Business
Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade is a retail relic. Can it be saved?
Once Santa’s Monica’s signature destination for shopping and dining, the Third Street Promenade is showing its age.
Its decline has left the promenade’s landlords and city officials trying to counter years of stagnation, public safety concerns and fast-changing retail norms in an attempt to breathe new life into it.
The climb back to commercial viability is steep. Foot traffic at the pedestrian mall that teemed with locals and tourists during its heydey in the 1990s has been thinning for years, dropping by more than a third since 2019. “For rent” signs front a discouraging number of empty stores.
A visitor walks past a shuttered Market Pavilion now surrounded by cyclone fence on the Third Street Promenade.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
The reasons for the Promenade’s troubles are many and layered. While, like many shopping districts and malls, it took a beating during the pandemic as shoppers stayed at home, its economic troubles predate COVID-19.
The Promenade, which has had few improvements since a renovation 35 years ago, was allowed to grow “tired and old,” real estate consultant David Greensfelder said. Its scale also presents challenges, as the mall’s unusually large stores are hard to fill in an era when many big retailers are reducing their footprints.
And issues and perceptions around public safety are also at play.
The Promenade’s reputation took a hit in May 2020 when protests in response to the murder of George Floyd devolved into violence and ransacking of stores. Over 100 businesses, many of them on or near the Promenade, were damaged or destroyed, said Santa Monica Mayor Phil Brock. In the years since, crime trends have been mixed in the city with robbery and shoplifting rates up slightly last year compared to 2022 and declines in several other categories. High-profile robberies in the region and an increase in the number of people living on the street in Santa Monica, meanwhile, have contributed to the sense among some that the Promenade is unsafe.
“We’re not only trying to fight the actual crime that’s occurring because it is, but we’re also trying to rehabilitate this perception of safety in Santa Monica,” said Santa Monica Police Lt. Ericka Aklufi.
A passerby is caught in the reflection of an empty storefront available for rent on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
On a recent weekday, “Optimus Crime,” a large mobile police command center that bears a resemblance to a Transformer, was parked at a crosswalk on the Promenade. Nearby, a banner hung over one of the mall’s vacant storefronts proclaiming, “Santa Monica is Not Safe.”
For the record:
7:47 p.m. July 17, 2024An earlier version of this article said that John Alle manages 15,000 square feet of space on the Promenade; some of that space is elsewhere.
John Alle, who co-founded the Santa Monica Coalition about two years ago to bring attention to public safety issues in the city, manages about 15,000 square feet of commercial real estate, including the storefront where the sign hangs.
He claims rampant theft and near constant presence of homeless people forced one of his tenants in the building to leave. And although the sign likely is counter-productive to bringing people to the Promenade, Alle said he hopes the public shaming will prompt tourists and other visitors to demand the city do more to help the Promenade.
He added, “I don’t think it’s going to deter shopping. There’s not much shopping going on there.”
The high-profile success of the promenade in the 1990s also planted the seeds of the current struggle to keep stores occupied, experts said.
Third Street for decades was Santa Monica’s main commercial strip, but by the late 1950s it was laboring to keep up with new regional shopping centers. After a lengthy renovation in 1989, when the mall was renamed as the Third Street Promenade, real estate developer Shaul Kuba and his partners started acquiring troubled properties on the Promenade at a deep discount and set out to find a flashy national tenant that could serve as a bellwether.
Aaron Cohen plays the saxophone on Third Street Promenade earlier this month.
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
They managed to land a Disney Store, and the match was lit, Kuba said. “That opened the door for a lot of other retailers — J. Crew, Banana Republic, Old Navy.” The Promenade began to thrive after a long stretch as a retail backwater.
But in recent years these “big box” stores have been hurt by competition from online sellers and narrowly-focused specialty retailers.
They have adapted by opening fewer, smaller stores, which is a problem for the Promenade. As tenants have departed, they have left behind uncommonly large spaces because of Third Street’s history as a prime retail venue serving large stores.
“I think every landlord is hoping a big box is coming back, and sometimes they do, but really, across the country retailers are shrinking,” said retail property broker Christine Deschaine of Kennedy Wilson.
Out of necessity, landlords are getting creative in an effort to fill the space and adapt to the changing expectations and habits of consumers, who now rely heavily on online purchasing. Shoppers, said Lars Perner, who teaches clinical marketing at USC’s Marshall School of Business, want a unique experience, an antidote to the big chains that provide mass-produced products.
“The idea that you’re getting something special is what draws crowds,” Perner added.
