Government Advocacy

Fall 2019: As brick and mortar stores struggle to compete during the holidays for consumer dollars, the last thing a corner shopping center wants is blocked access. When store visits and sales suddenly plummeted at the 10.85 acre Inglewood shopping center at the intersection of Crenshaw Bl. and Imperial Hwy, the property manager received a flood of urgent complaints from tenants including anchors Big 5 Sporting Goods, Chase Bank, Superior Grocery, Jack-n-the Box, and Panda Express demanding a quick fix. The culprit: left-turn lane closure at a primary entrance driveway near an intersection traveled by 36,000 vehicles per day per LA County Dept. of Public Works.

Year-End profitability at the 160,000 sf of retail space is heavily dependent upon holiday sales. The site owner contacted their trusted go-to consultants at HORIZON Development + Entitlement, a land use permit expediting and community outreach firm, to engage Inglewood’s Public Works Department to re-open access to the Center.

HORIZON immediately reached out to Public Works to determine the cause of the closure: community calls about dangerous traffic conditions caused by vehicles accessing the site. Vehicles exiting the shopping center had to “floor it” to accelerate across five lanes of heavy traffic to enter the adjacent neighborhood. However, HORIZON took a deeper dive to analyze incident reports and revealed that the accidents were rarely caused by vehicles making a left turn into the Shopping Center.

*New protected turn lane

Armed with the facts, HORIZON successfully negotiated on behalf of their client and worked closely with Public Works to identify a solution. A barrier protected left-turn lane allowed patrons to safely turn into the site, while eliminating cross-traffic access to address the community’s concern about cars barreling across five lanes of traffic. This win-win solution reduced the likelihood of accidents by over 90%. Site access was restored in early November 2018, which provided time for tenant revenue to recover and maximize Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Year’s holiday shopping opportunities.

HORIZON owner Nichole Smith notes, “the key was to look beyond the immediate access issue to identify the critical concern for traffic safety. Only then could we work with Public Works to implement a smart solution. The Public Works team in Inglewood was proactive and played a pivotal role to resolve a

• Category : Community Relations / Project Management
• Date : October 17, 2019
• Client : AMT Enterprises
• Address : Crenshaw Blvd & Imperial Hwy