Council Hears New Plans for Bowl Entrance

Plans to reconfigure the entrance of the Santa Barbara Bowl — and abandon a portion of a public street in the process — encountered no major opposition at the City Council on Tuesday, but several councilmembers made it clear they wanted a lot more attention paid to providing drop-off and pickup points on Milpas Street for people coming and going to Bowl shows. By officially abandoning a stretch of Lowena Drive, a little-used thoroughfare that snakes through the Bowl property, Bowl officials are hoping they can create a bigger buffer between cars and people inside the Bowl parking lot, not to mention building a brand new ticket office and an overflowing begonia garden. Before submitting a formal application, they wanted some sense where the City Council stood on the matter.