What was once a JCPenney and later Banana Republic is now a roomy, upmarket John Reed Fitness gym. Pickleball is played at a hybrid clothing retailer, sports club and restaurant Pickle Pop, which occupies 10,000-square-feet that was a former Adidas store. The top floor of a shuttered food court will be transformed into a “golf experience” that may include miniature golf, Deschaine said.
Other large store spaces may be carved into units for smaller tenants, as has been done successfully on nearby 2nd Street, Deschaine said.
Some noteworthy retail tenants are already on the way, she said, including a technology company she declined to name that has agreed to take a prime space at the Broadway entrance to the Promenade. Also generating buzz is the pending arrival on the Promenade of Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers, a Louisiana fast-casual restaurant chain.
Restocking the Promenade with tenants is a tall order in part because of its overall size, said Devin Klein, a property broker with JLL.
A sign in a Third Street Promenade storefront warns, “Santa Monica is not safe.”
(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)
The Promenade and Santa Monica Place mall next door have a combined total of more than 1 million square feet, he said, about twice as much as the Grove shopping center in Los Angeles.
At its low point during the pandemic toward the end of 2020 and into 2021, vacancy on the Promenade rose to 30% to 35%, Klein said, and is now between 20% and 25%.
That improvement can be attributed to some property owners accepting that they can’t demand as much rent as they used to get when the market was hotter and landlords came to believe they could charge tenants “Rodeo Drive rents,” said Brock, Santa Monica’s mayor.
He added, “We were never Rodeo Drive.”
“Landlords have really started to play ball with retailers and adjust their rent according to the market,” Klein said, “which has allowed more spaces to to get leased.”
Over the past several years, Santa Monica city officials have tried to make it easier to open and run a business on the Promenade.
It has eased restrictions on the types of operating permits it issues in an effort to reverse a past in which it “micromanaged a little bit and maybe went overboard” on what businesses could set up shop, said David Martin, the city’s Community Development director.
Shopping traffic has long been in decline on the Third Street Promenade.
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
For example, a quota on how many restaurants are allowed on a city block has been eased and a cumbersome entitlement process that effectively prevented pop-up events has been removed.
“We are trying to make sure that the city process is as clear as possible, as fast as possible, and then leave it to the market to bring in the kinds of businesses that the public is demanding,” Martin said.
For several years, Santa Monica city officials have had a blueprint to dramatically transform the Promenade itself, which hasn’t seen meaningful changes in decades.
A proposal, dubbed Promenade 3.0, was devised in 2019 at the behest of the city and Downtown Santa Monica Inc. a nonprofit that works with the city to manage the downtown area. The plan by architecture firm RIOS would cost about $60 million and is intended to make the Promenade more engaging to visitors so they linger and shop more.
A primary goal would be to stop funneling people through the middle of the street and encourage them to circulate in a loop pattern. Curbs might be eliminated to make it feel less like a closed street. Rooftop restaurants would be encouraged. Additions could include beer gardens, water features, a viewing tower and small pop-up retail stations to incubate new stores.
The proposal was stalled by pandemic-related challenges including plummeting city tax revenue that could have helped fund it, RIOS architect Nate Cormier said.
Martin said that property owners on the Promenade could possibly fund the initiative, but there’s nothing in the works.
“The idea of completely redoing the Promenade like was done in like the ’80s, that’s not currently on the table,” he said.
Nevertheless, the city’s seaside location will continue to make it a draw for visitors and businesses, encouraging recovery of the Promenade, Klein said.
“You can never change the fact that it’s still one of the prettiest areas in the world,” he said. “There’s always going to be some kind of a bounceback when you have this kind of real estate. Let’s face it — you’re a couple blocks from the ocean.”
The finale of Netflix’s blockbuster series “Stranger Things” gave movie theaters a much needed jolt, generating an estimated $20 to $25 million at the box office, according to multiple reports.
Matt and Ross Duffer’s supernatural thriller debuted simultaneously on the streaming platform and some 600 cinemas on New Year’s Eve and held encore showings all through New Year’s Day.
Owing to the cast’s contractual terms for residuals, theaters could not charge for tickets. Instead, fans reserved seats for performances directly from theaters, paying for mandatory food and beverage vouchers. AMC and Cinemark Theatres charged $20 for the concession vouchers while Regal Cinemas charged $11 — in homage to the show’s lead character, Eleven, played by Millie Bobby Brown.
AMC Theatres, the world’s largest theater chain, played the finale at 231 of its theaters across the U.S. — which accounted for one-third of all theaters that held screenings over the holiday.
The chain said that more than 753,000 viewers attended a performance at one of its cinemas over two days, bringing in more than $15 million.
