Elements of Urbanism: Los Angeles

[GayLA]

BTW, I have spent lots of time in Compton, LaBrea and even Gardena(East LA) and it really is not as bad as the movies depict it by any stretch of the imagination.  In fact, there are areas and pockets in Compton and LaBrea that can be quite nice.

.Hey buddy, I currently live in City Terrace (East L.A.)....Gardena is in the Southbay towards Long Beach

[thelakelander]

Please tell me you went to Astro Burger in North Hollywood... it was literally up the street from that picture.

Nope.  Some guy mentioned going to In and Out Burger but my thought at the time was I didn't go to California to eat fast food.  So I ended up in sit down restaurants for the most part.

[iloveionia]

Chain link fences around people's houses and bullet proof glass in the fast food joints is my radar for "you in the hood!" LA truly has the "ganstas" with the baggy pants, white tees, wife beaters that are tell tale in the hood. That said, Compton has long standing residents there, and definitely there are "pockets" as stated of nice neighorhoods. It is one of the cities oldest neighborhoods, where a large section of it was predominantely white, and other portions middle class blacks; it was not a poor community back in the day.  There are very pretty Spanish style houses there too and a number of historical landmarks.    While I don't know my history of Compton so well, I do know it is next to Watts (the riots in the 60s and later the LA Riots in the 90s,) which caused "white flight" and middle class flight to the suburbs.  Compton is well known due to rap music and rappers from Compton where the hood is immortalized.  The population has changed all around, and I do not believe it is predominantely black now.  Like many areas in LA there is a mix of all races, colors, and economic levels.  Compton still has inexpensive houses compared to other parts of LA and at the height of the market here they were selling at upwards of half a million dollars.  Honestly, crime ridden and delapitated neighborhoods' houses were selling for $500k+ during the height.  Insane.

There are a number of L and Ls in LA.  Delicious macaroni salad. Think I'll go get me some. . . . .LOL.  There are a couple just a stone's throw away. 

And plenty of food trucks.  There is an event going on at the Home Depot Center in October where 35+ food trucks will be there. . . . . Hoo Rah.

Lastly, there are some great, great areas in LA County.  Pasadena, particularly Old Town, I love the quirkiness of Venice Beach, Silver Lake has made a comeback, and some areas around the Farmer's Market downtown. 

[north miami]

               www.paddlethelariver.org

[fieldafm]

And plenty of food trucks.  There is an event going on at the Home Depot Center in October where 35+ food trucks will be there. . . . . Hoo Rah.

It's all about Kogi BBQ.  I think I have come pretty darn close to perfecting their pork tacos and kimichi.

Gastrobus is good too.

Wow, I'm really feeling like an LA trip is in my very near future.

Pasadena, particularly Old Town

Pasadena is cool.  I spend a great deal of time in Pomona county and really any of those places are pretty cool.

Really as long as you stay out of the 909, you'll find an extraordinary amount of places in the LA basin that you can fall in love with, IMO.

Hey buddy, I currently live in City Terrace (East L.A.)....Gardena is in the Southbay towards Long Beach

I thought anywhere around LAX would be considered 'East LA' ?

Nope.  Some guy mentioned going to In and Out Burger but my thought at the time was I didn't go to California to eat fast food.  So I ended up in sit down restaurants for the most part.

You and your fancy per diems.... you missed out.  LA is the burger epicenter of the world. 

[Ocklawaha]

I also agree with fieldafm, LA-Long Beach, along with Portland, are both great choices if I ever leave Jacksonville.

Where else in this great country, can you surf and ski in the same day??  Then when you head back home, grab some In N Out... double double with fries animal style!

I'll be the one gorging on Jack-N-The-Box fried tacos or perhaps we'll meet at Tommy's on Beverly Blvd. over in Westlake. Your right about the variety packed into such a small area. It is possible to snow ski on Mount Baldy in the morning, fish through the lunch hour at Lake Arrowhead, Play rockhound or pan gold in Placerita Canyon in the afternoon, and watch the evening settle in over the Pacific Ocean, all in ONE DAY and within 100 miles.

Progress? In the 1880's Henry Flagler visited Palatka with plans to make the 'Gem City' into America's next great tourist resort, they told him to go away. Interestingly when we were the movie capital of the country, no less then 4 major Interurban Electric Railways were incorporated to stretch from downtown Jacksonville to Ocala, Palatka, St. Augustine and between St. Augustine and Jacksonville Beach.  St. Elmo Acosta pushed to get the county to install an interurban railway between Downtown and Jacksonville Beach... In every case those projects were killed. The movie industry was chased away.  Miami became America's next great resort. The Great Depression and war effectively stopped any forward motion Jacksonville had. Our locally based international carrier, National Airlines, packed up and moved south. We were the first city in the state to embrace the freeway as a solution. Jacksonville totally wiped out its waterfront industry in the 1960's.  We abandoned our Union Station in 1974. In the 1980's we invested in a stillborn Skyway. The 1990's were marked by completely leveling Fairfield, Brooklyn and LaVilla. Now we are planning to shut down street vendors. Worse still, today were proposing to shut down mobility fee's on new development that would pay for massive infrastructure improvements.  ...And some of you probably wonder why iloveionia, fieldafm, Zoo and I get all nostalgic for Southern California! Go figure Jacksonville, 'No tiki, no laundry.' Yeah LA isn't perfect, but neither is Jacksonville.

