Hansen: Summer of cars starts on discordant note

Downtown business owners got their wish Saturday when Forest Avenue became a parking lot.

Despite traffic police stopping pedestrians at every corner, the cars still clogged Forest from Coast Highway to City Hall as part of the Fête de la Musique — the unofficial start of summer.

At times, pedestrians had to jump out of the way of frustrated drivers who doubtless felt entitled to own Forest after the city recently refused to attempt a trial shutdown of the street to cars.

In line with the city’s vision, perhaps it’s time to change the name of Forest Avenue to Pavement Place.

But even though cars were everywhere, the music and people rose above it.

The eighth annual festival was the perfect kickoff to summer, put on by the Laguna Beach Sister Cities Assn. Kids participated in a parade, then played on Main Beach and got their faces painted. While music dominated the day, there were also dancers, circus performers and other eclectic entertainers.

Almost every nook and cranny of downtown was occupied by some talented and colorful character: the foot-stomping Budrows, the bohemian Denmantau band and the delicate, professional sounds of Croatian violinist Alessandro Tanasache.

You could be surprised and delighted nearly everywhere — if not for the musicianship, at least for the panache.

For example, what would a sophisticated music festival be without Elvis?

Variety entertainer David Gorgie was the King of Rock and Roll, but he can also play Neil Diamond, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Cash, Austin Powers, Bill Clinton, Jack Sparrow and the Mad Hatter.

Off the record, he said city officials asked him to double as a traffic cop, but he refused. I’m kidding.

However, this festival does illustrate the blind polarity — some would say schizophrenic nature — of a city that continues to hold large events to draw ever more visitors without doing anything to help the infrastructure.

I tried taking the trolley on Saturday but it didn’t work. I was able to get downtown OK from Woods Cove but had to walk home in the afternoon after waiting more than 30 minutes for a trolley at Legion Street. Then the two that finally arrived were full.

As a resident, I shrugged it off and walked, but most of the out-of-town tourists who were waiting were not pleased.

The city has added more trolleys this year — even though it doesn’t seem like it — and simplified the routes to make them more efficient, but clearly something is still not working.

It’s ironic that the Fête de la Musique also serves as a celebration of our sister city in France. Menton is a beautiful coastal city on the French Riviera with a population similar to that of Laguna Beach.

It has a historic market in the center of town. Do you think cars run through the middle?

Every year the city holds a lemon festival. It’s big, running a couple days with music and street vendors — but no cars.

Menton also has the celebrated the Menton Classical Musical Festival every year in the old town center. It would be hard to pull off, however, with Harley-Davidson motorcycles rumbling through the orchestra.

Everyone will say that the Fête de la Musique was another success this year and it was. The music was fun, entertaining and consistently really, really good.

But you had to shut off all the background noise.

It’s like that loud movie patron you just have to ignore.

Or the person at the Pageant of the Masters who insists on pontificating about every painting.

You know when a city denies a proposed new business because it is “incompatible” with existing zoning laws? Maybe someone is trying to put in a skateboard park next to a library or a homeless shelter next an expensive jewelry store.

Leaders often say the two are incompatible.

So why is it that the city ignores the incompatibility of a sublime violinist playing 10 feet away from a belching monster truck?

Clearly, Laguna is not the sophisticated city it thinks it is — or maybe it’s just tone deaf.

DAVID HANSEN is a writer and Laguna Beach resident. He can be reached at hansen.dave@gmail.com.