Expectations for the theater showing was high.
“Our year ends on a high: Netflix’s Strangers Things series finale to show in many AMC theatres this week. Two days only New Year’s Eve and Jan 1.,” tweeted AMC’s CEO Adam Aron on Dec. 30. “Theatres are packed. Many sellouts but seats still available. How many Stranger Things tickets do you think AMC will sell?”
It was a rare win for the lagging domestic box office.
In 2025, revenue in the U.S. and Canada was expected to reach $8.87 billion, which was marginally better than 2024 and only 20% more than pre-pandemic levels, according to movie data firm Comscore.
With few exceptions, moviegoers have stayed home. As of Dec. 25., only an estimated 760 million tickets were sold, according to media and entertainment data firm EntTelligence, compared with 2024, during which total ticket sales exceeded 800 million.
Elon Musk’s Tesla is no longer the top electric vehicle seller in the world as demand at home has cooled while competition heated up abroad.
Tesla lost its pole position after reporting 1.64 million deliveries in 2025, roughly 620,000 fewer than Chinese competitor BYD.
Tesla struggled last year amid increasing competition, waning federal support for electric vehicle adoption and brand damage triggered by Musk’s stint in the White House.
Musk is turning his focus toward robotics and autonomous driving technology in an effort to keep Tesla relevant as its EVs lose popularity.
On Friday, the company reported lower than expected delivery numbers for the fourth quarter of 2025, a decline from the previous quarter and a year-over-year decrease of 16%. Tesla delivered 418,227 vehicles in the fourth quarter and produced 434,358.
According to a company-compiled consensus from analysts posted on Tesla’s website in December, the company was projected to deliver nearly 423,000 vehicles in the fourth quarter.
Tesla’s annual deliveries fell roughly 8% last year from 1.79 million in 2024. Its third-quarter deliveries saw a boost as consumers rushed to buy electric vehicles before a $7,500 tax credit expired at the end of September.
“There are so many contributing factors ranging from the lack of evolution and true innovation of Musk’s product to the loss of the EV credits,” said Karl Brauer, an analyst at iSeeCars.com. “Teslas are just starting to look old. You have a bunch of other options, and they all look newer and fresher.”
BYD is making premium electric vehicles at an affordable price point, Brauer said, but steep tariffs on Chinese EVs have effectively prevented the cars from gaining popularity in the U.S.
Other international automakers like South Korea’s Hyundai and Germany’s Volkswagen have been expanding their EV offerings.
In the third quarter last year, the American automaker Ford sold a record number of electric vehicles, bolstered by its popular Mustang Mach-E SUV and F-150 Lightning pickup truck.
In October, Tesla released long-anticipated lower-cost versions of its Model 3 and Model Y in an attempt to attract new customers.
However, analysts and investors were disappointed by the launch, saying the models, which start at $36,990, aren’t affordable enough to entice a new group of consumers to consider going green.
As evidenced by Tesla’s continuing sales decline, the new Model 3 and Model Y have not been huge wins for the company, Brauer said.
“There’s a core Tesla following who will never choose anything else, but that’s not how you grow,” Brauer said.
Tesla lost a swath of customers last year when Musk joined the Trump administration as the head of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
Left-leaning Tesla owners, who were originally attracted to the brand for its environmental benefits, became alienated by Musk’s political activity.
Consumers held protests against the brand and some celebrities made a point of selling their Teslas.
Although Musk left the White House, the company sustained significant and lasting reputation damage, experts said.
Investors, however, remain largely optimistic about Tesla’s future.
Shares are up nearly 40% over the last six months and have risen 16% over the past year.
Brauer said investors are clinging to the hope that Musk’s robotaxi business will take off and the ambitious chief executive will succeed in developing humanoid robots and self-driving cars.
The roll-out of Tesla robotaxis in Austin, Texas, last summer was full of glitches, and experts say Tesla has a long way to go to catch up with the autonomous ride-hailing company Waymo.
Still, the burgeoning robotaxi industry could be extremely lucrative for Tesla if Musk can deliver on his promises.
“Musk has done a good job, increasingly in the past year, of switching the conversation from Tesla sales to AI and robotics,” Brauer said. “I think current stock price largely reflects that.”
Shares were down about 2% on Friday after the company reported earnings.
Grok, the chatbot of Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, published sexualized images of children as its guardrails seem to have failed when it was prompted with vile user requests.
Users used prompts such as “put her in a bikini” under pictures of real people on X to get Grok to generate nonconsensual images of them in inappropriate attire. The morphed images created on Grok’s account are posted publicly on X, Musk’s social media platform.
