The LA River Revitalization Master Plan

All future news, development information or discussions relevant to the LA River Revitalization Master Plan should be posted in this thread.



Proposed $2-billion makeover of the ugly concrete waterway calls for a string of parks, housing and offices.
By Steve Hymon, Times Staff Writer
February 2, 2007

River conceptualized
Urban Eyesore
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Manmade Oasis
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- Key provisions of the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan
After decades of enduring jokes about the city's concrete-lined waterway, officials today will release an ambitious master plan for restoring the Los Angeles River, a project that reflects lofty dreams and carries a big price tag.

If anything, the plan is significant not for its specifics but for its sweep and boldness in proposing to turn the industrial-strength storm drain running from the San Fernando Valley to the sea into "one of the city's most treasured landmarks."

The Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan proposes a $2-billion-plus makeover that would replace vast tracts of industrial land along the river with parks, clean up the river and make it appear more natural while retaining its important flood-control role.

The plan is intended to guide construction of a series of parks along 32 miles of the river from Canoga Park to downtown Los Angeles over 25 to 50 years.

Channeled decades ago to protect the city against periodic flooding, the river has provided an ugly contrast in a city known for the natural beauty of its setting. The waterway in recent years has attracted new interest from those who would like to blast away its walls and replace them with a semblance of a natural river.

LA River Make Over
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Up to now, however, visions for doing so have been vague or piecemeal. The master plan offers the first comprehensive — and as yet unfunded — proposal for a restoration.

It consists of 239 projects, most of them small. Some, however, would be immense. In two places — Chinatown and Canoga Park — residential and office villages would rise along the river's newly greened banks, replacing factories and warehouses. The plan also envisions widening the river channel in some places to preserve its flood-control capacity while creating more riparian habitat.

Advocates say that the plan offers the possibility of constructing the kind of grand public gathering places that have been in short supply in Los Angeles. The restoration's new parks would appear in many parts of the city, rich and poor, including downtown, which is undergoing a revival.

"All of these statements about it being impossible have been made before, and I listen to it and understand it," said Councilman Ed Reyes, the head of the council's river restoration committee. "But impossible? I don't believe it is."


LA River Developments
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LA River:Scenic Walkways

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w194/future_trance011/LA-River-canoga-park.jpg


'Wildly ambitious'

Gail Goldberg, the city's planning chief, praised the plan for its scale. "These kind of plans are always long-term," she said. "And they need to be wildly ambitious to capture the public's attention and imagination. Urban design should be bold."

At this stage, the plan is largely hypothetical. Most of the money has not been secured. Beautifying the river could be a hard sell in a city that chronically struggles to hire more police, repair streets and sidewalks, and find funding for transportation improvements.

But the plan— drafted by the city, consultants and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the behest of city officials — has growing political momentum on its side. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has said he is a supporter, and a majority of the City Council wants to see something happen.

Powerful and deadly floods in 1914, 1934 and 1938 prompted civic leaders to tame the river to protect the city growing on its floodplain. By the 1950s, most of the river had been encased in concrete, though some portions north of downtown and in the Sepulveda Basin still have a natural bed.

River restoration efforts have come into vogue for cities across United States in recent years as a way to bring parks into the urban core and reclaim nature. Los Angeles County has built several parks along the river's southern reaches over the last decade, and the nonprofit North East Trees and the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority have constructed a series of pocket parks along the river between downtown and Glendale.

City Engineer Gary Lee Moore said he believes that the plan will begin with relatively small projects designed to bring people closer to the river. Among those are the completion of a bike path connecting Chinatown and Griffith Park via the river's banks and new pedestrian bridges over it.

"We're talking about signature bridges — a bridge that people really want to see and that will allow them to see the river," Moore said.

The next phase would be to construct parks along the river while softening its edges with greenery. If that goes well, the city would move on to the biggest project of all: widening and deepening the river channel.

The idea is to preserve the river's current flood-control capacity while slowing its peak flows. Accomplishing that would allow more vegetation and wetlands to be created in the channel because the tamer current wouldn't wash them away.

The Corps of Engineers — the same agency that channeled the river between the 1930s and '50s — is in the early stages of a three-year, $7.3-million study to determine what is technically possible.



- Key provisions of the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan
"We're trying to find the best locations for potential ecosystem restoration, with an eye toward riparian habitat and aquatic species," said Col. Alex Dornstauder of the corps.

The city is contemplating tearing out concrete in a few places. Reyes and Moore said the site where the river most likely would be widened is next to the almost-finished Taylor Yard State Park next to Cypress Park.

There, a Union Pacific maintenance facility is between the river and the new park. The facility has seldom been used since 2003, and the city hopes to purchase it from the railroad. As for funding, the city is hoping that breaking the restoration effort into smaller pieces will enable it to tap into a variety of funding sources, including local, county and state water initiatives.

Others believe private funding will be essential, because federal and state money is in short supply. In Chicago, for example, residents and businesses contributed more than $200 million to build a downtown park that opened in 2004.

"I think it's going to have to be a public-private partnership," said Shelly Backlar, executive director of the advocacy group Friends of the Los Angeles River. "And I think to rely specifically on governmental funds is going to take a long, long time."

The plan also proposes new agencies to oversee the project and offers several suggestions for cleaning up the river's poor water quality.

An element likely to draw controversy is a proposal to rezone river-adjacent property to encourage residential development to replace factories and warehouses.

Housing and offices

The plan calls for nearly 6,200 residential units along the river in Canoga Park and 4,665 units near Chinatown. Both sites also would see new retail and office development.

It remains unclear how the plan will be received, although the good-sized crowds drawn to public meetings held across the city over the last two years indicated public interest.

Councilman Dennis Zine, who represents Canoga Park, is noncommittal at this point. Councilman Tom LaBonge said he is reluctant to lose industry — and jobs — in his district, close to downtown.

Council President Eric Garcetti said residents near the waterway want it restored.

"If you want to represent these areas near the river, you have to be for this," he said.

Driving through the warehouse and factory district along Main Street in Chinatown, Reyes motioned toward the buildings and predicted that one day many will be replaced with a more campus-like city near the river.

"You won't even recognize it," he said.

steve.hymon@latimes.com

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(INFOBOX BELOW)

Key provisions

Some elements of the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan

Governance: The plan calls for three new agencies to guide river restoration. One would be a joint powers authority of city and county officials to oversee construction while the other two would be nonprofits that focus on managing the land and fundraising.

Water quality: Several solutions are posed to help clean polluted water that spills into the river from 2,200 storm drains. Most proposals would rely on filtering the water through new vegetation before it reaches the river.

Location: Many projects are targeted for one of five areas determined last year: the river's headwaters in Canoga Park; the confluence of the river and the Verdugo Wash near Griffith Park; the new Taylor Yard State Park next to Cypress Park; Chinatown; and the river between the Santa Ana and Santa Monica freeways.

Source: Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan

The plan calls for nearly 6,200 residential units along the river in Canoga Park and 4,665 units near Chinatown. Both sites also would see new retail and office development.


^^ Can't wait to see this?

NIIICE! HIGH FIVE!!!

I like the "stepped" concrete walls. Brings beauty and design while still retaining function.
I would love to see the day when I can ride my bike from Canoga Park to Long Beach along a river bikepath.

Great pics!! thanks for making the thread. I think that pic of a second skyline next to Chinatown, posted by LA MetroGuy, might have been for the chinatown portion of this.

God, it looks so nice. i really wish this would be done ASAP!

What an awesome transformation! I just hope I live long enough to see this.

^ 32 Miles in a couple of years, oh yeah you'll witness it as a Grampy*

^^
Projects like these are the kinds of projects that only true visionaries dream of...a dream that I hope some day will become reality. I totally believe the LA River Revitalization Master plan will alter and re-shape the future landscape of Los Angeles.

The only thing holding this project back is funding. I really hope the city gets the funding it needs. In a city with so many multi-millionaires like ours..we need some philanthropists to step up or the city needs to get some type of bond measure to the voters. I don't know if waiting for federal funds to trickle in could take forever at a time when our city's transportation and other infrastructural needs are taking top priority. But I don't see why we can't get this done. $2-billion dollars for a project of this scale and magnitude is relatively cheap compared to today's mega-projects standards. You really can't place a monetary value on a project like this..it's really priceless!

I too, can't wait till the day that I can ride my bike or take a stroll along the LA River banks....:banana: :banana:

Great pics!! thanks for making the thread. I think that pic of a second skyline next to Chinatown, posted by LA MetroGuy, might have been for the chinatown portion of this.

God, it looks so nice. i really wish this would be done ASAP!


You're welcome LASF...:)

I think you're refering to the River Ridge Project with all the high-rises..and yeah, that's certainly related to this project. We need Vicecityguy (aka LAmetroguy) to post that here.

^^
Projects like these are the kinds of projects that only true visionaries dream of...a dream that I hope some day will become reality. I totally believe the LA River Revitalization Master plan will alter and re-shape the future landscape of Los Angeles.

The only thing holding this project back is funding. I really hope the city gets the funding it needs. In a city with so many multi-millionaires like ours..we need some philanthropists to step up or the city needs to get some type of bond measure to the voters. I don't know if waiting for federal funds to trickle in could take forever at a time when our city's transportation and other infrastructural needs are taking top priority. But I don't see why we can't get this done. $2-billion dollars for a project of this scale and magnitude is relatively cheap compared to today's mega-projects standards. You really can't place a monetary value on a project like this..it's really priceless!

I too, can't wait till the day that I can ride my bike or take a stroll along the LA River banks....:banana: :banana:


^ Do we really need a another "Bond"? Although I would love see the LA River transform as a first priority and Whatnot. Can't we find another method to obtain funds to we won't get stuck with a bill?

^ Do we really need a another "Bond"? Although I would love see the LA River transform as a first priority and Whatnot. Can't we find another method to obtain funds to we won't get stuck with a bill?

I hope they do find a way to fund this thing pronto! But if it came down to voting for a bond measure...would you vote for the betterment of the city's future or be scared away for fear of paying taxes? I certainly don't mind a paying a little out of my wallet for seeing a grand vision like this come to fruition for the benefit of posterity and all Angelenos.

That's a very good question there. The Angelino side of me is all for it, F**K it just built the B**ch!!!! The realistic Me is more concerned about the financial burden it would create.

Do we even know or better yet have any credible facts as far as the Financing?

Another thing is I don't live anywhere near the LA River.

.... but sure would like to see it transform*

How far do you live from the LA River, Trance?

