Here’s a piece of Hollywood history in the making: An aerial photo showing the Cinerama Dome under construction on Sunset Blvd in 1963. It marked the first new major motion picture theater in Hollywood in 33 years, and in record time. The groundbreaking ceremony took place in July 1963 and opened a mere four months later on schedule on November 7 with the world premiere of “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World.” Apart from the Dome taking shape, this photo shows us how much land in Hollywood was given over to parking lots.
This satellite image from January 2020 shows much of the parking lot land is now filled in.
I see the RCA Building across the street is also under construction! (Now the Los Angeles Film School.) To the right of the RCA Building is the very first Norm’s Restaurant, which opened in 1949. Always nice to see the NBC Building in any photograph as well!
Re: Parking lots. Aerial photos of downtown LA after Bunker Hill and environs were razed and terraformed, but before the skyscrapers were built, show vast expanses of parking lots. Most of the parking around there these days is underground.
The structure seen in the more recent photo, below/south of the Cinerama Dome, is a massive 6-storey parking garage, 3/4 of a block long. I wonder
what percentage of parking spots in LA are above or below ground. In Century City it’s probably 90%+.
Anecdote Alert! I parked in that parking facility once and had to go to the 6th level to find a spot. I went to the Cinerama dome and saw Spinal Tap hosted by Harry Shearer who hung out afterwards and chatted with people including me. I met Mr. Burns and Principal Skinner!
Thanks Martin Pal, I was wondering what the little building on the corner was. Norm’s!