By Devora Vrana ,Time staff Writer

Arco Plaza Wins Star Tenant..
City National Bank will move into 310,000 square feet in the downtonw La landmark. It is latest sign of the area's recovering commercial real state market.
City National Bank, is expected to announce that it will lease 310,000 square feet in Arco Plaza. It will be the largest deal in downtown LA
this year, and the latest sign that the central business real state market is recovering.
Under terms of the 15 year agreement, Arco Plaza's twin towers will be renamed City National Plaza, returning a bank's moniker to the skyline after the disapperance of financial institutions like Security Pacific and First Interstateduring the last 2 decades.
"This is huge vote of confidence in downtown LA, because we know they were looking at other locations in SoCal", said Jack Kyser chief economist at the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp. A nonprofit organization
located in Arco Plaza.
Terms of the lease were not disclosed, but brokers specializing in the downtown market estimate at 120 million, based in the price for square foot from $24 to $30.
When the move is completed by early 2006, the bank expects to have 800 employees on 12 floors in the property's south tower at 555 South Flower St.
"This will work best for our clients" said Rusell Goldsmith, City National Bank's chief executive, We are commited to Los Angeles. It's a recognition that we are the largest local bank here".
City National, which has long catered to a high-end celebrity clientile, will maintain its headquarters in Beverly Hills. The company with $20 million in assets, said that their deposits in the third quarter had risen 23% from a year earlier.
City National will take up space being vacated by Bank of America Corp. and several other law firms. BofA annouced earlier this year to move employees from Arco Plaza and consolidate it's downtown space in 333 South Flower St., on top of Bunker Hill. The bank said that one of the reasons it was moving was because Arco's landlord wanted to raise rents.
Arco Plaza is owned by Thomas Poperties Corp., which bought the 2.7 million square foot this year for $270 million, less than half it sold by sixteen years ago.
With it's twin 52 story tower, Arco Plaza was once considered one of the best corporates addresses in the city, home to Fortune 500 petroleum company Arco, which owned the property with Bank of America before selling it. Arco was aquired by BP oil company in 2000.
"We are just delighted to have them as tenants" James A Thomas who heads Thomas properties, siad of City National Bank.
Currently, BP and Bank of America are the largest tenants in Arco Plaza, Thomas said. But City National Bank will be the largest once it moves in.
The entire property which is located in the heart of DTLA between Flower St., 5th and 6th streets, will be renamed City National Plaza in September 2005. Thomas Propertys has envolved in a five year $125 million to transform the plaza with retail, restaurants, and [B]special lighting.
"City National Bank has been looking all over SoCal". This is such great news for downtonw", said broker Joe Faulkner, executive managing director of Charles Dunn Co., a regional commercial real estate brokerage company , " It's a big, big statement".
The market for downtown Los Angeles officee space this year is consirdered by brokers to be in the upward arc of the real state cycle, based on the rent and overall vacancy trends, employments, and projects in the construction pipeline.


What is really interesting for me is the fact that the City National Plaza will have special lighting between them. I heard on certain telecast that the lights might be lasers. This and LA Live { its lights } will make the city really stand out at night in the future. I went to the underground mall in City National Plaza and there is constructions everywhere, although mostly restaurants for office workers. For you that don't know, there is a mall in the spot below City National Plaza. Check it out, it's worth it, mainly if you want to have luch.

Hey could city goers go down there? And what kinda restaurants do they have? Man, LA is seriously lacking in certain departments. They need more stuff going on underground, like malls and all that. I also wish there were more places to eat that weren't 5-star type restaurants like "She La Peur" and all that. That'd also be dope if they had an In-N-Out Burger across from LA Live.

There restaurants down there aren't that expensive :) they are a little more expensive than Olive Garden.
More good news- it has already been discussed that LA Live will have affordable dinning for us normal folks. :cheers:
ps: ofcourse normal people can go there, why? you thought it was private?

What's the source and date of this article?

I think it is from a newspaper, but i'm not sure since it doesn't have any labels on it except the staff writer's name. The date i don't know either

why?

thats pretty old, maybe a year or so. City national moved in and the tower has already been renamed.

There restaurants down there aren't that expensive :) they are a little more expensive than Olive Garden.
More good news- it has already been discussed that LA Live will have affordable dinning for us normal folks. :cheers:
ps: ofcourse normal people can go there, why? you thought it was private?
Because it seems like every high-rise is off limits to us. Oh yeah, andthe Arco Plaza AKA whatever it's called his a dope rail that's been shown in quite a few skate videos and THPS3.