OCKLAWAHA

[iloveionia]

Right! 
Right!
And there is a mapped bike path that almost takes you cleanly in a circle around the LA River and the San Gabriel River.  I do like the bike paths on the San Gabriel, the LA River at Long Beach is clean and neat but a lot of transciency lives on or near the river.    The northern part of the LA River is really nice. 

I don't think anyone living south of the 405 or boardering it considers themself "East LA"  East LA is north of the 105 and west of the 710, almost to downtown near Boyle Heights (or probably right there.)  It is not cooth to say I live in East LA. 

[thelakelander]

Ennis where was the Metrolink station in the last photo?

Fullerton.  Here are some random transit pics snapped that didn't make the photo thread:


Inside the Pacific Surfliner


A cafe at Fullerton Station


Lots of these out there.  I noticed several had multiuse paths next to them.


Love the art deco bridges.


A Union Station platform.  Amtrak on the left, Metrolink commuter rail on the right.


Inside a Red Line train (heavy rail subway)


Looking for my San Diego Amtrak train platform in Union Station.


Metro maintenance yard


Anaheim Station.  Catch the train to the ballgame.


Or take the train to the beach.


Metro Rapid BRT.  Just like rail?  Not really.


Inside the Gold Line LRT.  Anyone from JTA familiar with this line?


For those of you who weren't around in MJ's early days, JTA used this line as proof that LRT cost more than their old billion dollar BRT plan.


The consultants failed to mention that a good portion of it is elevated.


Oh yeah, it goes underground too.


TOD? You betcha!


Metro local and rapid buses


Want to save some money on a transit center?  Visit Long Beach.


No need to have different modes blocks apart.


When designing a transit center, remember bikes are a mode of mobility too.

[Ocklawaha]

FULLERTON? Damn! I used to go to Cal State all the time.

On weekends we used to go to Clifton's Brookside in downtown. In the late 50's and 60's it was still a fabulous place both for food and for atmosphere. Waterfalls, a stream that twists through past the tables, a Alpine chapel, and the mother of all murals as big as the redwoods it depicts.  Clifton's Brookside has been leased and is being/has been restored to it's original glory. When they get it operating again, if it's anything like the original, missing it would be a crime.

The original I think was Clifton's Pacific over on Olive Street, but Brookside was the one I clearly remember. Clifton's opened in the 1930's, and was famous for his 'Eat and pay whatever you think it was worth' policy. He also NEVER turned away a homeless or any other hungry person, you were welcomed to eat free if you couldn't pay.  The new incarnation of Clifton's is hiring from one of the rehab missions that teach culinary skills so it ought to be just as cool as before.

BTW, At various times I lived in Long Beach, Paramount and Santa Clarita. My sisters and I still have property there and in the high desert, so one might say I already have reservations.

OCKLAWAHA

[thelakelander]

A blast from the past!

JTA: Why BRT is the Better Choice for Jacksonville

...Comparisons between BRT and LRT are often made, including by some urbanites here on the First Coast. They are rarely made, however, using an apples-to-apples test as most systems differ so greatly. But one city, Los Angeles, may offer the perfect look at how BRT and LRT match up head-to-head.

Los Angeles, the nation’s second largest city, has both BRT (called the Orange Line) and LRT (light rail transit called the Gold Line). LA’s Gold Line (LRT) opened in 2003, while the Orange Line (BRT) opened in 2005. Each is about 14 miles long and each has 13 stations, approximately one mile apart. Both were built at-grade, have signal-priority granting the transit vehicles green lights at intersections and both serve primarily a suburban, middle-class area. These nearly identical routes, length and number of stops makes for a perfect comparison of LRT versus BRT.

The BRT line was expected to start out averaging between 5-7,000 weekday boardings and then grow to 22,000 within 15 years. Remarkably, the BRT had 2020 projection by its seventh month. By comparison,the LRT line was expected to start with around 30,000weekday boardings, increasing to 60,000 within 20years. However, the actual LRT ridership has been lower than that of the BRT â€" obviously far below projections.

The capital cost of the BRT was $349 million (or$25 million per mile). The LRT cost more thantwice that amount â€" $859 million ($61 millionper mile). The operating cost also favors the BRT,costing about 54 cents per passenger comparedto the $1.08 for each LRT passenger.