Rolling Out the River

Master Plan Envisions a Massive Makeover, Much of It in Downtown

by Evan George

Hoping to restore the city's concrete-lined river - and the waterway's trashed reputation - to prominence, officials recently unveiled an expansive and costly master plan. The ambitious effort would clean and green the Los Angeles River, creating a 32-mile swath of parks that would spill into Downtown.
The Los Angeles River Master Plan's vision for the future of the waterway in Chinatown. Along with public parks, the plan anticipates more than 4,500 new housing units in the area. Rendering by Bureau of Engineering.

How ambitious? Kayaking along the edge of Chinatown and watching birds where fleets of diesel trucks once sat are just the beginning.

But the sweeping proposal does not stop at the river's edge.

The Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan, released by the City Council on Feb. 2, proposes a long-term and dramatic makeover of surrounding areas, including parts of Downtown, where it envisions 4,665 new housing units in Chinatown, more than 1,000 residences for the Arts District, and a long chain of riverside retail.

A rezoning effort to phase out many of the industrial businesses that have operated along the river and railroad tracks for decades is also part of the plan.

City Councilman Ed Reyes, who has spearheaded the action, said that economic redevelopment is crucial to making the River important to Los Angeles again.
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"To me, the economics and the land-use patterns are as significant as the impact of environmental and re-greening of the whole corridor," Reyes said.

Expected to top $2 billion and take nearly 50 years to implement, the plan is far from rolling. Although little funding has been identified, Reyes said that some of the plan's small-scale projects, such as bike paths, bridge repairs and pedestrian pathways, could be completed within two years.

"I'm thrilled that there's 239 projects identified at all levels," said Shelly Backlar, executive director of Friends of the Los Angeles River, an early proponent of river restoration.

Not all stakeholders are convinced the master plan goes far enough into Downtown or is realistic about what it will take to carve green space out of Downtown's industrial land.

"It is not a master plan, it is a Band-Aid for the Downtown area south of Union Station," said Brady Westwater, vice president of the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council.

The rezoning and land acquisition required to green what some consider industrial blight also flies in the face of a recent city Planning Department recommendation to preserve most of the industrial land in Chinatown for industrial use.

The master plan - still in draft form, with public comment open until March 19 - is partly the result of a massive public outreach campaign that culminated last year in a series of well attended, even contested, community workshops.

Reyes said the catalyst was the 15-year battle to create a park on the site known as Taylor Yard. The official opening of that new 40-acre state facility - which the master plan will connect to the Los Angeles State Historic Park (formerly the Cornfield) - is expected in March.

"It's 2007 and we have the park, so it doesn't happen overnight," said Reyes.

L.A. Birthplace


When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers channeled the river following a series of devastating floods in the 1930s, it was heralded as a victory for the city over future disaster.

Now many look at the graffiti-heavy and trash-strewn waterway as a disaster itself.

A crucial source of water, food and transportation for early settlers, the river is often cited as the reason Los Angeles was founded in the first place. Yet most people know little about the waterway.

In the last two decades, cities like San Antonio, Portland and Denver have undertaken river restoration projects. Backlar said the latter's effort demonstrates the political force needed for it to happen here.

"They were dealing with brownfields and rail lines, highly industrial areas, vacant lots," Backlar said. "But there was this window of opportunity where the mayor got involved and the private sector and it was one of those things that just went 'boom, boom, boom.'"

Reyes said river restoration is intertwined with the revitalization of Downtown.

"What it's actually highlighting, if not pronouncing and in a very strong way, is the connection between the birthplace of the city and the role of Downtown," Reyes said. "If you go to any major city in this country, the one thing that tourists gravitate to is the city's birthplace and we don't have that here."

Areas of Opportunity


Like the river itself, the plan banks on Downtown.

Last year, officials looked at 20 possible sites for the heaviest initial investment and chose five - three of which are in or around Downtown. The master plan proposes concentrated greening at the new park at Taylor Yard, the Los Angeles State Historic Park and the industrial area in the Arts District.

The plan, drafted by the city, consultants and the Army Corps of Engineers, paints bold strokes for a new recreation hub and a significantly widened river channel at the edge of Chinatown where industrial warehouses, vacant lots and city vehicle substations sit now.

A landscaped island with kayak rentals would replace industrial property. On the eastern bank, a pedestrian promenade lined with shops would connect park-poor communities with both the river and the Los Angeles State Historic Park.

Close to that park, the plan imagines more high-density and multi-family housing, with as many as 4,665 units rising in Chinatown, along with more than 11,000 parking spaces.

In the Arts District, where some residential conversion has occurred, the plan calls for another 1,067 housing units amid pocket parks, river overlooks and pedestrian-friendly bridges that would connect to three large riverside parks in Boyle Heights. Water treatment terraces would also be constructed, as would a rubber dam to help fill the concrete channel with water.

The plan would require consolidating busy rail lines, relocating some city services and major bridge construction. It also hinges on massive land acquisitions, at a cost of at least $400 million for Chinatown and the industrial area alone.

The plan's 239 projects include 49 in Downtown Los Angeles. They range from complicated tasks like creating outdoor classrooms and wetlands at the former Cornfield to simpler ones like adding bike paths to the Arts District.

Thirty-three of the projects could enter the design phase as soon as funding is found, according to the master plan.

Upstream Battle


With a price tag already above $2 billion, and with major work not scheduled to begin anytime soon, restoring the L.A. River, advocates and opponents agree, is a huge political and financial undertaking.

Though the plan pinpoints potential grant money, proponents say it is too early to know what would be available.

"We need to use the government as a springboard," Reyes said about sparking private investment. Overlay zones and incentives may help residential developers contribute to the process, he said.

Others say such a wide-sweeping plan makes no sense without more financial certainty.

"It ignores the problems and makes no effort to put together a financial business plan and without a business plan it's all moot," said Westwater. "It's got to pay for itself."

A more immediate clash is evident in the rezoning effort - changing decades old land-use patterns - the plan suggests. A recent report by the city Planning Department recommends that the city preserve much of the industrial land that the master plan hinges on changing, especially in Chinatown and the Arts District.

Reyes acknowledged that the battles looming over the master plan concern much more than the river itself. They strike at the core of the city's debate over housing, gentrification and urban redevelopment, he said.

"I believe the river becomes an opportunity to address these issues," he said, "if we stay positive."

seems nice, just hope it can still contain the flood waters

I can't believe we don't have any new updates on this important project?

^^ you and your update requests...

^^ It's nice to be updated. ;) :D

Watery Disputes

Controversy and Complaints Follow New L.A. River Plan

by Evan George

Last month, the City Council rolled out an ambitious plan to revitalize the Los Angeles River from Canoga Park to Downtown. The massive report capped an 18-month campaign of unprecedented community outreach.
An image from the recently released L.A. River plan. A coalition of Latino groups claims many of its suggestions have been ignored. Rendering by Bureau of Engineering

Now, less than two weeks before the draft plan enters its final stage, the most vocal and well-organized coalition involved in that process is up in arms, claiming its input has been marginalized.

Though city leaders and others strongly defend the document, some acknowledge that improvements to the final plan are necessary.

Leaders of the Alianza de los Pueblo del Rio, a loose coalition of Latino organizations, last week said the plan focuses too much on beautifying the concrete channel's riverside property and not enough on the mostly poor, park-starved communities that surround it.

"The plan as it stands now could be called the L.A. River Gentrification Master Plan," said Robert Garcia, executive director of the nonprofit City Project, which provides legal and research aid to the Alianza. "It's utterly incomprehensible why they would have ignored all of our input, not cited any of our work, not cited any of our maps and our statistics on children's health and the lack of parks."

Leaders of the Alianza scrambled last week to put together a rebuke of the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan before public comment on the draft ends March 27.
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The group finds itself in a strange position: once heralded by city leaders for generating excitement and feedback about the master plan and now on the offensive for more input.

The report, which Garcia said will be released this week and presented formally to the Council's Ad Hoc River Committee, assails city officials for paying lip service to issues like public health and gang prevention in urban communities without offering detailed solutions.

"One of our biggest concerns is that it utterly disregards human health and the need for places for physical activity in parks and schools to improve health," Garcia said.

The plan identifies 239 improvement projects along a 32-mile stretch of the river. They include everything from pocket parks to creating more than 4,600 housing units near Chinatown. Implementing all of them would cost more than $2 billion.

However, only two of the 87 proposed park projects include any sports fields or facilities.

Councilman Ed Reyes, who chairs the Ad Hoc River Committee, defended the plan even as he praised the Alianza's success in garnering feedback. He acknowledged the need for more active parks, but said those uses must be balanced with other concerns, like flood control.

"Where possible I will advocate for the active space," he said.

Additionally, Reyes said, two obvious sites for heavy recreation use - the new Los Angeles State Historic Park at the former Cornfield and the Rio de Los Angeles State Park at Taylor Yard - are overseen by the state Parks Department, not the city.

"What it speaks to is the need to have the state redefine its definition of parks," Reyes said, "especially in the urban centers, and that's a cultural shift for the state."

Making Waves

The complaints don't stop at more soccer fields.

Last week officials with the William C. Velasquez Institute, a nonprofit Latino policy center and member of the Alianza, criticized the plan's environmental impact report for using demographics that, they say, grossly underestimate the impact on Latinos.

The study looked only at neighborhoods within a half mile of the river, while Latino leaders say the city should consider the overwhelmingly Latino neighborhoods within one to three miles that would be affected.

City officials have said they will include broader statistics but not redo any of the analysis.

The master plan has also been attacked for failing to include specific measures to help spur local jobs and build more affordable housing.

Alianza leaders said they have been championing these issues to city officials for 18 months at more than 50 meetings. By organizing families to participate in the city-sponsored workshops, and even spearheading their own well-attended meetings, the Alianza became the overwhelming voice, said Reyes and others.

Reyes added that the Alianza's input will inform future details. "The implementation arms... the governing structure itself, I believe, is where you're going to see those details emerge," Reyes said.

Garcia is skeptical.

"If that's their approach than why are they so specific as to everything else, such as pocket parks, paseos, promenades, linear parks and ecological restoration?" he asked.

While Alianza chafes at the plan, other groups who participated - as well as some that didn't - applaud the initial results.

Russell Brown, president of the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council, said his group is impressed by the overall concept, though they disagree with some of the details.

Brown called the plan "an interesting first step," and said many of the DLANC members were "surprised it was this far along," because they had been less involved in the process. The Friends of the Los Angeles River, a longtime activist group, has also signaled its approval.

James Rojas, a planner for MTA who runs Spring Street's Gallery 727 (where a current exhibit allows visitors to make their own models of the river plan) takes issue with the complaints of those who are upset with the master plan.

"Some of the funnier critiques I've heard is that it's not going to solve gang violence. That's not the river's problem, or a design problem, that's a much larger social problem," Rojas said. "It's not going to solve world hunger."

