More than a decade after kicking off plans to bring multifamily housing and retail to a property just off the beach in Playa del Rey, Legado Companies is going back to the drawing board, according to plans submitted late last month to the Los Angeles Department of City Planning.

The Legado del Mar project, planned for a vacant at 138 E. Culver Boulevard, would also have frontage on Vista del Mar to the east and Pacific Avenue to the south. Plans call for the construction of a five-story building featuring 108 studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments above  approximately 3,200 square feet of ground-floor commercial space and parking for 144 vehicles.

Street-level view looking eastAC Martin

In addition to density bonus incentives, Legado is taking advantage of the provisions of AB 2011, state legislation which is intended to ease the construction of housing on commercially-zoned lots. If approved, it would be the second AB 2011 project in the City of Los Angeles, following a new Costco-anchored apartment complex in Baldwin Hills.

For mixed-income projects using AB 2011, developers are required to provide either 8 percent very low-income units and 5 percent extremely low income units, or 15 percent low-income units. Legado would provide 17 units of very low-income housing.

AC Martin is designing the podium-type building, which would place amenity decks on the second floor facing Pacific Avenue and Culver Boulevard.

138 E. Culver BoulevardGoogle Maps

The proposed development is larger in scale than the original Legado del Mar project pitched for the site in 2012, which had called for a shorter four-story building with 72 apartments, but also substantially more ground-floor commercial space and parking. While that version of the project received city approvals, it had faced staunch opposition from residents in Playa del Rey, and even the office of former Councilmember Mike Bonin.

While the Legado del Mar project has failed to get off the ground in the past decade, other Legado Company projects have had better luck. Legado is heading towards completion on a large housing, hotel, and retail complex in Redondo Beach, and broke ground this year on a 270-unit development in Santa Ana.

Follow us on social media: 

Twitter / Facebook / LinkedIn / Threads / Instagram / Bluesky