LA City Council Approves the $2 Billion Fourth and Central Project Downtown

After roughly five years of environmental review, appeals and a major redesign, the Los Angeles City Council approved Fourth & Central — a $2 billion, ten-building complex on the eastern edge of downtown — over objections from Little Tokyo neighbors who fear it will accelerate gentrification.

Desmond Clarke July 1, 2026 at 10:15 PM

One of the largest developments proposed for central Los Angeles in years cleared its final hurdle this week.

From cold storage to a downtown campus

The Los Angeles City Council voted to approve Fourth & Central, a mixed-use complex on a roughly eight-acre site at 400 South Central Avenue long occupied by refrigerated warehouses, Urbanize LA reported. The project is the work of Los Angeles Cold Storage, the company that has owned the land for generations and pressed ahead after its original partner, Denver-based Continuum Partners, exited. The vote capped a roughly five-year entitlement process that included an environmental impact report, two appeals and a redesign.

What gets built

The approved plan calls for ten buildings totaling about 2.3 million square feet, with a tallest tower of 30 stories — trimmed from an original 44 — designed by architect David Adjaye and Los Angeles firm Studio One Eleven, The Real Deal reported. It includes 1,589 residential units, of which 262 are reserved as affordable at very low and extremely low income levels, plus about 145,000 square feet of retail, roughly 410,000 square feet of offices and more than two acres of public open space. The Downtown Women's Center agreed to provide on-site services for the affordable units.

Labor and community support

The project drew a broad coalition. The Los Angeles/Orange Counties Building and Construction Trades Council backed it, citing thousands of union construction jobs, and community groups including The People Concern and the East LA Community Corporation endorsed it. Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, whose district includes the site, attached conditions to the approval, among them a $700,000 small-business fund and tighter limits on new alcohol permits near Skid Row.

Little Tokyo's objections

The path was contested. The Little Tokyo Community Council filed two appeals, both rejected, arguing the project's scale threatened to accelerate gentrification in one of the last remaining Little Tokyos in the country, Rafu Shimpo reported. "Our community showed up, spoke out, and made an impact," the group said after the vote, while adding that "many of the community's core concerns remain unresolved" — including the roughly 16 percent affordable share and the concentration of alcohol-serving businesses near Skid Row.

What comes next

With entitlements secured, the developer now moves into construction planning and financing; groundbreaking is not expected for about two more years. At $2 billion, Fourth & Central lands at a fragile moment for downtown, which is still absorbing pandemic-era shifts and a weak office market — making the pace and terms of its rise a story the surrounding neighborhoods will watch closely.