"Some of the funnier critiques I've heard is that it's not going to solve gang violence. That's not the river's problem, or a design problem, that's a much larger social problem," Rojas said. "It's not going to solve world hunger."

Thank You!

Los Angeles River is a flood of inspiration
Two exhibitions capture the gritty and intriguing stream that bears Los Angeles' name.



Artist, gallery or museum:




By Scarlet Cheng, Special to The Times


THE Los Angeles River is the river that won't die, despite human efforts over the last century to channel and cement it in. Recently there's been a heightened awareness of this feature, thanks to new plans to restore the river and its banks to a more natural state — and perhaps thanks to some art shows that remind us of its existence and poetry. Last year, the Skirball Cultural Center featured photography and video in "L.A. River Reborn." Now there are two gallery exhibitions on two sides of town: "Poured in Place: 72 Los Angeles River Bridges" at Craig Krull Gallery in Santa Monica and "5 Models Afloat: Art Inspired by the L.A. River" at Gallery 727 in downtown L.A.

"Poured in Place" is a small solo show by Douglas Hill, a commercial photographer known for his work with architecture and interiors. In 1995 he was hired to shoot several downtown bridges by a contractor who was retrofitting them. "I found that I was going back more than I needed to," said Hill, who began taking an interest in the bridges as subjects for art photography. He took some of his own shots and showed them to Tim Wride, now interim head of photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Wride suggested that he do all the bridges.


All the bridges? There are 72 alone between Riverside Drive on the north end of Griffith Park and Queensway Bay in Long Beach, the last bridge before the river flows into the Pacific Ocean. Although most are for cars, about a dozen are for trains, pedestrians and pipelines.

Hill took to the idea. Starting in April 2005, whenever he had downtime from assignments, he set out on day trips and began shooting the bridges, often two to three a day. He located them on Google maps, parked nearby and trekked down to the river searching for interesting angles.

Fifteen photographs from his portfolio have been selected for this show. Taken from riverbed or riverbank level, they all show some water — whether a wending stream or a trickle in a cement wash. "I wanted to show the relationship between the river and the bridge," said Hill, a low-key man who speaks with some deliberation. "The context was quite important to me." He shot digitally, using his Hasselblad, and produced square color images.

Of course, there was plenty of graffiti and trash lurking in the pylons and the shallows — Hill doesn't avoid them in his photographs. "I almost hate to say it, but I actually found it interesting," Hill said. "I'd go back and found it constantly changing." Then he pointed to an exception — a photo showing names written in a formal font decorating a remote cement wall by the Colorado Street extension. "This one looks quite old, and it seems to be a dedication of some sort."

Another shot, a long shot of the railroad bridge south of Del Amo Boulevard, captures both natural and unnatural detritus — in the foreground, a scraggly tumbleweed sits in the water, and an overturned shopping cart is behind it. The river is cemented in on either side, and a series of stark electric towers, posed like giant robots, run along the right bank.

There was much beauty to be found on his forays, Hill said. He was drawn to the older bridges with their vintage architectural details. The sky-high interchange loops of the 105 Freeway were stunning "as feats of engineering."

By and large he avoided other people, but one day at the Glendale Boulevard bridge, he found a man reclining on the bike path. The man was staring at the bridge and the stream flowing under it, and the photographer snapped that nearly pastoral scene.

"This is Part 1," Hill said. "Part 2 will be from Riverside to the Valley, where there are another 65 bridges. I got a lot out of doing these, but there's still plenty to say with the rest I haven't shot."



Diverse views

Gallery 727 is also celebrating the river in "5 Models Afloat." Eighteen artists, mostly from the L.A. area, were selected by curator Helen Campbell, and the works include paintings, drawings, photographs and multimedia.

There aren't too many straightforward depictions of the river here. The small paintings of Ichae Ackso, the pseudonym of a young downtown artist, turn the river into a series of geometries. Leo Limon, known for decorating concrete drainage pipes around the Arroyo Seco with whimsical cat heads, has rendered a few of these on canvas. Photographs of the river by Bill Johnson show a decidedly romantic view, including one of the 6th Street Bridge at night, its streetlights flaring with ghostly light.

In the back room, Army Corps of Engineers drawings of recent proposals for developing several areas along the river are posted on the wall. They seem like very serious blueprints that will be pored over and debated for years to come.

Perhaps to counterbalance that is the offering of audience participation. In the center of the galleries are five tables covered with Lego pieces, wooden building blocks, and various small found objects collected by gallery co-owner James Rojas. The tabletops — the "5 Models" of the show's title — have been outlined with demarcations for the river, and visitors are free to move about the pieces to create their own visions for redevelopment.

"This is just for fun," said Rojas, an urban planner, stacking colored blocks to create an imaginary tower. "I just wanted to give people a chance to play with ideas."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
weekend@latimes.com

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From trickle to stream

'Poured in Place: 72 Los Angeles River Bridges'

Where: Craig Krull Gallery, Bergamot Station, 2525 Michigan Ave., Santa Monica
When: 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Fridays, 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Saturdays

Ends: April 7
Info: (310) 828-6410, artnet.com/ckrull.html
'5 Models Afloat: Art Inspired by the L.A. River'
Where: Gallery 727, 727 Spring St., downtown L.A.
When: noon to 9 p.m. today for Downtown Art Walk; regular hours, noon to 6 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, noon to 4 p.m. Sundays
Ends: March 18
Info: (213) 627-9563, www.gallery727losangeles.com

In the 18th Century, settlers founded a town by The River.

In the 19th Century, the railroads helped turn that town by the River into a city.

In the 20th Century, the city tamed the river.

In the 21st Century, that city will bring new life to that river.

12th century - 20th century river floods and kills and destroys on a regular basis.

middle 20th century, government steps in to save people

21st century people hate the concrete ditch and make it pritty

^^ Hey I wanna play too....

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w194/future_trance011/LA-River-manmade-oasis.jpg

I dont understand this picture...Isnt that the same area as the Los Angeles State Historic Park? Didnt that park already get a design approved that isnt the one we see in the picture?

I hope Im wrong because that park in the picture looks very nice.

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w194/future_trance011/LA-River-manmade-oasis.jpg

I dont understand this picture...Isnt that the same area as the Los Angeles State Historic Park? Didnt that park already get a design approved that isnt the one we see in the picture?

I hope Im wrong because that park in the picture looks very nice.


Hey that looks very sharp :banana:

As far as a decision made, I don't believe so.

River project is child's play -- and more
A gallery invites visitors of all ages to tinker with models of L.A.'s much-maligned waterway to illustrate their visions.
By Bob Pool, Times Staff Writer
March 18, 2007

Inspiration was flowing like the Verdugo Wash after a five-day rainstorm for Alex Dann.

"Where's the zoo?" he asked, sizing up the table-size tableau in front of him. "Over there? Cool."

The 7-year-old Tarzana boy was at a downtown Los Angeles art gallery Saturday, poring over an exhibit called "Five Models Afloat." A moment later, he was participating in it.

He carefully studied the 4-foot foam-board square, which was divided into thirds by a bright blue plastic slash that depicted the Los Angeles River where it is joined by the Verdugo Wash at the Glendale-Los Angeles border.

One part of the square was covered by a miniature "mountain" molded out of window screen material to represent the Hollywood Hills. The other two, depicting flatland areas, were grids marked with a series of green swatches.

Dotting the areas around the swatches were tiny movable structures formed from small blocks of wood, Lego pieces, parts of toys and objects such as toothpaste caps.

Alex moved a wood-block figurine resembling a high-rise apartment house away from the edge of the river. He was asked if he had ever seen the real Los Angeles River and what it was like.

"Yeah, I've seen it. It's a sewer," he replied as his mother, Holly Dann, blanched.

"Well, it is," Alex said, standing his ground.

The pair, along with father David Dann and 11-year-old sister Abby, had stopped at the gallery while shopping downtown.

The three-dimensional scene Alex was working on is a representation of one of five points along a 32-mile stretch of river for which officials have launched long-range plans to beautify the waterway and make it appear more natural.

Los Angeles officials, consultants and the Army Corps of Engineers spent two years conducting formal public workshops seeking ideas for the rehabilitation of what is now a mostly concrete-lined flood channel. Last month, they issued a draft report suggesting that a $2-billion makeover over the next 50 years could replace industrial land along the banks with park space. The steep concrete walls could be landscaped and rebuilt with step-like channelization.

There are professionally drawn maps and computergenerated renderings of what the future river could resemble. But it took transportation planner James Rojas to give it a threedimensional look.

Rojas, 47, works for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. He is also co-owner of Gallery 727 in a storefront at 727 S. Spring St., where "Five Models Afloat" will end its monthlong run today with a final showing from noon to 4 p.m.

"As a planner, I go to a lot of meetings, and they're always very boring because they're flat and one-dimensional," Rojas said. "A lot of people can't read maps. By showing them three-dimensional models, it becomes a lot more engaging. You can figure out how the topography works. You can lean down and look at it and see how things relate to each other."

The tiny blocks, figurines and other objects that gallery visitors use to create bridges, park plazas, town houses and shops are things that Rojas has collected since childhood.

Rojas said he planned the installation with children in mind, because the actual river renovation "will come in their lifetime, not ours."

About 700 people have visited the exhibit, including design consultants working on the river plan and city officials. One of them was Councilman Ed Reyes, who heads the river master-planning committee.

"When I first heard about it, I thought it was unconventional, kind of strange. But when I got there, I saw people doing some creative things," he said. "What struck me was how elaborate the little block and figurine structures were. People were really thinking about what they were doing."

After watching awhile, Reyes tried some hands-on planning of his own.

"I felt kind of silly at first. But then I got to thinking: Where does the bridge go? Then I thought about decorating it with an angel, since the bridge was going to be near where the birthplace of the city was.

"Toward the end of my stay," he said, "I saw a 6-year-old take over the whole board. And he did his own thing, and it didn't look much different from what others were doing. He was laying down his vision as a young person."

Reyes said professional planners welcome such creativity. Rojas agrees. So he has photographed various versions of the five river model boards as a permanent record of what visitors have suggested.

Some of the ideas are novel. One person used an acrylic toy lighthouse to mark the start of the river, where the Arroyo Calabasas and Bell Creek come together behind Canoga Park High School. Small plastic half-spheres illustrate "floating sticky balls" that another visitor placed at the juncture of the river and the Verdugo Wash "so people who fall in can stick to the balls and be saved."

That's the same area where Alex Dann installed his floating filter — made up of several rubber gaskets and what appeared to be a silver-colored tube connector he found in one of Rojas' supply boxes.

