The Culver City Council on Monday extended a pause on permitting new drive-thrus to address complaints from residents worried about traffic, noise and pollution from an In-N-Out planned for a shopping center parking lot. The 10-month extension will allow the city time to consider a permanent ban.
What was the council thinking? I put this and other questions to Culver City Vice Mayor Bryan “Bubba” Fish, who is spearheading the drive-thru ban. Portions of our conversation, which touched on a lot more than just In-N-Out, are reproduced here, edited for length and clarity.
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The drive-thru moratorium was spawned by a new In-N-Out, which has drawn a lot of attention.
It's not about In-N-Out. It's about the impact of drive-thrus on our communities. This In-N-Out happened to start the conversation because residents came to me in the hundreds asking us to do something about this proposal.
Honestly, of all places in the city, I think the drive-thru probably makes the most sense if we are going to put one here, right? But when I looked at the impact of drive-thrus on neighborhoods, I saw that they create traffic jams. The idling cars create pollution because of their exhaust. They're also less safe for pedestrians and anyone who's not driving.
Look, I love a burger and fries as much as the next person. If I'm on a road trip, I'm going to hit the drive-thru 10 out of 10 times. The problem is there's a difference between a drive-thru off a highway, and one in the middle of our urban area.
Do you see this as showing some broader anger or displeasure over the effects of car dependency?
That's a great question. I love harnessing NIMBYism for good things.
This has taught me that there is a lot of support for stopping environmentally harmful things from coming into the neighborhood. If you're worried about the In-N-Out causing idling cars and pollution, guess what? Our car-dependent infrastructure does that every single day.
But we take it as a given. We should also be angry because we're spewing insane things into our homes and we're breathing that air every day. We need to be just as passionate about demanding the change on our streets that we need to see, like protected bike lanes, like dedicated bus lanes, ADA [Americans with Disabilities Act] access, fixing our sidewalks, adding crosswalks, street safety. Because the safer our streets are, the more comfortable our streets are for people who get around in other ways besides driving.
Karin Klein
That's the thing about the drive-thru – it's only accessible for one way of getting around. That's sitting behind the wheel of the car. A lot of people with disabilities can't drive.
We can have a burger joint, sure. Just don't have the drive-thru.
So, if In-N-Out were to resubmit its application without a drive-thru, it wouldn’t be a problem?
Absolutely. In a second.
Do you see this spreading beyond Culver City?
It has spread very far. We're just one of the many to adopt it. So for whatever reason, Culver City is getting all the attention for something that has happened in many many cities already. Santa Barbara has banned drive-thrus for decades. San Luis Obispo has since 1982. Minneapolis has a drive-through ban, a huge, huge city like that.
For some reason, it really became news when we did it. But drive-thru bans have been a thing for a long time.
What’s it been like for Culver City to get all this media coverage?
It is absolutely wild because we've got a lot of things, and I have to tell you, this is not the biggest priority. For example, we're working on a new zoning plan that impacts the whole city.
But nothing that we've done in my year and a half on the council has gotten this much attention. I’m so burned out getting through this. But you know what? I like anything that gets people more aware and engaged in what's happening in their local city hall.
At first I was like, "What the hell? Why is this popping off?" But if it takes In-N-Out for people to wake up and go, "Who is my council member? What's going on?" I'm OK with that.
Mariel Garza
Noted, With Comment
The not-so-great Great Highway debate: Opponents of Sunset Dunes park, a closed stretch of former highway along the Ocean Beach in San Francisco, say they have submitted enough signatures for a ballot measure asking voters to spend $14 million to turn it back into a road. S.F. Chronicle columnist Harry Mok laments that this years-long debate is still unsettled: "Some say that's democracy, and they're certainly right. But to me, it's messy and unnecessary."
Pool party poopers: Not all World Cup experiences have been rainbows and unicorns. Alissa Walker writes at Torched LA about the city of Los Angeles handing over the municipal pool at Hansen Dam Aquatic Center to FIFA on July 4 for an expensive watch party. In one of the hottest areas of the city on the Fourth of July, the community was shut out from their pool.
In defense of the Coastal Act: President Trump is targeting the California Coastal Commission for its "environmental extremism." L.A. Times columnist Steve Lopez explains how the commission’s mission to protect the coast for Californians conflicts with Trump's efforts to expand coastal drilling, allow more rocket launches and erect a 70-foot flagpole at his ritzy Rancho Palos Verdes golf course. (Californians overwhelmingly agree that the commission has been mostly good for the state, according to a PPIC poll released Thursday.)
One really expensive crosswalk: Los Angeles doesn’t have enough money to implement its own safe-streets plan, but it must still make huge payouts to people who sue after tripping on sidewalks or getting hit crossing the street. In L.A. Material, reporter Matt Hamilton takes a look at a dangerous intersection in Boyle Heights that cost the city $20 million after a driver crashed into a 13-year-old boy walking in a painted crosswalk.
Mariel Garza
To check or not to check? In The Jewish News of Northern California, journalist and activist Sara Sarasohn pans Senate Bill 1387, which would add a checkbox to state government forms allowing people to identify as ethnically Jewish. “Judaism would become the only religion with its own ethnic checkbox – there’s no proposed Christian ethnicity,” she notes in a piece highlighting the ethnic diversity of Jews.
Rusty Who? The California Globe, which pretends to be a news site, but is pretty much an opinion-making outlet (hey, no shade from us), has a piece about an effort to name part of Highway 152 in Santa Clara County after Rusty Areias, an influential Sacramento lobbyist. Areias served in the state Assembly from 1982 to 1994. The proposal appears to have stalled after a heated Assembly Transportation Committee hearing last month, perhaps when committee members realized the negative optics of bestowing honors on a still-very much alive lobbyist with a firm that has big business before the Legislature.
