Danelo Billboard Lives On?
Has anyone besides me been weirdly surprised by the fact that the Mario Danelo Billboard is now on Sepulveda, over by the mini-golf course? I was driving by the other day, and I did a major double take.
Labels: Mario Danelo, sports
24 Comments:
What surprises me most is the iconic, heroic status granted to a teenager who killed himself while apparently in a drunken stupor.
Thinning the herd...
Einar
Man thats rough. I used to joke around about natural selection and drunk people at the cliffs but in all honesty its grown old.
Like it or not were all gonna die someday and ideally we will have lived in a world where someone liked us. If they need to put a billboard to get through their pain, so be it. Would you rather see a sign for Larry Flynt's Casino or the new crappy subdivision getting built two blocks away?
Maybe I'll get to die an old man in my lazy boy of natural causes or maybe some jackass will hit me with their car, ya just never know. But to be glib about someone else dying seems a bit lame.
That Einar is surprised by the reaction to a young football star's sudden and untimely death suggests that he is not paying enough attention to the world around him. This isn't exactly the first time that a person who died young and somewhat recklessly has been lionized by his or her friends and peers, you know?
Hey Einar why don't you grow a heart?
Geez, so a city wants to mourn one of its who by all reports was a good, all around kid.
What's your problem with it?
Yeah. Easy Einar.
It's not like Danelo was Steve Irwin or anything.
Einar I agree with you!
I saw this billboard the other day and was totally surprised. It has been almost a year and though it is sad maybe the money spent on a huge billboard on a huge street could be put to better use.
Chele
You might be surprised at how little it costs to rent a billboard. Not pocket change, exactly, but not enough to cure cancer or end world hunger either. I wouldn't worry about it too much.
But speaking of sad things and death, I just found out today that Jan Cooper, the guy who was going to open the ice cream shop on Seventh, died over the weekend. How ironic and awful. I was just in there a few weeks ago (I mistakenly thought it was already open, because the place was totally furnished and ready) and I had a nice conversation with him about how close he was to opening. There was just a little bit more red tape for him to cut through.
He was a really cool guy and I was looking forward to going in there for the first time and actually buying an ice cream from him. R.I.P.
Breeze article
Friends, neighbors, Pedropeople, lend me your eyes. I have a heart and would be devastated if it were my son foolish enough to walk down a cliff drunk - but I could hardly feel like it wasn't some how, well, deserved.
And I wasn't being glib, just realistic. Someone else was found dead in that area around the same time and no one seems to give a rat's ass about him or who he was - maybe another Pedro son.
And of course I understand putting the young dead on a pedestal, still I don't think a death caused by drunken stupidity should be celebrated.
Mourn for him if you want - me I have better things to do with my time. Like mourning for people who die at the hands of other's rather than as the result of their own heart wrenching irresponsibility.
Thanks Chele.
Man that Jan Cooper was a good egg, R.I.P. indeed. Wait, he didn't fall off the cliffs drunk did he??
Einar
Daaaaaaamn, Harshy Harshington...
Yes, I was really sad to hear about Jan. The whole thing is a sad commentary on how hard it is to open a business in LA. He's been struggling to get that shop open for nearly 2 years. Luckily, I stopped by the Port Gelato booth at the Taste and I can tell you first hand how good the ice cream was. If they do manage to get it open, stop by and have a gelato.
I have mixed feelings about Port Gelato, but Jan was a great neighbor and a cool guy. I wish I had the chance to know him better. I just saw him by my office a few weeks ago and he was being his usual friendly self.
Mixed feelings about an ice cream store?
Well, I had some mixed feelings about the weird mural (now painted over). On the one hand, nice to have a mural, on the other it looked like a prostitute kneeing a sailor in the crotch. I think they were supposed to be dancing, but maybe it was a tribute to the Old Days on Beacon St.
Yeah. I've got some pretty mixed feelings about the business district in general.
I watched Jan take over the ice cream store space several months before I closed Walled City, and about six months before I left 7th. Although he was always a really cool guy, it's kind of hard to run a business when you're surrounded by businesses that either never seem to be open or that never actually open. How long has that bakery going in where Walled City was been "about to open," for example?
