After years of trying to best manage the tour buses that bring visitors who wander the Golden Triangle, Beverly Hills will once again look to install pickup and dropoff zones to alleviate the traffic, loitering and other concerns businesses have complained about.

A designated dropoff and pickup zone for tour buses might be placed in front of a medical building at 414 N. Camden Drive. (photo by Luke Harold)

“Right now, there’s really no good dropoff and pickup located in the commercial area,” said Adam Englander, a registered lobbyist speaking on behalf of Starline Tours, who addressed the city’s Traffic and Parking Commission. “We believe it will greatly enhance the businesses in the area, just being close to Rodeo Drive.”

A proposed pilot program would add a pickup and dropoff zone in front of a medical office building at 414 N. Camden Drive. The city has installed and removed dropoff and pickup zones since the 1990s. A few commonly used tour bus zones have been removed in recent years due to construction. Tour bus operators first shifted their pickup and drop off to North Camden Drive and Dayton Way in 2010, when the Crescent Post Office staging area was eliminated because of construction, according to a city staff report. Some business owners have said tour bus loading zones have brought noise, trespassing and added traffic to their streets.

“There was no one stationed there and the tour bus companies quite frankly took advantage,” said Julie Wagner, CEO of the Beverly Hills Conference and Visitors Bureau. “They staged there, they didn’t move along as quickly as they were supposed to move along and it created a number of problems.”

In response to concerns by Traffic and Parking Commissioners that this proposal may lead to the same complaints from businesses, this proposal would add a city ambassador to help tour buses and their riders come and go more efficiently.

Jeffrey Gross, owner of Mickey Fine Pharmacy at 414 N. Camden Drive, said tour bus loading and unloading in front of the property has led to more sales to visitors who stop inside. He said in the past, the city failed to adequately respond to concerns of business owners worried about visitors loitering as they wait to be picked up, idling buses holding up traffic and other common complaints.

A record-setting 48.5 million visitors came to Los Angeles County in 2017, adding $22.7 billion to the local economy, according to the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board. In 2016, Beverly Hills received $57 million in tourism-related taxes, according to a study conducted by the Conference and Visitors Bureau. Todd Johnson, president of the Beverly Hills Chamber of Commerce, said the influx of visitors that tour bus companies bring into the city help local businesses compete with Century City, the Beverly Center and online retail.

“Are they going to spend money on Rodeo Drive? I don’t know,” Johnson said. “But they are going to order something to eat. Our restaurants will flourish. Some of the smaller stores will flourish and some of the bigger ones will as well.”

When the Traffic and Parking Commission considered the proposal on Dec. 6, Steve Pavlovsky, the regional manager for the property manager of 414 N. Camden Drive, asked commissioners to reconsider the location.

“I believe a few years ago when this was attempted before, it created quite an issue for patients, quite an issue for medical vehicles, ambulances to assist patients in and out of the building,” he said. “ … We want to support business, we’re a part of the community, [but] we do have a hard time with the idea of it being done in front of the medical building.”

City spokesman Keith Sterling said the City Council will consider the new proposal for tour bus pickup and dropoff within the coming months.