AVALON, Calif. (AP) - In a bid to revive tourism, California’s Santa Catalina Island has undertaken its biggest overhaul in nearly a century.
The 2-square mile harbor town of Avalon is adding a new museum, hotel, spa and wine-tasting room in an effort to lure more visitors from the mainland, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday (https://lat.ms/OJOU0H).
It is the biggest overhaul on the island off the coast of Southern California since chewing gum magnate William Wrigley Jr. built a casino there in the 1920s.
“Catalina is becoming a new old place,” Geoffrey Rusack, whose wife is a great-granddaughter of Wrigley Jr., told the newspaper.
For decades, the island was a popular destination for movie stars and power brokers from Los Angeles. In the 1960s, developers and tourists starting heading to mainland resorts in Palm Springs and Disneyland instead.
But island tourism has risen in the last four years since a zip line and new museum exhibits were added.
One of the biggest projects is a $6 million new museum building.
“This institution is going to change Avalon forever,” said Michael De Marsche, the museum’s executive director.
That’s precisely what has put some of the community’s 4,000 members on edge, said Avalon City Councilman Ralph Morrow.
“All of a sudden - boom! - we’ve got workmen going 500 miles an hour tearing down old structures and building new ones,” Morrow said.
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Information from: Los Angeles Times, https://www.latimes.com
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