I was on the street for about 4.5 years and I saw at least a dozen "never really opened" businesses come and go (especially galleries), and it was a constant disappointment. I've really come to the conclusion that there isn't even the interest in San Pedro in owning small businesses in the business district - mainly because so few of the businesses seemed to be run without any real effort or discernible business plan.
So my mixed feelings are really about the behavior of a number of business people in the district. It would have been great to be located next to an ice cream shop, but had I still been on 7th, I would have had to watch two whole summers go by without it being open. When I was still there, people were always presuming that it was just some kind of abandoned and left over movie set or something. I was so excited when Jan took over the space, and then my excitement turned to disappointment when I realized the place wasn't probably ever going to open.
Admittedly, one of my frustrations is that I will often go downtown to shop only to find most businesses closed. There was this one clothing place - I really wanted to go in and look around, maybe pick up a little something, but it was never open. Finally it just disappeared.
KM - that's exactly the problem. When I opened Walled City, I basically was there all the time, and I realized that the only time there was any, and I mean any, as in more than zero, street traffic was on weekends and evenings. Really, as far as I could tell, with the exception of the business generated by Godmothers and the liquor store across from me, the only business that regularly attracted any customers was the Whale and Ale.
So I set up my hours to be open from 5-8 weekdays, and 11-4 weekends. It worked - people could come to my gallery after work, or before/after eating downtown and I was opened on weekends. Most artist run project spaces like Walled City was are only open by appointment or on weekends, so I felt that I was doing my part - not being a closed storefront. It worked - people knew when I was open, and I got a fair amount of foot traffic, in what is essentially a deviod of foot traffic area. When other galleries on the street would open, we would synch our weekend hours and openings, so that people had more of a reason to come and more to see when they were here.
But the weird thing about being down on 7th was seeing "regular businesses", that would normally be open every day and during normal hours, be closed almost all the time. How is a business district supposed to revive if you're running a clothing store that's never open, or that no one knows when it's open? And then have 5-6 businesses "non-operating" in a similar manner. It's no wonder the district has been failing for so long.
One of the other frustrations I've had recently (since I'm venting a little here) was seeing all the media coverage for the businesses "about to open." All of the locals have run articles lauding all of these new businesses, but none of them, to my knowledge, have actually opened their doors, with the exception of Nosh, below the Cabrillo Hotel. I and a dozen other folks opened our doors and in many cases ran our businesses for years without getting the least bit of ink in the local papers. As a business who's function included regularly sending press releases and materials to all of the local papers, this was exceptionally frustrating, especially given all the lip service that the locals put into the value of the arts district. So what I've learned is that our local media cares much, much more for big talk than actual action.
Well, I think there is more ink out there now because of the efforts of some people, like Walter Beaumont for example, to raise awareness. Everyone knows, or should know, that if the ACE district is going to work it needs organized effort and positive press. I'm staying optimistic that things are turning (slowly, slowly in the wind) for the better. That said, how long do I have to wait for a freakin' strudel? Seriously!
I drove by the strudel place earlier today, and it looked like it might actually be close to opening.
It's looked like that for a while.
Yeah, but it looks a little closer now. It's gotten to the point where I can't tell what businesses are in operation or not.
It does make one wonder sometimes. Even the ones that are operational can be open on the "when we feel like it" schedule.
Kind of a chicken-or-the-egg thing, though, isn't it? I can imagine a business opening up there, finding that there's no foot traffic, and cutting back (and back and back) on hours in response. Of course, that's no way to make money either, as the rent is going to stay constant no matter how infrequently you open up...which probably explains why these sporadically-open businesses eventually disappear.
Ultimately, small businesses aren't going to survive down there until people start venturing out of their houses and availing themselves of these places. One Thursday night every month isn't enough.
Having been a business owner in Downtown, I can tell you that the cutting back never seems to occur. Most of the time, the businesses aren't committed to keeping anything resembling meaningful hours from the start.
The thing is though, that the restaurants (at least most of them) are open on a regular schedule. So why aren't the adjacent businesses? I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've gone to the Whale and that cute little gift shop right next to it isn't open. Wouldn't you think that place should be taking advantage of the fairy heavy traffic that the Whale generates? Especially since the merchandise is all about that country Anglophile thing?
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