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| Battalion Chief John H. Duca shows a model of Fire Station 34, to be built this year and next at Motor Ave. and Regent St. |
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Work will begin in 2005 on a new fire station for Palms and Rancho Park on the northeast corner of Motor Ave. and Regent St., where the National Wushu Training Center used to be.
Battalion Chief John H. Duca told the December 2003 meeting of the Palms Neighborhood Council and the Palms-Westside Village Neighborhood Watch that the work of tearing down the old building, preparing the site and building a new station will take about 14 months.
He said the contractor will have to come up with a suitable “mitigation” scheme to keep the noise and commotion to a reasonable level during the construction period.
The current engine company — one truck, four men and one rescue ambulance — will be moved from the old station on National Blvd. east of Motor Ave. Nothing has yet been planned for the old building, although the city policy is to adapt surplus structures for public use wherever possible.
Will the Palms community be allowed to put the name “Palms” on the new building.
No, Duca said.
“We try to be consistent throughout the department, and the way we’re accomplishing that is through real simple block letters, ‘Fire Station Number whatever-it-is.’ . . .
"We’ve got 20 separate facilities going across the city, and each of those is going to say, ‘Fire Station’ and the number.”
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PALMS will be the motif for an art installation to be placed at the new station by artist Todd Gray, but not just the kind with the long trunk and lots of fronds.
The PALMS that Gray has in mind are also those attached to the ends of most people’s wrists.
Gray is no stranger to this area. He is a Hamilton High School graduate who traveled to school daily from his home in South L.A., and he is determined to give something back to this district.
“I drove the neighborhoods in August, and what I came up with was this: Panels, like a Mondrian grid, rectangular shapes made of metal. Images of palm leaves and palms. . .”
At this point he showed his hand, fingers splayed, his palm facing the audience. He will, he said, be using the shape of human palms as part of his work.
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“I want to get a child’s palm who has been impacted by the fire station in Palms . . . I want to use the palm of one of the men and women assigned to that station . . . I want it to be subtle; you will be living with this art for many years; I would like to reveal itself over time. It will be affected by light, time of day — the colors will become more vivid and less vivid.”
None of the palms (human variety) will be of any particular skin color, he said.
“It will just be attributed to the earth. It’ll be water, sky, only those colors I’ll be using.”
Gray said he would come back to the Neighborhood Council for help in getting the palms (the people kind) to use as models in his project.
[Go here to see Gray's complete biography.]
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