"This is a machine that sucks up the trash and stuff from the water," the boy explained, dropping bits of paper onto the faux river to illustrate how it would work.

Gallery 727 co-owner Adrian Rivas nodded knowingly.

"You're an urban planner now," he told Alex.

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w194/future_trance011/LA-River-manmade-oasis.jpg

I dont understand this picture...Isnt that the same area as the Los Angeles State Historic Park? Didnt that park already get a design approved that isnt the one we see in the picture?

I hope Im wrong because that park in the picture looks very nice.

This isn't the Cornfield site...I think that rendering is north of the site.

And I thought the final design WAS chosen...isn't it this one?

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/hargreaves2.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/hargreaves1.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/hargreaves3.jpg

yeah, thats what the park will look like. Im glad they arent two conflicting parks. It would be awesome to have both.

The think that lead me to believe it was the cornfield site is that the Goldline runs throught the cornfield site much in the same way that river redevelopment shows

State park to open near L.A. River
Rio de Los Angeles State Park is a symbol of the revitalization of a once crime-plagued neighborhood.
By Steve Hymon, Times Staff Writer
April 16, 2007

http://www.latimes.com/media/thumbnails/photo/2007-04/29081843.jpg

http://www.latimes.com/media/thumbnails/photo/2007-04/29081832.jpg

http://www.latimes.com/media/thumbnails/photo/2007-04/29081831.jpg

Just a few decades ago, the Taylor Yards was a two-mile-long expanse of railroad tracks where trains were coupled together to connect Los Angeles industry to the rest of the nation.

Today, most of those tracks and grimy rail yards are gone, and something else has risen in their place: a 40-acre state park that is intended to revive the working-class neighborhood of Cypress Park in northeast Los Angeles and be part of the "emerald necklace" of parks the city envisions one day lining a rejuvenated Los Angeles River.

The Rio de Los Angeles State Park opens Friday, complete with soccer fields, baseball diamonds, a playground and a new community center — not to mention vast expanses of grass and a field strewn with wildflowers.

"This park is a symbol; it's almost like a fresh start," said Gus Lizarde, president of the Greater Cypress Park Neighborhood Council and a longtime business owner in the community. "It brought us together because it was such a long fight to get it."

A little more than a decade ago, Cypress Park was in the news for all the wrong reasons. In 1995, 3-year-old Stephanie Kuhen was killed after her family's car was struck by a hail of bullets fired by gang members. The shooting also became a symbol for the long decline of Cypress Park.

Union Pacific phased out most of the rail yards in the 1970s and '80s and began moving those operations to the Inland Empire. Soon the city began pushing a plan to create new jobs and amenities by allowing nearly all of the area to be developed as warehouses, commercial sites and a multiplex theater. The proposal spurred a lawsuit by a coalition of community groups who argued that the city should have required a proper environmental review of the project.

In July 2001, a judge agreed with the groups.

"There would not be a park here if not for the community," said Melanie Winter, a Los Angeles River activist who helped bring the suit against the city. "The residents are the reason that there is something to celebrate."

The court ruling opened the door for the state to purchase the land from funds generated by a $2.1-billion parks and water bond measure approved in 2000. The money enabled the state to purchase 40 acres for the new park, a 17-acre parcel along the river that hasn't been developed and to acquire the Cornfield — another abandoned rail yard next to Chinatown — for the Los Angeles State Historic Park, which is being designed. But there was a problem: Nearly all of the state parks in California are intended to protect landscapes and ecosystems. The community wanted something different: playing fields. Over the years Cypress Park business owner Raul Macias, a Mexican immigrant, had organized a nonprofit youth soccer league with hundreds of players who desperately needed a place to play.

The matter was resolved when legislators devised a way for the city to lease the land and build much-needed playing fields. In addition to the five soccer fields — including one with a synthetic surface — and two baseball diamonds, the new park features an expansive children's playground and walking paths through an area of natural-appearing grasslands.

City parks General Manager Jon Mukri called it "the greenest park from an environmental standpoint we've designed," from the waterless urinals in the community center now under construction, to the park's permeable parking lots, intended to absorb storm runoff.

Ruth Coleman, chief of the state parks system, said that she views the local park as a return to an earlier time.

"Really, this is a new vision for state parks to create large-scale places of beauty and nature in the city because the cities are so park poor," Coleman said. "It's kind of going back to the vision Frederick Law Olmsted had for Central Park" in New York. "These parks can become community centers if they're done right."

One question that remains is whether the city or state will be able to acquire a key parcel, owned by Union Pacific, that separates the new park from the Los Angeles River.

"We are still assessing any impacts to the environment that may have taken place over the years in the areas where rail cars and locomotives were serviced and repaired," wrote Mark Davis, a Union Pacific spokesman, in an e-mail. "This property may be retained for railroad uses."

River activists covet the property because it is a site where the river channel could potentially be widened to create more riparian habitat. The feasibility of reworking that stretch of the river is under study by the Army Corps of Engineers.

Even if the land were acquired, there would be challenges. Union Pacific and Metrolink commuters use tracks that form a barrier between the new state park and the parcel along the river. That corridor also is being considered for a proposed high-speed rail system tying Los Angeles to Northern California.

City Councilman Ed Reyes, whose district includes Taylor Yards, is still hopeful that something can be done to make the tracks less of an obstacle. Reyes grew up three blocks from the new park and came to be a supporter of it after initially working on building proposals for the site as a deputy to former Councilman Mike Hernandez.

Reyes said he appreciates Cypress Park's railroad legacy and the jobs it provided, but he has come to believe there's a greater need now for open space for today's youth. Like many others, he also grew up hearing the clang of railroad cars being coupled together day and night and was a little shocked to see the yards gone.

"I went down there after they had finished the cleanup of the site and had taken the tracks out," Reyes recalled, "and it just blew me away because we're actually living in a beautiful valley here. I never appreciated it before."

City Council approves plan to revitalize the L.A. River
By Steve Hymon, Times Staff Writer
2:41 PM PDT, May 9, 2007

Embracing an ambitious and expensive vision, the Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved 12-0 a long-awaited blueprint for revitalizing the much-maligned Los Angeles River.

The plan -- which itself cost $3 million -- calls for spending as much as $2 billion over the next half century on more than 200 projects along the 31 miles of riverbed within Los Angeles' city limits.

It took five years to frame the details, but the roots of the proposed river restoration go back to a fledgling group of environmentalists who in the late 1980s began insisting that the river could be much more than a concrete-lined flood control channel.

"This is a great step," said Lewis MacAdams, founder of the activist group Friends of the Los Angeles River. "One of our first slogans was when the steelhead trout returns to the Los Angeles River, then our work is done, and to see an acknowledgment of steelhead in the plan -- well, I like that."

Echoing that thought was an ebullient councilman, Ed Reyes, who represents parts of northeast Los Angeles and is chairman of the council's river committee.

"This is now a real mandate that declares the river is a real river and we're going to give it life and support the way it supported us when Los Angeles was first started," Reyes said.

Among the proposed projects are dozens of new parks and pedestrian walkways and bridges. The plan also calls for some river-adjacent areas to be rezoned to allow for more housing to be built near the waterway and its parks.

At its most extreme, the plan proposes knocking down one of the concrete walls that contains the river to expand the channel and make it look more natural. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is studying that prospect.

"It's incredibly visionary and I think they've set the bar high," said Nancy Steele, executive director of the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council. "The key is going to be implementation."

Steele said that both the city and region have a rich history of putting together plans for rivers and then never following through. She noted that the river plan doesn't include upstream tributaries.

Hitting on that point, Councilman Richard Alarcon voted for the plan but threatened to withhold support unless studies are conducted to include parks along tributaries in his district. "In the Valley" the river "goes through all the rich communities," Alarcon said.

Alarcon represents the northeast San Fernando Valley, which is bisected by the Tujunga Wash.

The council also committed to begin creating a three-tiered management structure to oversee the restoration plan's implementation.

A joint powers authority between the city and county would manage projects within the river channel, a nonprofit appointed by elected officials would manage and construct parks along the river, and a philanthropic organization would help raise private funds.

Other thorny issues remain: finding money for projects -- state and federal help will likely be required -- and improving water quality. The city is in the early stages of a federally ordered cleanup of several pollutants in the waterway, including trash, bacteria and heavy metals.

Sounds good. I like that it will use private sources. So where can we find out what construction project is going on? Basically, is there a list of priorities?

Sounds good. I like that it will use private sources. So where can we find out what construction project is going on? Basically, is there a list of priorities?
check the reports...
found here:
http://www.lariverrmp.org/
they might be somewere on the website but i think in the report they explain the different areas and how to fix them up

I guess I have to look through the EIR, but that's pretty big, so I'll have to look at it later. Besides that, the site just says that it wants to revive the river and then gives a lot of pretty pictures.

...yah

HALF CENTURY?

Thats a very long implementation time

OMG... I hate it when they extend things over looong period of time like that...

HALF CENTURY?

Thats a very long implementation time

It took a half century to build all our freeways...

^^ thats veeeery different

It took a half century to build all our freeways...

You mean a small portion of what the original called for. :lol:

It took a half century to build all our freeways...

Which are more extensive too, though. And, the reiver is considerably easier, I would think, becayse its somewhat removed from everything else. Its own ROW,

On river plan, Alarcon reluctant to go with the flow
By Steve Hymon, Times Staff Writer
May 14, 2007

The morning after parts of Griffith Park went up in flames last week, the Los Angeles City Council put aside that disaster and turned to another environmental issue: the Los Angeles River.

If you haven't been following it, the council wants to spend a couple billion boxes of ziti to build a series of parks along the river over the next half-century. The idea, briefly, is to make the river look more like a river and less like something OSHA should be investigating.

The council, to its credit, spent the last five years assembling a master plan for the river and unanimously approved it last week.

That made Ed Reyes, the chairman of the council's river committee, pretty much the happiest man on Earth.

But that approval came only after newly elected Councilman Richard Alarcon expressed some concerns….



Alarcon's beef?

He wanted the plan updated to include more parks for tributaries to the river, specifically the Tujunga Wash, which flows through his northeast San Fernando Valley district.

It's good to fight for your district, but what raised eyebrows in council chambers was that Alarcon waited until the last moment to say something on a plan that has been in the works for five years.

During that span, the council's river committee has held more than 60 public meetings and the city has conducted 18 public hearings to ask residents what they wanted in the river plan — which has been posted on the Internet since February, in English and Spanish.

And when did an Alarcon deputy ask for the plan? Wednesday morning at the council meeting.

In addition, a youth group Alarcon created called the Young Senators was briefed on the river plan last May in L.A. — with Alarcon in attendance.



How were Alarcon's objections received?

