Santa Monica Unveils Draft Master Plan for 192-Acre Airport Park

The City of Santa Monica unveiled a draft “Illustrative Master Plan” for its 192-acre airport-to-park conversion at a public workshop on Oct. 17. The event opened phase four of the five-phase Airport-to-Park process. The plan is a proposal only, not a decided outcome: it still faces commission review in November and a City Council vote in January, the city said.

Santa Monica Airport’s aviation operations are set to end permanently at midnight on Dec. 31, 2028, under a Federal Aviation Administration settlement that followed voters’ 2014 approval of a measure directing the city to convert the land to parkland once the airport closes. The draft plan builds on the Phase 3B Framework Diagram, which drew more than 4,200 survey responses from February through April.

Why it matters

A 192-acre park in the middle of the Westside would change the math for parcels around it. Owners and builders in Sunset Park, Ocean Park and nearby West Los Angeles should watch access routes and adjacent zoning as the plan firms up. The project is still unbuilt, unfunded and unapproved.

The numbers

The site totals 192 acres. The draft proposes roughly 40 acres for active sports fields, with up to 10 of those acres reserved to replace fields now at Clover Park, an 18-acre site the city separately plans to convert into a pedestrian district called “The Stroll.” Airport Park, 8 acres, is proposed for conversion to an active sports area. City staff have not produced a construction cost estimate; the Recreation and Parks Commission has proposed funding the build out with the airport enterprise zone’s $20 million to $22 million in annual non-aviation lease revenue.

What’s next

The Planning Commission and Recreation and Parks Commission, which already flagged concerns in a Sept. 21 letter about losing Clover Park and Airport Park in their current form, take up the draft again in November. The City Council is slated to weigh in on the draft plan in January. No construction timeline or environmental review consultant has been finalized, and the plan will keep evolving before aviation use ends in 2028. Background on the Santa Monica market is tracked on the Los Angeles hub, alongside recent coverage like The Victorian’s Santa Monica members club conversion.