by Garth Meyer
After two years of design and planning, a two-and-a-half-acre park of native plants is coming to the land under the powerlines just up from the AES plant, on the hill where city officials held a ceremony to mark the shutdown of the power plant on New Year’s Eve, 2023.
“I was ecstatic when I got the news yesterday,” said Mayor Jim Light, who announced it at the city council meeting Tuesday night, Jan. 4. “We were bogged down in nitpicky design details.”
The city has a current five-year lease for the park acreage, owned by Southern California Edison (SCE), just south of the large power-line bases, by the intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and 190th Street.
Because SCE will need access to the lines, no development will take place inside a 50-foot radius of the bases.
The pedestrian park will consist of a walking path and native plants – the ground landscaped to appear as it looked before European/American settlers arrived, though denser.
The list of plants was developed by South Bay Parkland Conservancy. Light was part of that effort, before he was mayor.
He and the late Mayor Bill Brand first proposed a park on the SCE ground 15 years ago, in public comment at city council meetings, as regular residents.
“This is phase one of my vision for the area as a Green Belt to the Sea,” Light said.
The powerlines will remain in place for the foreseeable future.
“Currently, there are no plans to remove the towers, without a formal AES request,” said Diane Castro, SCE spokesperson.
The small park will go in just east and up the hill from the 51-acre power plant site, which Brand, Light and many others have sought to become parkland as well.
Development of the new 2.5-acre park – the cost partially-covered by a state grant – will now begin the city process to choose a contractor to build it. ER