Not so well.

Reyes said that he would have city officials look into his suggestions — thereby securing Alarcon's vote — but that it will be hard enough finding the resources to do the work on the river, let alone the tributaries.

Councilman Greig Smith added that the council had in recent years made significant investments in the park at Hansen Dam along the Tujunga Wash.

That park, of course, is square in Alarcon's district, and two ongoing park projects along the Tujunga Wash and Pacoima Wash are in the district he represented when he was a state senator.



Alarcon's response?

He got steamed:

"I didn't come here to patronize folks," he said, adding that there was a plague of poverty in the northeast Valley.

He then said: "I don't know what has been going on the last eight years and three months since I left" the council.

"My district is a community of needs, and no one is going to shut me up because I press these needs," he said.

What Alarcon didn't mention is that no one forced him to leave the council in 1998, when he resigned early in his second term after being elected to the state Senate.

On Friday, Alarcon said that he recently learned there are millions of dollars in community redevelopment funds available to his council district. Getting the tributaries in the river master plan, Alarcon said, would make it easier to use that money.

Cool. And we look forward to writing about those funds being used on river and tributary projects one day.



Turning to other issues, anything interesting renters may want to read?

The latest report from the real estate analyst M/PF YieldStar contains some alarming news for renters in the city.

"Los Angeles ended 2006 ranking among the nation's leaders in terms of occupancy and rent growth," states the report. The city "saw apartment occupancy top 97% in December 2006, with this rate allowing property owners to raise rents notably even though typical monthly rents already are among the highest in the country at nearly $1,500."

The report also indicates that new apartments are being built in Los Angeles at a rate that is second in the country only to Dallas. Problem is most of the new units are expensive, so demand keeps rising for less expensive units.



Will putting a bus lane on Wilshire Boulevard really speed up bus travel times?

The city says it will.

The plan approved by the council this month would convert the curb lanes in each direction on Wilshire into lanes that could be used only by buses and vehicles turning right at intersections.

The city estimates such lanes would cut 12 minutes off travel time from the Los Angeles-Santa Monica boundary to downtown, from 48 minutes to 36 minutes. Bus speeds would go from an average of 11.9 mph to 15.7 mph.

Yes, that's considered progress.

At this point, the proposal is just a concept, because the city doesn't have the $14 million to $16 million it would take to build the lanes and make street improvements, including widening Wilshire in some places.

Let's think about this.

What happens, for example, when a "Rapid" bus is stuck in the bus lane behind a local bus that makes more frequent stops? And what happens when a bunch of buses get stuck behind a line of vehicles waiting to turn right while pedestrians cross a side street?

Anything that speeds up buses on Wilshire — the city's heaviest-traveled bus line — would be welcome. But it sure seems that Wilshire bus lanes are hardly a panacea and would work best if complemented with a subway.



Why do superheroes shun L.A.? We began contemplating this question after Councilman Dennis Zine, a longtime cop, e-mailed a police report to demonstrate his crime-fighting skills:

"Council member Dennis Zine observed two suspects acting suspiciously in his neighborhood and called the watch commander," stated the report. "Officers responded and detained the suspects," who were in possession of spray paint and markers. Our suggestion to Zine: Don't get outfitted for a cape and codpiece just yet.

That said, the superhero community has shown remarkably little interest in Los Angeles, despite the city's penchant for violent crime and car chases.

Some of this is understandable. Spider-Man, for example, probably would find shooting webs off mini-malls is hardly exciting, and Superman would be apt to grow bored flying over the same few tall buildings.

"L.A. is too spread out, and a lot of the people that do the characters are based in New York, and when you're writing something, you write what you know," said Shane Coleman, a clerk at Golden Apple, a comic-book store.

Coleman pointed out that DC Comics does have an L.A. superhero. Her name is Kate Spencer, and she is a prosecutor whose alter ego, the Manhunter, fights supervillains who fail to succumb to ordinary justice.

Spencer has no superpowers per se but carries a staff that blows things up. In her first several books, she rescues Batman (apparently on vacation from Gotham) and vanquishes enemies outside City Hall, in Hollywood Forever Cemetery and at Griffith Park. And this column suspects that she looks a little better in a super-skintight suit than would a certain member of the City Council.

I haven't heard anything on this lately, what happened to it?

... flush down the toilet!

I saw some work being done in the river off of the 5 near Elysian Park. Was that part of this project?

I saw some work being done in the river off of the 5 near Elysian Park. Was that part of this project?

^ They were cleaning up some trash and over grown brush to get ready for the rainy season. Usually happens every year or so.....

There's no need to get all wet and excited for nothing!!!

^^And that's why they were digging into the cement?

Possible repairs that were well overdue, that's it*

Why so negative Fern?

Why so negative Fern?


^ Negative? where did you get that from?

All I'm doing is preventing you from getting to excited over a minor repair, that's it. You know, just being a pal!

Well, I'm not getting excited, but I hope that it's a part of this plan.

Know you now that is construction was to start that they would tons of news about it. Especially with such an important project in Los Angeles. Don't you think???

*%#^#$)*@... :ohno:

well its gonna take about 25 to 50 years to be complete....

So then they better get started soon.

well its gonna take about 25 to 50 years to be complete....


^ Yeah we know that already.... what I'm getting at is that if this mega project has commence, do you not think it would be all over the airwaves and newspapers? This is something huge to by pass any media radars.

It's just that some newbie Bruin, no names. Has to stop jumping to conclusions over a minor drill. Although lately has been a bit analish and whatnot.

I also look forward for this project to get started since it's way over due!

^ Yeah we know that already.... what I'm getting at is that if this mega project has commence, do you not think it would be all over the airwaves and newspapers? This is something huge to by pass any media radars.

It's just that some newbie Bruin, no names. Has to stop jumping to conclusions over a minor drill. Although lately has been a bit analish and whatnot.

I also look forward for this project to get started since it's way over due!


well your Right.. and about taking 50 years .. Um I disagree.. because come on... its not THAT huge... but the sooner the better...

I have no idea what this project is, what's included in it, what it's purpose is. If there is a lot of rain, will this project remain intact, or will it be flushed away? :)

Wow! I guess I should have read the first post! Seems like a mature way to deal with flood control, and would certainly develop the 'weak' part of the downtown area. Kind of like setting a controlled burn of developement that will move its way westward and meet the construction in South Park and along the 110. Where will the railways go?:cheers:

Ferney, you know that I'm not analish, I wasn't here. With a project that takes this long, would there really be a commencement?

Well if this isn't it then it needs to start soon, especially in downtown.

I'm not sure how new this information is but I found it while looking through SOM's site:

Los Angeles River - A Plan for the Next 100 Years

Los Angeles, California

For sheer environmental, cultural, and recreational benefit, few projects match the potential of an ecology-minded and people-centric revitalization of the Los Angeles River. By utilizing a balance of advanced engineering and imaginative planning, the LA River can be of comparable civic worth to New York’s Central Park, Chicago’s Grant Park, or Washington’s Rock Creek Park. The sustainable concepts for LA River were developed in collaboration with Gehry Partners and Bruce Mau Design.

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/park1.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/park3.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/park4.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/park6.jpg

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b43/samceb/park7.jpg

The LA River should be redirected Westward so it goess through the city.

The LA River should be redirected Westward so it goess through the city.

right after we turn the land under your feet into the worlds largest subway system...

Few parks, but L.A. is sitting on pile of green

The city has $77 million in unspent developers fees for grassy venues. Report angers builders.

By Steve Hymon, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 20, 2007

In a city widely acknowledged to be woefully short of parks, Los Angeles has about $77.5 million in fees it has collected from developers for outdoor improvements but has yet to spend, a city report says.

The report, issued by city parks chief Jon Kirk Mukri, contains noteworthy passages despite its bureaucratic prose:

"While . . . fee collections have grown rapidly, the necessary Department staff and infrastructure for the proper accounting, tracking, and distribution of these funds have never been acquired," wrote Mukri.

Nor, he added, does the city have a comprehensive plan for matching the money with the needs around the city.

The parks issue came to a head recently, with some downtown developers expressing anger over the city's proposed elimination of a fee discount. The so-called Quimby fees, named for the 1975 law that created them, range from about $3,000 to $10,000 per new residential unit.

Developers who have been wanting to know how the city accounts for and spends those fees are particularly peeved by Mukri's acknowledgment that his department doesn't have the answers.

"In a city that cries poverty every 20 minutes, it's amazing there's that kind of money waiting to be spent on the thing that people want the most," said Tom Gilmore, who has been developing apartments and lofts downtown for the last decade.

"I'm not complaining about paying the fees, I'm just saying, 'Show me some results,' " he added. "I want to see green space -- and not just the green space outside City Hall."

Gilmore has filed an appeal to the proposed elimination of the discount. He said he may drop it if the city can demonstrate where the Quimby fees are going.

Carl Schatz, president of the Central City Assn., which represents downtown developers, was more scathing. "The report from the city was just one excuse after another. We've yet to see one blade of grass from this."

City Controller Laura Chick has said that she will audit how the Quimby fees are tracked.

The report also shows that some council districts have significant sums of unspent money.

Councilman Bill Rosendahl's district, on the city's far west side, has nearly $12 million yet to be earmarked. And the council district in the southwestern San Fernando Valley represented by Councilman Dennis Zine has $11.3 million.

Zine said Friday he knew of the money, much of which was collected in the last two years. The problem, he said, is that Quimby fees must be spent within two miles of the development that generates them, and it's often hard to find available land.

However, downtown Councilwoman Jan Perry said she hadn't been aware of how much money was available for her district. "And we had to beat the stuffing out of [Mukri] just to get this report," Perry said.

Residential construction in Perry's district has generated $15.8 million in park fees over the last five years. About $3.3 million has been spent and $8.8 million may soon be spent on acquiring three parcels for parks in downtown -- one in the arts district, one near the Los Angeles River and another in South Park.

Park costs vary widely. The recently opened, one-fifth-acre Marson Park with a small playground, in Panorama City, cost $650,000, while the tab for rebuilding the gym at Van Ness Recreation Center in South Los Angeles was $3.5 million.

Mukri said in an interview Friday that every council office has been informed of how much Quimby money it had and that it takes time to find effective ways to spend the money. He said the city plans to build 35 parks over the next five years across Los Angeles and is trying to acquire land in downtown for park space.

Although acknowledging that the city's Quimby tracking system isn't up to date, Mukri said a new computer mapping system is in the works. That should make it easier to track money and find where it can be spent, he said.

Mukri dismissed complaints from developers about the fees.

"The fees are typically less than 1% of the price the developers are charging for some of these projects," he said. "We do need park land downtown, and we have a plan."

steve.hymon@latimes.com

^^^ Wonder why that Kukri guy is sitting on the money?

