Today’s Headlines

  • W Hotel an Experiment in Gullibility (City Watch)
  • New Ridership Projections for Westside Subway Extension (The Source)
  • OCTA Receives Hundreds of Millions of Dollars for Highways, Tens of Millions for Transit from Prop. B (ABC7)
  • Expo Supporters Fight Back (Curbed)
  • Fencing Completed Along Gold Line Eastside Extension (The Source)
  • Is the Backbone All Its Cracked Up to Be? (Biking in LA)
  • LAPD Planning Enforcement of No-Tailgating at Dodgers Games (LAist)
  • Los Angeles on Foot (Planetizen)
  • Cycling Should Be Dull: No More Lycra Racers and Car Cultists (Times UK)

  • Ahh, I can’t leave a comment at City Watch, so I’ll leave one here. At the risk of re-arguing this issue. I think it’s possible to not like the W’s billboards and lack of bike parking (I don’t like these things) and still see some value in the project.

    If you think parking cancels out all of the benefits of a TOD, I think you’re just plain wrong. You’re clearly ignoring walkability. You’re ignoring the power of proximity to transit, and you’re ignoring the environmental values of density that go beyond transportation, such as saving habitat.

    As I’ve said before, people have a choice about where to live. If you take such an extreme view about parking in an apartment building that you force people out to the suburbs where odds are THEY REALLY WILL DRIVE FOR EVERYTHING and waste a lot of land at the same time, you haven’t done the environment any favors.

    Instead of blanket denunciations, how about we focus improving what’s bad about the W and celebrating what’s good about it.