Downtown resident Susan Simon says the late-night musical bombardment from a Gaslamp Quarter bar complex was maddening. The noise was so loud she’d close the windows on her unit, turn up the TV and still not be able to drown it out.
Other residents at downtown condo building Meridian, primarily those who live on the Front Street side facing east, had similar complaints.
“It was constant–from Wednesday through Saturday–and would last into the night past midnight,” Simon says. ”Some of the DJs at special parties were the loudest.”
Noise complaints are not uncommon or new in downtown San Diego. There’s an annoying trend of cars and motorcycles using booming modified mufflers. E-powered pedicabs have been mostly stopped from blaring music while they ferry passengers. And the San Diego Padres are facing a lawsuit from East Village residents over music that emanates from concerts at Gallagher Square.
One train of thought goes that downtown dwellers shouldn’t be surprised that city life can be clamorous. But while ambulance sirens and the sporadic bleat of traffic comes with the territory, other aural disruptions–some that flaunt city noise codes–are avoidable.
Getting a thoughtful remediation from a perpetrator, however, is a rare and newsworthy occurrence.
That’s what happened when Simon reached out to several sources about the music from Cielo Rooftop Lounge that was blasting into people’s homes.
The rooftop bar is part of a 75,000-square-foot entertainment complex that took over the former Theatre Box operation at the corner of Fifth Avenue and G Street. The Gaslamp Quarter complex includes several bar/restaurants, including Mr. Tempo on the street level. The Cielo Rooftop Lounge is an open-air party spot on the top of the building.
Simon says she called the lounge numerous times to complain. She says staff was courteous, and offered free meals, but then the line stopped ringing through.
She resorted to calling the SDPD’s non-emergency number.
“None of us wanted to call the police,” she says. They’re understaffed and have plenty of other things to do.”
Frustrated, she reached out to Eric Nemoseck. He’s a downtown resident who oversees a network of downtown San Diego HOA boards of directors. The group is called the San Diego Community Association Network of Directors and Officers (SD CAN DO).
Nemoseck contacted the Downtown San Diego Partnership, which sent word about the noise complaint to the Gaslamp Quarter Association.
Wheels were set in motion.
Cielo operating partner Mauricio Cardoza says he’d heard about noise complaints, looked into them, but initially wasn’t sure where Meridian was located. He and a work associate first believed the condo building was in Little Italy.
Cardoza had worked at Theatre Box before it went out of business. He then opened the Coco Mayo restaurant in Little Italy before returning to the Gaslamp to help manage the Latin-themed entertainment center.
Meridian, a 27-story luxury residence built in the Marina District in 1985, is roughly five blocks away from Cielo Rooftop Lounge.
After putting the pieces together, Cardoza agreed to walk over to Simon’s Meridian unit with a decibel meter in hand. During the visit he had the Cielo staff turn up the volume so he could get the full-blown experience.
“We connected and we wanted to rectify the situation,” says Cardoza, a downtown resident who adds he is well aware of urban noise annoyances. “We want to make money but we also want to be a good neighbor.”
He went back to the bar and discovered a speaker that was positioned wrongly, facing outward into the community. Cardoza had it disabled.
Simon says the problem went away immediately.
“We’re so appreciative of what Mauricio did,” Simon says. “He was so helpful and now all we want is for him to be successful.”
She’s planning to dine at the restaurant in the near future and has recommended that the Meridien social committee consider the rooftop bar for an upcoming event.
For its part, the Downtown San Diego Partnership said in a statement: “As a community-based organization, we know that one of the ways we can provide value to downtown is by activating the right partners in our network to address neighborhood needs.”
SD CAN DO’s Nemoseck echoes that sentiment.
“So much of city life is often just knowing who to talk to,” he says. “One of downtown’s biggest frustrations is noise and it’s actually one of the easiest problems to solve.”
Nemoseck wishes this situation could be seen by the Padres as an example of how to respect their residential neighbors.
“Those East Village residents couldn’t get a response from the Padres about noise from the Gallagher Square concerts, and now it’s become a lawsuit,” he says. “That’s what happens when these things just fall on deaf ears.” SDSun