Nov 8, 2007 1:02 pm US/Pacific

Victory! Los Angeles Leaders Applaud River Funding
(CBS)
LOS ANGELES Congress on Thursday overrode President Bush’s veto of a water infrastructure bill, and one of the projects that will now benefit is The Los Angeles River Revitalization plan, according to Southland officials.


http://img.viacomlocalnetworks.com/images_sizedimage_190210723/lgThe Los Angeles City Council signed off in May on the blueprint for rehabilitating 32 miles of the waterway, including 239 parks, open space, pedestrian and bicycle paths, bridges and channel modifications from Canoga Park in the San Fernando Valley to Boyle Heights on the Eastside.




The Water Resources Development Act of 2007, which includes $23 billion for some 900 water projects across the country, was vetoed by the president, who said the bill was too expensive.

The House of Representatives voted to override Tuesday, and on Thursday the Senate voted 79-14 today to override the president's veto, marking the first time Congress has overridden a Bush veto.

The measure includes $25 million for the city's plan to revamp 32 miles of the L.A. River.

"Enactment of the $25 million authorization for Los Angeles River projects ensures the long-term federal commitment to revitalize the blighted areas along the L.A. River and enables Congress to consider annual federal funding for new construction projects," said Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard, D-Los Angeles.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said the money gives the city "the opportunity to revive the literal lifeblood of Los Angeles. Thanks to Congresswoman Roybal-Allard's vision and leadership, we will have the resources to revitalize the river and help make L.A. the cleanest and greenest big city in America."

The Los Angeles City Council signed off in May on the blueprint for rehabilitating 32 miles of the waterway, including 239 parks, open space, pedestrian and bicycle paths, bridges and channel modifications from Canoga Park in the San Fernando Valley to Boyle Heights on the Eastside.

The $2 billion plan, which also calls for housing, retail and office space along some parts of the river, will take 20 to 50 years to complete.

Councilman Ed Reyes proposed the major revitalization plan.

"The Los Angeles River, the birthplace of the city of Los Angeles, is a valuable resource to our city. Yet, most people cannot see it, let alone enjoy the opportunities the river presents," he said.

"This historic congressional override means that the people -- not just locally, but at a national level -- see how revitalizing the L.A. River with improved water quality, flood control and environmental restoration will benefit all."

Wow, thanks, they gave us $25 million for a $2 billion project. Wow, that's 1.2% of what we need.

yea, but invest that baby at 6% interest and 2 billion will be within reach in only 75 years! (Assume there's no inflation and that LA will be livable in 2082)

So when does some of this construction start?

Is it all right if we add the Arroyo Seco Parkway Project in this too? It follows a river as well. What's been going on with that project?

assuming the earth still exist around 2080

at least it better than nothing, right?
and it's a step in the right direction.

NIMBY - "But there are special rare bacterial colonies growing in the LA River! We can't mess with nature! Leave the river the way it is!"

... oooooh zip it!

... oooooh zip it!

NIMBY - Not to mention the fact that people will want to spend time at the river... increasing traffic! Plus, children may relax by the river and fall in... and drown. Stop making the river nice!

I can just see it now, in a report in the year 2013 read, of course, by Paul Moyer: "I'm Paul Moyer the big story today: The L. A. River- and the weather of course has made itself known to the area around the Griffith office construction site, not to mention the 134 freeway. The rain of the past couple of days was too much, but the estimated 4 inches received in the valley this afternoon put the finishing touches on what was once to be the Valley's largest contribution to the L. A. River Revitalization Project. Channel 4's Chuck Henry now at the remains of the site near Griffith Park, Chuck?" - "Thanks Paul, and you can see behind me, now that the sun is finally out, what's left of the massive construction site after the river was 'naturalized' here two years ago. No one was even injured as traffic was halted on the 134 freeway as well as this area of North Glendale being completely evacuated earlier this morning, but the devastation is almost complete. Even though it was predicted, no one could have foreseen the impact of the wall of water that moved through this section of the river today around 2:48 pm. The aerial video here shows where the water moved through the project, up into the office park that was still under construction and on past the Union Pacific tracks and over what used to be San Fernando Road, flooding the neighborhoods to the east. The water continued downriver and compromised the supporting structures for the Ventura freeway, causing the collapse that you see here. President Schwarzenegger has promised the state all the resources it needs for the immediate future, but everyone has seen what has been feared all along; That this project started 5 years ago cannot provide safe, or even adequate flood control, Paul?"- "Chuck, thank you. Well, Colleen, you hate to see this devastation"- Colleen: "Yes, I know. All those poor people and their homes... you really hate to see it..." Paul: "Yes. You really hate to see that happening at all......moving on! Paris Hilton today swore off her current diet, stating that...:)

Parks will be built but it will still provide flood control. Taking that away wouldn't be allowed by one group or another.

Artists are sharply divided over project near L.A. River

Supporters see a boon to the arts district in the proposed complex of housing, shops and gallery space. Foes see an out-of-place, outsize 'wall.'

http://www.latimes.com/media/thumbnails/mapimage/2007-11/33703183-08203205.gif

By Ari B. Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 9, 2007
The proposed building sprawls across three city blocks and reaches 70 feet high. To some, One Santa Fe would sweeten the gritty streets that run along the Los Angeles River east of downtown. To others, the $140-million project is a monstrosity.

Along this stretch of Santa Fe Avenue, between the bridges on East 1st and 4th streets, chain-link fences topped with razor-wire enclose Metro Rail car repair depots and an employee parking lot. The river is barely visible, and delivery trucks pass noisily along.


Map
"To me, this is visual blight I'm looking at," said Father Spencer T. Kezios, a city planning commissioner. "We have lemons and we're getting lemonade."

But the massive, 500,000-square-foot development has divided local residents, pitting artist against artist -- with violin-makers, architects, designers and painters choosing sides.

At stake, many residents say, is the fate of the arts district, an area that was once a beacon for artists who needed affordable living and work space.

Opponents cannot stomach "the great wall" and argue that One Santa Fe is a byproduct of a sweeping downtown gentrification that is rapidly changing the complexion of local communities.

"This is something that we're going to regret in a decade," said Jeremiah Axelrod, an area resident and history professor who started an opposition website, www.onesantafe.org.

"My big objection is to the scale of the project," he said. "It's going to be an eyesore."

But supporters say builders have compromised with community groups, and would bring vital additions to a neighborhood that has been struggling in recent years. Several neighborhood organizations have signed on to the project; they include the Historic Cultural Neighborhood Council, the Los Angeles River Artist and Business Assn. and the adjacent Southern California Institute of Architecture.

"It's going to provide a lot of neighborhood amenities that have been desperately needed for years," said Tim Keating, 58, who has lived in the district for over two decades.

One of those amenities is a 5,000-square-foot arts community center that developer McGregor Co would lease to Keating's own neighborhood arts organization for $1 a year. The center would provide gallery space, show films and host a variety of cultural activities.

Other plans include 439 rental units, 50,000 square feet of retail space, parking and improvements to the streetscape, such as dozens of trees. Developers hope to break ground next summer. World-renowned architect Michael Maltzan's designs for One Santa Fe are built around the existing Metro structures, and drawings show a narrow series of buildings rising six stories.

But despite Maltzan's prestige, his designs for One Santa Fe look to opponents like nothing short of a large wall.

Foes have described the development as "aircraft carrier-sized." They also say that it lacks affordable housing for young artists and that the complexion of the district will change as One Santa Fe fills up with people who can afford the market rates of luxury lofts.

Julie Rasnussen, who has lived in the arts district about four years, said she would support the project only if it were used exclusively for community art space or to house artists.

She called the design a "weird, mammoth, monster building."

The arts district emerged around the 1970s when young artists illegally moved into abandoned buildings in the area and used the large spaces to both work and live in. The city passed an ordinance in 1981 that legalized artists' dwellings in the abandoned industrial buildings.

Once a major hub in L.A.'s art world, with an array of galleries buzzing each weekend, the area in recent years has not been the flourishing arts community that many residents had hoped for. The One Santa Fe project reflects the differences in opinions about how to move forward.

At last month's Los Angeles Planning Commission meeting, artists gave radically different predictions of what effect the project would have on the community.

One woman speaking for the opposition called the project "the essential death of the arts district," while a supporter viewed it as a good thing because "it's an area that needs to be activated."

After more than three hours of discussion, the commission passed the first zoning changes necessary for the project to move forward. The City Council must still approve the development before builders break ground.

ari.bloomekatz@latimes.com

Transforming wastewater

Thirsty L.A. should take a clue from Orange County.
December 5, 2007

The Orange County Water District's new $480-million Groundwater Replenishment System is set to launch operations Dec. 15. It will take treated wastewater -- a.k.a. sewage -- from an adjacent treatment plant, force it through state-of-the-art microfiltration, reverse-osmosis and ultraviolet-ray purification systems, and then dump the resulting 70 million gallons of purified water a day into a system of ponds in Anaheim, from which it will percolate slowly into an aquifer and into the county's drinking water supply.

When Los Angeles tried to do something like this a decade ago, constructing a $55-million wastewater reclamation plant in the eastern San Fernando Valley, citizens flew off the handle, fretting about the prospect of water flowing from "toilet to tap." Politicians who had supported the project reversed course in 2000 and shut it down.

But Orange County's Groundwater Replenishment System, the largest of its kind in the world, is getting nothing but kudos. Running at full capacity, it will provide enough water to satisfy 140,000 families each year, at a lower cost than relying on imported water from Northern California. It also will reduce the amount of sewage the county dumps into the Pacific Ocean, making beaches cleaner and safer.

On Monday, San Diego's City Council voted to study a water-reuse project of its own, overriding a veto from Mayor Jerry Sanders. And the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is once again considering plans to recycle wastewater.

As the discussions proceed, Angelenos should resist false notions about fecal matter spewing from kitchen faucets and accept the basic truth about, well, fecal matter spewing from kitchen faucets. Water molecules are water molecules are water molecules. The same limited number of them have been recycled continuously for billions of years. Treated sewage already flows into the Colorado River, the San Joaquin River and the Sacramento River -- all upstream sources of L.A.'s water. And that water, once cleaned, is perfectly safe.

With supplies from the Colorado River and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta increasingly unpredictable, regions need to do what they can to tap into local water resources. Wastewater reuse is a relatively cost-effective and environmentally friendly way to make that happen. Cheers to Orange County for outgrowing its potty-humor phase. It's time for Los Angeles to do the same.



Isn't this one of the main parts of the River Revitalization?

... oooooh zip it!

