizes that it has some good buildings. But I'm not sure that you want to extend it very far. Breaking up this long boulevard into understandable segments really is the on}y way to go. Heckman. I'm afraid that these newin- ternally illuminated vinyl awnings are becoming the contemporary version of the mansard roof, which you saw on every main street in the 1970s. You have to be careful that it doesn't become a cliche on every block. Make it clear to the store ownersthat you won't tolerate a simplistic, uniform design solution. Dubnoff. You do need some overall design principles to give both some variety and some continuity to what you're dointg along the strip. For instance, the canopy is going in on the north side of Firestone, which is where it's least needed. The design principles could deal with the differences in sun and shade on the north and south sides of the street. The kinds of trees you se- lect should be different, too, according to where they'll go. Something else that concerns me, that we haven't talked about, is what happens to the backside of the strip and to the edge, where it meets the residential areas. The row of trees on the north-south streets should ex- tend into the residential areas. Incidentally, a tree farm would be a wonderful interim use for some of the vacant land along Firestone. The core Heckman, The idea of extending these tentacles at appropriate places is an impor- tant one. Lakewood Boulevard, which in- tersects Firestone, is an important street. You should have a clear signal there that you're approaching the center of the city. But to me, what's most delicate is that northern frontage of Firestone, including the fenced-in, high school parking lot and the Stonewood parking lot. Have you con- sidered potential double use of the shop- ping center par. king lot? If you put a movie theater nearby, for instance, you'd have FEET II I