Honoring the Real Stars of Hollywood, Friends of the Hollywood Central Park Pay Tribute to Community Leaders at First Awards Ceremony

December 28, 2009

HOLLYWOOD—Paying tribute to the real stars of Hollywood, the Friends of the Hollywood Central Park will honor community leaders on Jan. 7, 2010 at the first For the Love of Hollywood celebration.

Friends of the Hollywood Central Park (FHCP), a nonprofit organization dedicated to creating a 44-acre street-level park over the Hollywood Freeway in a densely populated and park-poor area of the city, will hold the event to celebrate its first anniversary and thank the Hollywood community for their support.

“We are gathering to celebrate the accomplishments of outstanding organizations and public officials whose leadership has allowed us to move the dream of the Hollywood Central Park closer to reality,” said FHCP Chairman Philip E. Aarons of Millennium Partners/Argent Ventures, who was the founding member and chairman of Friends of the High Line in New York City. “It is a salute to those who have the vision to literally change the landscape of an entire region for the better.”
Recipients of the first For the Love of Hollywood awards are: the Central Hollywood Neighborhood Council, East Hollywood Neighborhood Council, Hollywood Studio District Neighborhood Council, Hollywood United Neighborhood Council, Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, Community Redevelopment Agency of Los Angeles, Caltrans, Assemblymember Kevin DeLeon, City Councilmember Tom LaBonge, and City Council President Eric Garcetti.

“Building a Hollywood Central Park over the 101 Freeway is truly visionary and would provide sorely needed open space in one of L.A.’s densest neighborhoods,” said Garcetti. “It's wonderful that Friends of the Hollywood Cap Park is moving us closer to making this vision a reality.”

Friends of the Hollywood Central Park was created in December 2008 to raise funds to create a park above the Hollywood Freeway between Santa Monica Boulevard and Hollywood Boulevard. The park will produce more than 4,500 jobs, improve air quality and reduce global warming, utilize 21st century cutting-edge technologies, reunite communities separated by the Hollywood Freeway, and serve as a national model for the creation of new greenspace in a dense urban environment. The park will be a major stimulus for the Los Angeles economy by serving as an economic engine for construction jobs, tourism, and development opportunities.

The idea for the park came 26 years ago from local landscape architect Edward V. Hunt who envisioned a cap park over the 101 Freeway in Hollywood as a way to create much-needed greenspace. In 2006, Hollywood Chamber of Commerce and Urban Land Institute member Don Scott revived the idea and created a coalition within the Hollywood Chamber to build the park. With assistance from chamber board members Jeff Briggs and Laurie Goldman, Scott took the pulse of Hollywood to gauge support and was greeted with overwhelming approval of the concept. Through private fund-raising and assistance from City Council President Eric Garcetti and the Community Redevelopment Agency, a feasibility study was commissioned to study the concept further through detailed engineering studies and design plans.

Over the past year, Friends of the Hollywood Central Park have aggressively advocated for the park. The group’s first year of existence brought many accomplishments, including resounding support from Caltrans, collaboration with the USC Master Landscape Architecture Studio, a productive advocacy trip to Washington, D.C., several prestigious awards from the American Planning Association-Los Angeles Chapter, Westside Urban Forum, and Urban Land Institute, partnerships with Los Angeles Magazine and Vanity Fair, and, most importantly, unconditional support from the schoolchildren of Hollywood’s elementary schools.

In the year ahead, FHCP has an ambitious agenda to further its mission to make the dream of creating a grand urban park above the Hollywood Freeway a reality, and the funds raised from the first of what promises to be many For the Love of Hollywood events will go toward that goal.

This year’s event held at Vanguard is made possible through the support of Diamond Sponsors: AREA Property Partners, Los Angeles Magazine, and Millennium Partners/Argent Ventures; Emerald Sponsors: Allen Matkins, CRA/LA, Hart Realty Advisors, Kaiser Permanente, Psomas, and Sheppard Mullin; and Ruby Sponsors: Cheryl Gaskill Graphics, Conway Family Wines, Galpin Motors, Gensler, GO! Goldman Organization, Hennigan, Bennett and Dorman, Hollywood Chamber of Commerce/Hollywood Community Foundation, Hudson Capital, Paramount Contractors, Paramount Pictures, Roschen Van Cleve Architects, Selma Hotel, and Vanguard.

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