By Garrison Frost

Several years ago, fresh out of college, I moved into a small beach rental about a block from downtown Manhattan Beach. About a week after I moved in, my aging Toyota Corolla blew its second head gasket in a year and went sent to the junk yard. Not thrilled about the prospect of buying a new car, I decided to make a go of living without one.

I was aided in this decision by the fact that I worked a short walking distance from my place, and spent most of my leisure time on volleyball courts equally as close. Furthermore, downtown Manhattan Beach was – and remains – one of the few downtowns in the South Bay with a sufficiently thriving commercial district able to provide nearly all of one's material needs. Several grocery stores, the local tavern, several good restaurants, a choice of Laundromats, my bank, the ice cream store, a diversity of clothing shops and many other needs were just minutes from my doorstep. Good weather meant that I could easily take my bike to further destinations.

Manhattan Beach has one of the few – if not the only – downtowns in the South Bay where I could have pulled off this pedestrian lifestyle for more than a week. And as much as I appreciate the value of that downtown, I must say that the real soft spot in my heart is for the desolate, decaying downtowns of the South Bay – places through which the wind blows loud and dry without touching a live being on weekday afternoons, where brick buildings with empty windows beckon, where one parks easily for free. Yes, downtown Manhattan Beach has its allure, but only by standing on the quiet sidewalk of a desolate downtown can one truly hear the whispers of the South Bay's evolving soul.

I particularly enjoy Lomita's downtown, which, despite a well-intentioned revitalization movement, is still a classically defunct beauty. If you're not paying attention as you drive down Narbonne Avenue, you might miss the sudden collection of masonry buildings, feed stores and quirky business that survived the trends of modern years. Where else could a wedding shop named Minty's have such a prime location? What other downtown has more than one place you can buy bales of hay? Lomita's exemplifies a particular truism about desolate downtowns: they nicely evoke the character of place that gets lost in more trendy commercial districts. Downtown Lomita feels like Lomita. It's blue collar, patriotic, diverse, carefully neat and has a gentle respect for tradition. They put flags up for any reason at all. There are more than a few motorcycle shops and family restaurants. At least one hairdresser puts up overtly religious signs in the window. There's no trash to be seen anywhere.

Downtown San Pedro is also pretty reflective of the odd compilation of Latinos, artists and longshoremen who inhabit the surrounding residential neighborhoods. Certainly a more lively than Lomita's, San Pedro's downtown also seems to be caught in that gray area between decay and gentrification. And that's perfect. A Starbucks would put Sacred Grounds out of business, and higher rents would drive out the artists. In short, if this place were more popular, it would cease to be distinctive. It would lose all the things that make it downtown San Pedro.

Torrance is similar to San Pedro in that it has many of the elements of a successful downtown but just cant seem to turn the corner. And thank god. One can just imagine a Pottery Barn and parking meters all over the place. As it is, the antique shops and low stress eateries are perfect. I especially enjoy the gentle transition from the surrounding bungalow neighborhoods to the quiet commercial district. Just imagine what lines of SUVs would do to that easy relationship.

I grew up in the South Bay, and yet I still never entered downtown El Segundo until after college. I didn't even know it was there. The city is in the middle of a major renovation of the downtown – and this comes on the heels of a giant marketing push – but, nonetheless, driving into downtown El Segundo is still not unlike strolling into Brigadoon. The place is an anachronism, like some kind of movie set from the 1950s.

There is this odd notion that desolate downtowns need to be saved, that they will only be deemed successful when they become "destinations." Perhaps it's part of the Old Town Pasadena model that downtowns aren't considered to be thriving unless hip Westsiders are willing to jump in their cars and go there. Well, that's never really been what downtowns are supposed to do. Of course, municipal reliance on sales tax revenue has upped the pressure on these little commercial districts to support city services, but really a Target on the other side of town can do that.

When you talk to older folks who have lived in the South Bay, they will tell you that at one point the entire area was farmland, how people used to consider it the sticks. And a lot of that is still true today. The South Bay is far from the vital centers of Los Angeles: downtown, the Westside, Santa Monica, the Valley even. In a lot of ways, the South Bay was and remains something of a frontier. And it's in these desolate downtowns that one really addresses that character face to face. Standing in downtown Lomita, you really feel like you're in some artificial outpost, a colony. It's the empty corner of Seventh and Mesa in San Pedro that one finds the grit that belies the gloss of the South Bay. It's in these places that dreams have come to die, or fight on with desperation. There's a quality to Main Street in El Segundo that is lonely, disappointed and wise. You don't feel California noir in Hermosa Beach or Riviera Village, but you feel it in downtown Torrance.

And just as noir is a guilty irrational pleasure, so too is my love of these empty commercial corridors.

(July 16, 2004)

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