YOUR A NIMBY???? Shame on you if you are.

project looks nice.

i say build the damn project next to Sci-Arc. stupid NIMBYs!! sci-arc needs a place to house it's students. and, they would get first dibs, from what i was told.

i say build the damn project next to Sci-Arc. stupid NIMBYs!! sci-arc needs a place to house it's students. and, they would get first dibs, from what i was told.

I agree, it will probably another 10 years before anything else (to the tune of 500,000 sq. ft.) is built in that area anyway....!!

Visions of 'Chinatown North'

Planning Begins and Ideas Fly for Vast Expanse Near L.A. River

By Sam Hall Kaplan

When the city began talking about drafting a land-use plan to guide development beyond Chinatown, the area was simply referred to as Chinatown North.

Nothing besides its proximity to the conglomeration of Chinese restaurants and shops really distinguished the target area to the north and east bisected by Spring and Main streets; certainly not the scattered, fading industrial uses there and the spare pockets of modest housing tucked amidst solitary warehouses and barbed wire-wrapped bus and truck parking lots. It was truly nondescript.

Then came the 2003 opening of the Metro Gold Line serving the area with two stops. That was followed by this year's dedication of the Cornfield as a State Historic Park, and the completion of the L.A. River Revitalization Plan that identified the estimated 400-acre sprawl as a ripe "opportunity area."

As surely as carnivores follow the scent of raw meat, the promise of increased public investment in the area so close to an appreciating Downtown real estate market has prompted interest by a swarm of developers.

All these factors were noted at a Dec. 1 land-use workshop orchestrated by the city Planning Department. Nearly 100 community leaders, politicos and design professionals attended, an impressive turnout for an early morning gathering in a chilly warehouse.

Chinatown and its cultural and commercial identity hardly was mentioned as the diverse assemblage took up the larger and more weighty issue of the future use of what Claire Bowin of the Planning Department described as the city's most challenging and potentially most propitious planning effort.

"Just think of it, 400 mostly underdeveloped acres, a few miles from the Civic Center and Downtown," exclaimed Bowin, who deftly ran the workshop with the help of, among others, the Western Justice Center and the nonprofit Livable Places.

Like many in attendance, Bowin had been involved with the recent L.A. River planning initiative. She sees this effort along its banks north of Downtown as the logical next phase to the river's revitalization as a focus for the region's future public and private development.

"That's why we are not labeling the effort the Chinatown North Specific Plan, as first had been discussed, but rather the Cornfield/Arroyo Seco Specific Plan," commented Bowin. She added even that description was lacking, given the potential of the area, in particular the 150 or so acres between College Street and the river, which was simply identified as "Area A" for the purposes of the workshop.

The workshop participants generally agreed on the importance of the plot, at least as much as such a diverse group could. Working in small groups with land-use models, a more dense and urbane vision of the acreage emerged, overshadowing Chinatown as a focal point.

Most of the participants focused on the 32-acre Cornfield that is being planned as a permanent state park by a design team headed by the internationally renowned landscape firm Hargreaves Associates (currently only 12 acres of the site is utilized as parkland).

"The Cornfield should be thought of as an urban amenity, like New York's Central Park, edged by dense mixed-use developments," said architect Elizabeth Herron as she placed piles of colored disks the size of pennies, representing retail and residential uses, on a map of the area. Others proposed somehow linking the park with greenways extending to the east to a proposed pedestrian promenade and the hoped-for future development along the L.A. River.

Looking on and agreeing was Katherine Spitz, a Los Angeles landscape architect and a local member of the San Francisco-based Hargreaves team. She was among the many consultants attending the workshop. (In the interest of full disclosure, I have been advocating the intense development of the area for decades as part of the protracted L.A. River revitalization effort, and most recently as a consultant to Meruelo Maddux Properties, which owns several properties there.)

As the colored disks were stacked on the map, Jordann Turner of the Planning Department reminded the group of the need to retain existing jobs and generate new jobs in an area presently zoned for industrial and commercial use.

Some attendees responded that such uses are moving away from the area, and mostly what is left there now are distribution warehouses employing just a handful of people. "New jobs will come with the housing and commercial development," observed one participant.

In her summary, Herron declared that the plan needs to "get real," and suggested the city drop its dated industrial image of the area as well as its suburban image of the city, and instead encourage the emergence of a dense urban model of the future featuring flex space.

This made sense to me, and echoed what I and others had advocated while bantering over our study model spread out on a table in the warehouse.

But the model was one of six at the workshop. The city planning process indeed is a protracted affair, and how our recommendations will fare remains to be seen. City planners are weighing all the comments in preparation for the next workshop Feb. 9.

Meanwhile, the future of the Cornfield/Arroyo Seco area awaits its genesis, as does a more apt appellation.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: Los Angeles Downtown News (http://www.downtownnews.com/articles/2007/12/10/news/opinion/edit03.txt)

n her summary, Herron declared that the plan needs to "get real," and suggested the city drop its dated industrial image of the area as well as its suburban image of the city, and instead encourage the emergence of a dense urban model of the future featuring flex space.
im guessing she referring to all of LA?

Oh wow, nothing on this for a long time. But I thought I'd show some pictures of what other cities have done with their waterways. We can do some creative things and really green this city (and by green I mean add parks and such, not necessarily how the environmentalists would use the term).

River Walk in San Antonio:

http://thebestwalk.com/walks/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/RiverWalk-SanAntonio.jpg
http://www.planetware.com/i/photo/paseo-del-rio-river-walk-san-antonio-txsana1.jpg
http://cache.virtualtourist.com/2950175-s4The_River_Walk-San_Antonio.jpg

What used to be LA-style flood control channels in Zurich:
http://business.fortunecity.com/icahn/648/limmat1.jpg
http://www.pfriedli.ch/sternflug2007/DSCN0093_bearbeitet-1.jpg

And important to note that these still prevent floods. Now if only we could extend this to the many flood-control channels in LA and hopefully we can reuse a lot of the water in these streams instead of just dumping it into the ocean. It's possible with a more natural river. I know they have a plan to try this near Elysian Park, but they can do it in so many more places.

Well, hopefully we can get an update on how this plan is progressing, if at all.

Here's another example. I just got back from a trip around New England. This is the Providence river in Providence New England. This river was once totally polluted and basically built over. The folks in Providence excavated the river bed changed its course and below is the result.
http://www.avisionoftime.com/providence_river_downtown.jpg

Officials from Rome Italy are now studying Providence to see if they can apply some of the lessons to the Tiber.

I was thinking about this today: why was the whole riverbed embedded in concrete of just using some sort of levee type system? Instead of a concrete river, we would only have concrete walls around the river (which could possibly have ivy grown over it) and the river would be less polluted and more inviting to life.

I say we just cut off the river and turn the former-river land into strip malls.

I say we just cut off the river and turn the former-river land into strip malls.

:puke:

:puke:

whats cunnilingus?

why do things like this take so long....

It's a huge project and the city isn't doing too well financially right now.

^^ how about ever?

Update from downtown news:

LOS ANGELES RIVER

The effort to clean and green 32 miles of the Los Angeles River continues. An updated River Improvement Overlay Plan is now available for public viewing at the city Planning Department's website and public meetings to comment on the project will take place in the spring, said Tonya Durrell, a spokeswoman for the city Department of Public Works. The project includes design guidelines and recommendations for development within half a mile of the waterway. The Army Corps of Engineers is working on a feasibility study for ecosystem restoration; it is expected to be complete within two years. Some projects funded by state bond money are already moving forward, including the building of bike paths near Elysian Park. Of the five "Opportunity Sites" the revitalization features, three are in and around Downtown Los Angeles: the state park at Taylor Yard, the Chinatown area and the Industrial District. The overall project is estimated at $2 billion; no timeline has been announced. At lariver.org.

hopefully the plan routes this right though gehrys project. But with that aside, what an amazing and needed project :D

Why is the Los Angeles River paved?

Because it was the cause of almost a yearly flood disaster that caused deaths and destruction.

All the water during flash storms and regular winter storms and snow run off from the mountains to the north drain to the LA River. by the time it got to the LAB Basin and the City it was a torrent of destruction.

In the past, such torrents even changed the course of the river every so often years. At one paint in history it didn't flow south but west and drained in Santa Monica.

Brief History

* Gabrielino Era--The central village of the Gabrielino indians, Yangna, is established near the river and a large sycamore tree, or "council tree". Approximately 200 people live in Yangna, which was near present-day downtown Los Angeles. Recent excavations near Olvera Street have revealed Gabrielino artifacts over 3,000 years old. 24
* 1769--Portola Expedition and Juan Crespi document the Los Angeles River.
* 1777--Govenor DeNeve selects the sight for Los Angeles on the site of the current City Hall, a few blocks from the river.
* 1781--The Zanja Madre dam was built to supply water and irrigation for the young city.
* 1811-- Flooding
* 1815--The original Plaza is washed away as the river overflows and changes course at Alameda and Fourth Street to cut west across the low land and empty in Ballona Creek. The great "council tree", of the Gabrielino village of Yangna survives the flood.
* 1825--Govenor Pico recorded in his diary that the L.A. River changed its course back from the Ballona wetlands to San Pedro. Woodland between the pueblo and the ocean destoryed (woodland along the 110 FWY?). Marshland drained by the new channel.
* 1832--Heavy flooding
* 1845--Rancho Encino established at the head of the L.A. River.
* 1857--Los Angeles Water Works created under the direction of William Dryden. A water wheel was built at the Zanja Madre dam. The Great Fort Tejon earthquake also occurred, Southern California's last BIG earthquake.
* 1861-62--Heavy flooding. Fifty inches of rain falls during December and January. Much of San Fernando Valley is under water. City's embankment and Dryden's system are destroyed.
* 1867--Floods again spill over the old channel and create a large, temporary lake out to Ballona Creek.
* 1876--The Novician Deluge
* 1884--Heavy flooding causes the river to change course again, turning east to Vernon and then southward to San Pedro. The Downtown section of the river is channelized.
* 1888 to1891--Annual floods.
* 1896--Col. Griffith J. Griffith donates over five miles of riverfront property to the city with the expectation that Griffith Park would become a grand riverfront park.
* 1899--San Pedro is selected over Santa Monica and Redondo Beach as the official site for the L.A. deep water harbor.
* 1904--William Mulholland announces that L.A. will need new water sources.
* 1914--Heavy flooding. Great damage to the harbor. Public called for creation of the L.A. County Flood Control District and discussion of channelizing the river begins.
* 1921,27--Moderate flood.
* 1934--Moderate flood starting January 1. Fourty dead in La Canada.
* 1938--Great County-wide flood with 4 days of rain. Most rain on day 4. Red Cross said this was the 5th largest flood in history at that time with 113 lives lost, $40 million in damage ($360 million in 1994 dollars). Recorded as a 50 year storm. Public demands action. Army Corps of Engineers begins channelizing the river with 10,000 workers applying 3,000,000 barrels of concrete by hand.
* 1940--Sepulveda Flood Basin and dam is completed to catch excess water before it jumps the channel down stream.
* 1941 to 44--L.A. River floods five times.
* 1952--Moderate flooding
* 1969--One heavy flood after 9 day storm. One moderate flood.
* 1978--Two moderate floods
* 1980-Flood tops banks of river in Long Beach. Sepulveda Basin spillway almost opened.
* 1983--Flooding kills six people.
* 1991--Army Corps proposes to raise levees from Rio Hondo to Long Beach to protect against a 100 year flood.
* 1992--15 year flood. Motorists trapped in Sepulveda basin. Six people dead.
* 1994--Heavy flooding. Estimates range from a 15 to over a 100 year flood.

