Streetsblog Los Angeles

The Pacoima Wash Vision Plan doesn't choose between modes, but seeks to accommodate all of them. That's one reason that the rift between cyclists and horse riders that was so apparent during the Bike Plan process is not even on the map. All renderings via Mia Lehrer and Associates.

One of the lessons that the world’s great cities learned is how to use natural and man created landmarks to strengthen and create great places. This is one area where Los Angeles still lags, and nowhere is this clearer than in the case of the Pacoima Wash.

The Wash is a tributary of the Los Angeles River (actually a tributary of a tributary, but who’s counting) that runs through the San Fernando Valley from the Pacoima Dam southwest through Sylmar, the city of San Fernando and eventually Pacoima. Instead of being a vibrant open space designed to connect disparate communities and bring people together outdoors, the Wash is a physical barrier as real as a freeway or freight rail line. The land surrounding the Wash is kept behind fences, the trail running parallel is closed to the public and behind bars, instead of people, the Wash’s greenspace is a resting ground for weeds.

But a non-profit environmental justice organization known as Pacoima Beautiful wants to change all that. And with the help of the L.A. County Department of Public Health’s Policies for Livable and Active Communities and Environments (PLACE) Grant they will soon have an official plan to help do so. The first step in the process of turning the Wash from eye sore to community anchor is to create a vision for the area, a vision that is informed by representative of the community, and that’s what Pacoima Beautiful and its allies are trying to do.

“Pacoima Wash is a very important natural, open space to the community so we’re protecting it,” supplies Anita Cerna with the City of Los Angeles Department of Planning. “Now we’re also studying the Wash to see if there’s a way we can use it beyond being a place to collect water”

And help for the community can’t come soon enough. Pacoima is a desert when it comes to open space, even with the large Ritchie Valens Park located just off the 118 Highway. Pacoima has 54.3 acres of park space. According to the LA City General Plan, the ideal ratio of park space is 4 acres per 1,000 residents. Because Pacoima has over 100,000 people its ideal ratio,is close to 400 acres of park space. Read more…

As part of our ongoing coverage of the impact of the Los Angeles County Public Health P.L.A.C.E. grants, this week Streetsblog will focus on Long Beach.  Because Long Beach is so close to Los Angeles and has been making such strides in the world of sustainable transportation, the city’s strides have been a secondary focus of Los Angeles Streetsblog for the last three and a half years.  Heck, it even has its own Streetsfilm.

Two weeks ago, Streetsblog looked at Culver City’s first steps towards a Livable Streets transportation policy, while Long Beach is quite a bit ahead of Culver City there are some chinks in Long Beach’s armor.  There has been a quiet, but growing murmer that much of the outstanding infrastructure that has been put on Long Beach’s streets to help cyclists and pedestrians in recent years has focused on business corridors and upper class residential communities.  Streetsblog will examine that issue head on.  After all, a progressive public health plan for transportation should address the communities that most need it.

Since much of Long Beach’s PLACE Grant went in to funding the Mobility Coordinator position filled by the local bicycling community’s motivational speaker, Charlie Gand; Gandy will be a regular face on Streetsblog this week starting with our video and story series available after the jump.

In addition to this article, we’ll be publishing three more this week.  The first looks at the impact that this new focus on Livable Streets has had on business.  The second examines “Active Living and Complete Streets” planning documents put together as part of the PLACE Grant.  The third will look at the existing and funded infrastructure that’s been put in place over the last three years and talk about Long Beach’s recent past and future.

For anyone unfamiliar with our Long Beach coverage, or anyone that wants to catch up, read on after the jump.  We’ve added a few new interviews on You Tube discussing bike corrals, bike boulevards and separated bike lanes with Gandy.

Read more…

In 2008, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health awarded five Policies for Livable, Active Communities and Environments (P.L.A.C.E.) Grants, three to municipalities and two to non-profits working with local governments, to create programs and policies to encourage people to live healthier, more active, lifestyles through better transportation planning.  The grants ran from July 1, 2008 through June 30 of this year. For more on what to expect, please visit the announcement of this fellowship series.

The five grants were very different.  In Culver City, they used the grant to create their first-ever bicycle and pedestrian plan, while Long Beach used the funds to hire Charlie Gandy as mobility coordinator and he’s been painting the town green for three years.

We’ll go into a lot more details about the goings on in Culver City, El Monte, Glendale, Long Beach and Pacoima in the coming weeks, but to kick the series off, Streetsblog presents short videos with each of the five P.L.A.C.E Grant Coordinators – John Rivera in Culver City, Arpine Shakhbandaryan in El Monte, the LACBC’s Colin Bogart in Glendale, Charlie Gandy in Long Beach, and Pacoima Beautiful’s Max Podemsky in Pacoima – discussing the grants they oversaw after the jump.

One thing I can honestly say before we delve in to the series, the municipalities and non-profits that worked on these grants are immensely proud of them. I’ve never had an easier time setting up interviews in my career.

Read more…