LA Conservancy Position

With the sale of the Ambassador Hotel property to the Los Angeles Unified School District, I wanted to give you an “insider’s” briefing on the prospects for preserving and reusing the Ambassador as part of LAUSD’s new school campus.

After a decade of legal wrangling, LAUSD and the Ambassador’s owners have finally reached a settlement under which LAUSD will purchase the entire 23.7-acre Ambassador property, making it clear now that the site will be used for educational purposes. The Conservancy is therefore disseminating detailed plans, the product of many months of work by our Ambassador Hotel Task Force, demonstrating that it is entirely feasible -- architecturally, structurally, financially, and educationally -- to reuse the Ambassador Hotel as a school.

Why Save the Ambassador?

If there is a Los Angeles historic structure truly worth fighting for, it is the Ambassador Hotel. It is one of the two most important historic hotels in the City of Los Angeles along with the Biltmore. Opened in 1921, the Ambassador was the catalyst for development of the entire Wilshire corridor -- and all of Wilshire’s grand historic structures which followed its construction. It is one of the best works of Los Angeles architect Myron Hunt, one of Southern California’s most notable architects, who also designed the Rose Bowl, the Pasadena Public Library, Occidental College, and the Huntington Library and Gardens.

The Ambassador’s nightclub, the Cocoanut Grove, itself became one of Los Angeles’ most popular night spots and helped launch numerous performing careers -- from Merv Griffin to Barbra Streisand. The Ambassador was the site of six Academy Awards banquets and was the local lodging of every President from Hoover to Nixon.

In 1968, the Ambassador became part of our nation’s political history when Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in the hotel’s kitchen after winning California’s Democratic presidential primary. The Texas Book Depository Building in Dallas now houses a museum on John F. Kennedy’s assassination; the non-descript Lorraine Motel in Memphis where Martin Luther King was killed has been transformed into a National Civil Rights Museum. Yet, the Ambassador -- which also has tremendous architectural and historic significance even beyond this one tragic event -- may soon be wiped away.

Why Reuse Is Feasible and Cost-Effective

LAUSD has previously proposed demolishing the hotel for a new high school, and is now considering the potential construction of one or two additional schools (middle school and/or elementary school) on the site. Many within LAUSD’s staff believe reuse of the Ambassador is impossible because the space is “inefficient” or because reuse is not cost-effective.

However, the Conservancy’s analysis, made possible by its Ambassador Hotel Task Force (with generous pro bono assistance from top architectural, development, and engineering professionals), demonstrates otherwise: reuse of the hotel itself as a school is not only very feasible and exciting, but actually represents a lower-cost option for the School District.

Using the School District’s own facilities needs for the new school, Ambassador Task Force members, led by architect Barry Milofsky of M2A Architects, confirmed the hotel’s suitability for conversion to a school. How would this work?

• The hotel rooms of the Ambassador convert easily into classrooms. The “double-loaded” corridors with rooms on each side would be converted to a single, wider corridor for student passage, and columns would be moved to create ideally-sized classroom spaces
• The beautiful, expansive hotel lobby serves as the school’s entrance, “commons”, and student gathering place
• The famed Cocoanut Grove nightclub becomes the school’s large auditorium/lecture hall
• The grand ballroom (which hosted Oscar ceremonies and important political events) serves as a magnificent school’s library.
• The large retail concourse, downstairs from the lobby and accessed through a separate entrance, becomes on-site space for community organizations, literacy training, and neighborhood services.
• A new gymnasium and new athletic fields would be added south of the hotel building

Because the State of California’s Field Act imposes heightened seismic standards for public schools, it was essential to analyze how to achieve seismic code compliance. Structural engineer Nabih Youssef, one of the nation’s leading experts on seismic strengthening of historic structures, has completed a dynamic modeling of the entire hotel structure, concluding that seismic retrofit is very feasible, and less intrusive than originally estimated.

The construction/cost estimation firm of Davis Langdon Adamson took the seismic plans and prepared detailed cost estimates for the Ambassador project. The cost of the entire seismic retrofit, plus rehabilitation of the hotel’s exterior and roofing is less than $55 per square foot, including all design and contingency fees. In contrast, creating the same basic structural system and building shell for comparable new educational buildings typically costs about $80 per square foot. These cost savings did not even take into account the high cost of LAUSD demolishing the huge Ambassador complex.

The Conservancy’s plan leaves plenty of room for future student growth or a middle school campus on the site because it does not even utilize one entire wing of the hotel in order to serve 2,500 students. In addition, the reuse plan leaves seven acres on the Wilshire Boulevard frontage untouched, allowing for compatible commercial development opportunities that can contribute to Wilshire Center’s economic revitalization, or for additional school construction.

Furthermore, the Conservancy’s plan can get kids into school seats faster than can new construction. By reusing the Ambassador Hotel, the District can avoid the lengthy, expensive preparation of a full Environmental Impact Report that would be necessary to demolish a historic resource, and also avoid time-consuming demolition and re-grading.

LAUSD must make decisions that put kids first. And simply put, preservation of the Ambassador Hotel will get LAUSD more seats for more kids, less expensively, faster, and in a remarkable setting that could not possibly be replicated by new construction.

What’s Next?

Once the Federal Bankruptcy Court approves this settlement in late November and LAUSD assumes full control of the property, LAUSD will need to go through a public review process, which will give the Conservancy and others a formal opportunity to raise reuse options with the District. Board Member Caprice Young has promised an inclusive public process to discuss the future of this site. But we do not yet know whether the District will take these proposals seriously, or simply treat the Ambassador property as if it were a blank slate.

As an influential community leader in Los Angeles, we hope you’ll: 1) help the Conservancy spread the word by sending this briefing to other local leaders who may be interested in assisting; and 2) Tell us whether you would be interested in participating in a citywide coalition to urge reuse of the Ambassador Hotel for educational purposes.

The Opportunity

The Ambassador project can build on a number of positive models that have adapted historic structures for school uses. Just a few blocks down the street, the Art Deco Bullock’s Wilshire Department Store has been beautifully transformed into the centerpiece of Southwestern University Law School, including its Law Library. The expensive, prestigious Archer School for Girls on the Westside has moved into the historic Eastern Star Home on Sunset Blvd. in Brentwood. In Savannah, Georgia, an entire college campus -- the Savannah College of Art and Design -- has been cobbled together utilizing more than 50 rehabilitated historic structures.

The Ambassador Hotel provides an unparalleled opportunity to transform a Los Angeles site of exceptional significance into an exciting, community-serving educational complex. We hope you’ll help.

Sincerely,

Ken Bernstein
Director of Preservation Issues
Los Angeles Conservancy