text: 1955 cultural mall The proposal for a "cultural mall" along 10th Street SW became complicated again in mid-1955. On July 1, President Dwight Eisenhower signed into law legislation creating a District of Columbia Auditorium Commission, whose charge was to formulate plans "for the design, location, financing, and construction in the District of Columbia of a civic auditorium, including an Inaugural Hall of Presidents and a music, fine arts, and mass communications center". Southwest Washington, and especially Zeckendorf's proposed "cultural mall," became one of the top sites studied by the Auditorium Commission for its planned multi-use performance center. The RLA began looking at the cost-effectiveness of turning the 10th Street site over to the Auditorium Commission for its (rather than private) use in September 1955. A month later, an RLA consultant recommended a "World Center" for L'Enfant Plaza that would include 4,000-seat opera house, 2,000-seat theatrical stage, large and small concert halls, exhibit areas, meeting rooms, television studios, reception and formal dining halls, and cultural library. After another year of study, however, this plan had been scaled back to just three buildings (a combined auditorium-exhibit hall, combined opera-concert hall, and a theater). But D.C. Auditorium Commission officials now proposed two sites for the cultural center: L'Enfant Plaza and the Foggy Bottom neighborhood (an area of factories, breweries, gas works, and decrepit housing then also undergoing study for redevelopment).