In Jacksonville the numbers also favor BRT. While projected 2020 daily weekday ridership numbers are slightly higher on LRT (BRT - 34,000 to LRT - 41,000), the projected cost makes BRT a much better deal. A 34-mile BRT system here is expected to cost between $388-557 million or $11-16 million per mile. LRT on the otherhand would cost a total of $974 million - $1.1 billion or $28-32 million per mile. No matter how you look at it, BRT is the most cost-effective choice â€" the better choice â€" for Jacksonville. Not only does JTA think so,so too does the Federal Transit Administration (FTA).

full article: http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2007-dec-jta-why-brt-is-the-better-choice-for-jacksonville

Back in those days, someone forgot to mention that the LRT line included in the BRT story wasn't exactly apples to apples.  The BRT example was on an at-grade street while the LRT line is elevated in some areas and goes underground in others.

[Ocklawaha]

Yeah the crooks payed to throw the JTA 'study' also used the subway that is called Buffalo Light Rail, and I think their 3rd example was St. Louis, also elevated or subway much of the way. We wouldn't need any of that elevated rail nonsense in Jacksonville.

Ennis, did you, or do any of our California friends have photos of the BUS SIDE of Los Angeles Union Station? Talk about a transit center being a one-stop shop!

OCKLAWAHA

[iloveionia]

Any LB photos Ock? I have hiked Mt. Lowe and most of the areas up there, also looked and studied history books. I'm 39 so my experience is pictures, books, and hiking the trails only. Both the LA River and San Gabriel River have a two lane bike bath. They go on forever and connect top and bottom. Let me dig up something.

[iloveionia]

http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/LA-San-Gabriel-River-Route

[Ocklawaha]

Any LB photos Ock? I have hiked Mt. Lowe and most of the areas up there, also looked and studied history books. I'm 39 so my experience is pictures, books, and hiking the trails only. Both the LA River and San Gabriel River have a two lane bike bath. They go on forever and connect top and bottom. Let me dig up something.

I'll have to dig around and see what I have or I can find for you. If they are 'found' photos, they would be of places I've been in the past.  BTW, if you like a good hike, have you been to the Devils Punchbowl? Very cool and be ready to get really wet... well, if there is any water in the creek. The rocks form a natural slide into a deep pool. Gee, just like the one up in Ben Hur in the old Mother Lode area and the infamous 'Dunlap Commune' where I misspent some of my youth.
http://www.devils-punchbowl.com/

You could do JAX a great service with photos from the bus side of Union Station, something that shows the proximity of bus to train to subway to Light Rail. I keep looking at those new condo's north of the station, um, tempting.

Most of the good ol day memories center around Long Beach-Lakewood-Paramount and to a lesser extent LA and Fullerton. Slightly more recent memories (when you were about 9 years old) center around Granada Hills, Griffith Park (Los Angeles Live Steamers), Burbank, and most of all Santa Clarita-Newhall-Canyon Country. Much more up to date is Landers and 29 Palms, (my desert cabin is in Landers) north of Palm Springs, Yucca Valley. If you get out towards the desert and if you like unbelievable fruits, nuts and dates, don't miss a stop at Hadley's.
http://www.hadleyfruitorchards.com/home.aspx

You might also enjoy a look at LA as it was... The Orange Empire Railroad Museum in Perris has several city blocks of old buildings, as well as complete operating segments of the ORIGINAL LA Yellow Cars, and Pacific Electric. Weekends are very nice, and you could easily lose a day out there.
http://www.oerm.org/

One of my favorite places in California is Bishop-Laws-Lone Pine-Independence-Mammoth Lakes, there is a very cool old style 'motor court' lodge in Lee Vining. This is the back door to Yosemite. The valley you'd travel through is where LA stole the water from the Owens River.  The north of the valley is pristine, cool, well watered, and the south end which is where steamboats operated across Keeler Lake is among the most desolate places on earth. There is a railroad museum in Law's (east of Bishop) which is much more of a historical old west site then it is a railroad museum. Nearby Bodie (ghost town) is cool to visit too. Mono Lake is stunning, and don't miss the volcanic tufa formations, just DON'T touch the water, it's full of arsenic.  If you make this trip be sure to top off your gas tank, the stuff is priced like gold in Bishop. Guess you know to ALWAYS carry water out in the boonies.
http://www.lawsmuseum.org/
http://leevining.com/
http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=514

If you'd like, I'll see what I can dig up, and post more cool places as they occur to me...

OCKLAWAHA

[iloveionia]

I am familiar with some of these places in name.  You've now just added some wonderful ideas on my "must do list" in California.  Looking forward to perusing the sites.

We are camping at Point Mugu SP north of Malibu over the Thanksgiving holiday.  Right on the beach, in an RV.  CA has a wonderful park system.