On May 27, business owners along the 200 block of Main Street between Second and Third streets received notice their establishments are targeted for demolition.
Among the affected establishments are the legendary alternative club space, The Smell, New Jalisco Bar, Five-Star Bar, Shish Kabob Restaurant and the Downtown Independent Theater.
According to its web page, The Smell has received responses “from throughout the Los Angeles area, and from all over the country…and the world.” Management has started a petition to save the space as well as a “Go Fund Me” account to raise money for a new locale.
The Demolition That May Not Happen
A company official at the developer, L&R Group of Companies, said in a May 31 interview that the company is in the process of handing out “better information.”
Demolition, he said, “is not going to happen in six or eight months. We have a year to decide if we actually want to demolish.”
The spokesman said the notices posted on the doors of the Main Street establishments are a requirement that kicks-in when a Department of Building & Safety demolition permit is granted for a structure that is 30-years-old or more.
“The permit gives us the ability to demolish,” the source explained. “It doesn’t mean we are going to do it.”
The Smell, an “all ages” nightclub doesn’t supply alcohol, opened at 247 South Main Street in 2000.
At the time proprietors Jim Smith and Jarrett Silberman moved the club from its digs on Lankershim Blvd., in search of cheaper rent, and hipper Downtown locale, between the Jalisco Bar and what was then Linda Lea’s boarded up Japanese Theater.
But “What ever Lola wants…”
L&R’s websites describes the company as “privately held, well capitalized organization that owns and operates parking facilities throughout the United States.”
It is the owner of Joe’s Auto Parks and WallyPark, which have locations on the section of Main Street targeted by the notices and throughout downtown.
In April, the company paid $30 million for the lot housing Toyota Downtown L.A., located north of the 10 Freeway and south of the L.A. Convention Center.
According to the New York real estate publication “The Real Deal,” the L.A.-based developer owns two office buildings downtown and warehouses between Broadway and Main Street.
It recently partnered with builder Geoff Palmer to build a 10-story apartment building on a lot the company owns north of Olympic Blvd. It also developing the “Circa” project at a lot it owns across from Staples Center, which entails two, 36-story luxury condominium towers.