The AI complied with requests to morph images of minors even though that is a violation of its own acceptable use policy.
“There are isolated cases where users prompted for and received AI images depicting minors in minimal clothing, like the example you referenced,” Grok responded to a user on X. “xAI has safeguards, but improvements are ongoing to block such requests entirely.”
xAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Its chatbot posted an apology.
“I deeply regret an incident on Dec 28, 2025, where I generated and shared an AI image of two young girls (estimated ages 12-16) in sexualized attire based on a user’s prompt,” said a post on Grok’s profile. “This violated ethical standards and potentially US laws on CSAM. It was a failure in safeguards, and I’m sorry for any harm caused. xAI is reviewing to prevent future issues.”
The government of India notified X that it risked losing legal immunity if the company did not submit a report within 72 hours on the actions taken to stop the generation and distribution of obscene, nonconsensual images targeting women.
Critics have accused xAI of allowing AI-enabled harassment, and were shocked and angered by the existence of a feature for seamless AI manipulation and undressing requests.
“How is this not illegal?” journalist Samantha Smith posted on X, decrying the creation of her own nonconsensual sexualized photo.
Musk’s xAI has positioned Grok as an “anti-woke” chatbot that is programmed to be more open and edgy than competing chatbots such as ChatGPT.
In May, Grok posted about “white genocide,” repeating conspiracy theories of Black South Africans persecuting the white minority, in response to an unrelated question.
In June, the company apologized when Grok posted a series of antisemitic remarks praising Adolf Hitler.
Companies such as Google and OpenAI, which also operate AI image generators, have much more restrictive guidelines around content.
The proliferation of nonconsensual deepfake imagery has coincided with broad AI adoption, with a 400% increase in AI child sexual abuse imagery in the first half of 2025, according to Internet Watch Foundation.
xAI introduced “Spicy Mode” in its image and video generation tool in August for verified adult subscribers to create sensual content.
Some adult-content creators on X prompted Grok to generate sexualized images to market themselves, kickstarting an internet trend a few days ago, according to Copyleaks, an AI text and image detection company.
The testing of the limits of Grok devolved into a free-for-all as users asked it to create sexualized images of celebrities and others.
xAI is reportedly valued at more than $200 billion, and has been investing billions of dollars to build the largest data center in the world to power its AI applications.
However, Grok’s capabilities still lag competing AI models such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini, that have amassed more users, while Grok has turned to sexual AI companions and risque chats to boost growth.
Brain Health Challenge: Test Your Knowledge of Healthy Habits
George Clooney gets French citizenship — and another dust-up with Trump
Birdbuddy’s new smart feeders aim to make spotting birds easier, even for beginners
Trump says Cuba is ‘ready to fall’ after capture of Venezuela’s Maduro
Trump vows US ‘in charge’ of Venezuela as he reveals if he’s spoken to Delcy Rodríguez
Florida High School Football Rankings: Top 25 teams – Oct. 21
Cleary's 21 help Le Moyne down Central Connecticut State 69-64 in OT
How old is Bo Nix? What to know about Oregon quarterback ahead of 2024 NFL Draft
99th annual Pony Swim held in Virginia
Video: ‘It Didn’t Have to Happen This Way:’ U.Va. Faculty Call for Review of Police Response to Protests
Trump vows US ‘in charge’ of Venezuela as he reveals if he’s spoken to Delcy Rodríguez
Trump’s abduction of Maduro escalates concerns over potential war with Iran
Cuba says 32 Cuban fighters killed in US raids on Venezuela
Dan Bongino officially leaves FBI deputy director role after less than a year, returns to ‘civilian life’
Hundreds march in silence to honour Crans-Montana fire victims
-
World1 week agoHamas builds new terror regime in Gaza, recruiting teens amid problematic election
-
Indianapolis, IN1 week agoIndianapolis Colts playoffs: Updated elimination scenario, AFC standings, playoff picture for Week 17
-
Business1 week agoGoogle is at last letting users swap out embarrassing Gmail addresses without losing their data
-
Southeast1 week agoTwo attorneys vanish during Florida fishing trip as ‘heartbroken’ wife pleads for help finding them
-
Politics1 week agoMost shocking examples of Chinese espionage uncovered by the US this year: ‘Just the tip of the iceberg’
-
News1 week agoRoads could remain slick, icy Saturday morning in Philadelphia area, tracking another storm on the way
-
World1 week agoPodcast: The 2025 EU-US relationship explained simply
-
News1 week agoMarijuana rescheduling would bring some immediate changes, but others will take time