There's a plan (city and civil) to make it green, (still safe), with parks etc.
http://folar.org/

Back in 1999, I finished my graduate program and move to DC to get a job with a large lobbying firm. One of their clients was the City of Phoenix and the contract was to secure Federal funding for the environmental restoration of the rivers that run through the city of Phoenix. The company I worked for had been working on getting the funding through the authorization process for a decade. in 1999 they finally got the whole project authorized, after 10 years of working it through not only the various committees on the Hill but also the Army Corps of Engineers. I mention this to put a little scale to the project of restoring the LA River, but also to point out that just because we got the project authorized, did not mean we had secured funding yet. So the attention then turned to the appropriations committee to get the money flowing.

So basically if the City of LA, or whoever has actual control over the river (might be some regional authority or something), has their act together and is working things as they can on their side, AND has a decent lobbyist hired to work that end. You could see the project authorized ~10 years after you get started and then the funding gets rolling about a year or two later.

Its not like some $1million little earmark you can slip in, and I think Phoenix's project was like $295m (1999 dollars), not $2billion (2007 dollars). So it'll take awhile, but in the end, it'll happen. LA is too important and visible and has too big a delegation.

^^ so it looks like my grand kids might be able to enjoy a new river area.

^^ it sounds slightly possible

I'm 38, with a 6 year old and I fully expect that he'll be able to take dates there probably late high school / early college years. Two things going for it are that when the next Omnibus Transportation bill comes up the economy will be improving, hence more money available and the new census will probably show that the region has grown, therefore more representation pushing for those extra dollars.

My family and I are moving out to LA next summer so we'll be nagging our reps about it. That and better transportation funding in general. I'd love to be able to get by with one car there if possible.

Are there any updates on how this project is moving forward?

Some updates?

Dead??

* 1896--Col. Griffith J. Griffith donates over five miles of riverfront property to the city with the expectation that Griffith Park would become a grand riverfront park.


Another lost opportunity. Now the 5 is in the way.

Nothing actually gets done in LA

True on so many levels. And what gets done seems by chance. But the city has had lots of lucky chances.

Status?

from: dailynews.com

Unleash the L.A. River?
By Dana Bartholomew, Staff Writer
Posted: 10/13/2011 01:00:00 AM PDT
Updated: 10/13/2011 10:16:05 AM PDT

http://extras.mnginteractive.com/live/media/site200/2011/1012/20111012__river_wild.JPG
The Los Angeles River has a more natural look in the Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area. (Michael Owen Baker/Daily News Staff Photographer)

It took John Long a dozen years to stop the stream of condoms, beer bottles and garbage dumped by his house near the headwaters of the Los Angeles River.
So the Canoga Park homeowner wasn't thrilled to learn of plans to transform the massive concrete flood channel into a sylvan urban river park.

"To add park areas and benches is the stupidest thing they could do," said Long, 43, admiring the sheer convergence of Bell Creek and Arroyo Calabasas, so imposing it resembles the bow of a battleship.

"The last thing we need is to create another place for partygoers and vagrants."

But while Long lauded the massive flood channel that paved the way for nearly 75 years of San Fernando Valley development, officials met Wednesday to discuss plans to undo its blight.
At a state hearing in Studio City, lawmakers joined local, state and federal officials, community groups and river buffs to discuss ways to restore the city's greatest waterway.

At the heart of the three-hour hearing was the stark, mostly concrete 51-mile-long river that bisects the Valley, and the cold concrete tributaries tying it to surrounding hills.

Plans call for tearing out tons of concrete and replacing it with terraced tree-lined banks that link bikeways, parks and neighborhoods from Canoga Park to downtown.

"This could not only be an amazing recreational resource for the San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles," said state Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills, co-chair of the joint legislative hearing. "It's a cost-effective solution to our water supply and quality."

Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes, D-Arleta, who also co-chaired the event, put it another way.

"There's an old yarn about Los Angeles: That it's the only city in the world where its river is paved and its streets aren't," he said to a packed room at CBS Studios. "Few can imagine the transformation of the L.A. River.

"And I realize we have a long way to go," he said.

To envision a regreening of a once-wild river that teemed with steelhead trout, engineers recounted the reason for its mostly concrete straightjacket.

In 1938, catastrophic floods killed 76 Angelenos, prompting the Army Corps of Engineers to turn it into a flood-control channel.

For decades, the trapezoidal channel was better known for graffiti-lined movie car chases than its potential as an L.A. Seine.

Then the Friends of the Los Angeles River held its first river cleanup in 1989, drawing 30 earnest volunteers. This year, an estimated 4,000 people turned out in the interest of reclaiming the river.

Governments followed suit, with county and city plans devoted to an all-new Southland waterway in the interest of capturing, storing and re-using its 330 million gallons a day of untreated water that flows out to sea.

And to create economic and recreational opportunities like redeveloped riverfronts in Denver or San Antonio.

"It's a dream come true, to see the layers of work and progress," said Councilman Ed Reyes, one of the largest L.A. River advocates. "The L.A. River is one of those elements that not only nurture life, but will lead to a rebirth of our city."



Full article: http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_19101666?source=rss

From Curbed L.A.

City Passes Plan to Start Un-Paving and Spiffing the LA River (http://la.curbed.com/archives/2011/12/city_passes_plan_to_start_unpaving_and_spiffing_the_la_river.php)

Big news for you river rats who are ready for the Los Angeles River to return to a more enjoyable state: yesterday, the City Council approved the Los Angeles River Implementation Overlay, meant to encourage good river-centric development, reports the Daily News. The LA-RIO creates a set of design guidelines for developers looking to build along the river's edges, and it's a crucial step in finally removing some of the concrete currently lining the river. According to city planner Tom Rothmann, this is the first plan for actually making changes along the river, unlike the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan, which provided more of a vision exercise. Rothmann told Curbed today that the overlay "requires changes along the river and a quarter-mile buffer around the river."
Some neighborhoods didn't want to see any changes>>

Those requirements include drought tolerant landscaping and more strategic positioning for the less desirable uses, such as dumpsters and parking. According to Rothmann, "There are no zone changes--up zoning or down zoning. The LA-RIO implements design standards and guidelines." The design standards would only apply to new construction or major remodels; except for the drought tolerant landscaping, they won't apply to single-family homes.

According to the LADN, the LA-RIO identifies "areas where the concrete could be removed to increase public access to the river, while not creating any flooding problems," and not every neighborhood along the river will see the same kinds of development. Councilmember Ed Reyes tells the paper "there are commercial areas where we are going to them to say, 'You can do more here than have a back of a building facing the river'...We want them to look at other possibilities of having parkways and bike paths."

In residential neighborhoods, however, some people worried about people cutting through to get to the river, according to Reyes: "There were areas, primarily in the San Fernando Valley, that are heavily residential and they didn't want to see any change, where people would be trying to get to the river."

Rothmann also told Curbed that for now, the LA-RIO will apply to the LA River, but that eventually the design standards implemented by the overlay could also apply to other watersheds in the city, such as the Tujunga Wash and Ballona Creek. The City Council is hoping that the LA-RIO will be sufficient to convince the Obama administration to fund an Army Corps of Engineers study on getting rid of the concrete.

From Curbed L.A.

City Passes Plan to Start Un-Paving and Spiffing the LA River (http://la.curbed.com/archives/2011/12/city_passes_plan_to_start_unpaving_and_spiffing_the_la_river.php)

Rehabing the river is a fine idea; but this is pretty useless.

Drought-tolerant plants? That's what's already growing there. The point of landscaping is to make it attractive, not to minimize water usage. After all, it is along the edge of a RIVER. If there's no water for a few trees and an occasional bougainvillea, how can it be a "river" project? Needs rethinking or re-explaining.

Removal of concrete without creating flooding problems isn't very exciting either. Wasn't the concrete put there specifically to reduce flooding? What other reasons were there?

And telling operating businesses to add and maintain bike paths behind their buildings? That's not the city doing anything. The govt. orgs. should make a single standard and act as a single manager, not push the costs onto a few hundred private locales and then sit around and hope they do it fairly consistently and maintain it.

You've finally gone off over the edge. Tea Party hat and all.

You've finally gone off over the edge. Tea Party hat and all.

Glad you're back but please don't get into name calling.

In any event, I'm just saying that that isn't a plan: it's a few platitudes cut and pasted from somewhere.

Did the San Antonio river project consist of putting in some drought-tolerant plants and removing a few pieces of concrete and telling some warehouses to put in some kind of bike path? This is more like a few sound bites to give the impression something is happening.

LA Daily News (http://www.dailynews.com/ci_19933543?source=most_viewed) (Feb. 9th)

L.A. River development plan approved

By Rick Orlov, Staff Writer


A far-reaching plan to control development and landscaping along the Los Angeles River received approval from the City Planning Commission on Thursday, setting the stage for a testy debate as it heads to the City Council.

The Planning Commission voted 5-0, with four members absent, to forward the L.A. River Improvement Overlay to the City Council.

"I'm a champion of this," Commission President Bill Roschen said, after an extensive public hearing. "I think as people review this it will get more and more support. To create a park of this size is unbelievable."

The city plan follows the 32 miles of the river within Los Angeles as it snakes from Canoga Park through the San Fernando Valley and into the Griffith Park and Atwater area.

The zone would include all property within 2,500 feet of the river, and would require that new projects meet design standards, such on setbacks, fencing and native landscaping.

Claire Bowin, the city planner who oversaw the project, said it was important for a number of reasons.

"It is critical to start thinking about the area around the river corridors as places of ecological habitats and species," Bowin said. "There are a number of species that migrate through the area and play a large role in the health of our community."


read more: http://www.dailynews.com/ci_19933543?source=most_viewed