Paseo Colorado revives the center of downtown Pasadena

Mixed-use project gives Southern California a taste of convenient, walk-to-everything living. When Paseo Colorado opened in downtown Pasadena, California, just one week after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, some felt nervous about its prospects. Would people be in the mood for a mixed-use, partly outdoor development offering a concentration of shops off Colorado Boulevard, restaurants and a 14-screen movie theater one (outdoor) flight up, several stories of high-priced apartments, and, in a lower rear corner, a supermarket whose customers had to park in a subterranean garage? As it turns out, they need not have worried. The experiment in turning a failed shopping mall inside out has done well and is now spurring redevelopment of property that had long lain dormant across the street. Paseo Colorado “is the prototype of how you do this stuff” says Marsha Rood, Pasadena’s former development administrator. P. Vaughan Davies, head of the Los Angeles office of Ehrenkrantz, Eckstut & Kuhn Architects, which was hired by developer TrizecHahn to revitalize the inward-focused Plaza Pasadena mall, says, “We all agreed from day one to turn it inside out.” Here are some techniques they used and lessons they learned: Adding apartments was crucial. Bill Trimble, a Pasadena city planner, says the nearly 400 apartments, which were owned by Post Properties until June of this year, made the project economically feasible. The housing reportedly rents for an average of $3 a square foot per month and it enlivens the complex. The outdoor spine connects the downtown. A key idea was restoration of the central axis of the Pasadena civic center’s 1923 Beaux Arts master plan. The Garfield Promenade, a public space and pedestrian artery, has recreated the view corridor between the Civic Auditorium and the historic public library. Trimble suggests that its 75-foot width may be too large to function optimally as a public space. Rood thinks the promenade would have been livelier if TrizecHahn had not insisted on devoting the first floor to stores and putting the restaurants and cafes on the second level. The supermarket is an important amenity. Customers use valet parking or drive into an underground garage to shop at the stylish Gelson’s supermarket. They then take the stairs or an elevator up to the market. “It certainly is a very strong amenity for people in the downtown, and it draws from outside as well,” says Trimble. The supermarket has windows right along the sidewalks and a café in a front corner. The mix delivers convenience. “Laundromat, health club, dry cleaner, cheap food, expensive food, supermarket — it’s unheard of in California that you don’t have to drive to get to those things,” Davies says. He expects that Southern California’s traffic congestion and the new Gold Line rail service to downtown Los Angeles will accelerate the demand for walkable convenience. The architecture is modest. “We wanted an architecture that would be commercially viable but that would not compete with the civic architecture,” Rood says. She credits Pasadena architect Stefanos Polyzoides, who worked on an urban design framework for the city, with the idea that Pasadena should have courtyards from which residents would enter their buildings. She believes Paseo Colorado’s overall success stems from the fact that it was designed as part of an urban district, not a stand-alone project. On what had been a barren property on the north side of Colorado boulevard, Western Asset Plaza, a 270,000 sq. ft., five-story office project with ground floor stores and restaurants and a central garden area is now being constructed. “It follows Stef Polyzoides’ basic form,” Rood says. Also on Colorado Boulevard, another mixed-use project is in the works. Nearby will be 38 residential condominiums of 4,000 to 6,000 square feet that are expected to sell for $2 million and up. Downtown Pasadena is setting the pace for urban development in Southern California. See page 16, Deals & Finance, for a brief report on the sale of Paseo Colorado’s apartments.