Venice Boulevard was once a jumble of different names. In Venice itself – see Abbot Kinney Blvd. for some history – it was called Center Street at the beach and Saint Marks Boulevard (a nod to the Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy) a couple blocks inland. Further east, past Penmar Avenue, it was variously known as Electric Boulevard and Electric Avenue because the Pacific Electric Railway chugged along it. In Palms it was called Front Street. And between present-day La Cienega and DTLA it was plain old West 16th Street. The roadway’s western stretch was renamed “Pico Boulevard” in 1912; three years later, when the Pico Boulevard you know and love today was being extended out to Santa Monica, this other Pico had to go. Hence Venice Boulevard, an idea that was originally hatched back in 1912 by Venetians wishing to consolidate Saint Marks Blvd. with part of Electric Ave. The full thirteen-mile-long rebranding, which wasn’t completed until 1938, was championed by Culver City founder Harry H. Culver, who obviously saw benefits in a Venice-themed thoroughfare abutting his town. Ironically, Venice’s Center Street was one of the last bits to adopt the Venice Boulevard name.
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