Sahra Sulaiman

"What do we want? Safe streets! When do we want them? NOW!"

While counting pedestrians and cyclists in the transit-dependent and heavily-pedestrian community of Boyle Heights for the Bike and Pedestrian Count this past Saturday, I got to thinking about street trees.

While some might not relish the opportunity to stand out on a street corner and count passersby for two hours, I can honestly say I really enjoy the experience.

It's hard to take some of the hysteria surrounding the City Council's approval of Mobility Plan 2035 this past August very seriously.

This past weekend, the East Side Riders Bike Club (ESRBC) celebrated the ribbon-cutting on their brand new bike co-op and shop located at 11321 S. Central Ave. in Watts.

Tracking the Great Streets program as it has begun to unfold around town has, at times, been a bit of an exercise in frustration. Which never fails to strike me as odd, given Mayor Eric Garcetti's declaration that the transformation of the 15 chosen streets into gathering places would happen via a "bottom-up and community-based process" in which the city "[worked] with neighborhood stakeholders to develop a vision for each corridor."

Tap tap tap.

"I want you to take a good look at me," the fragile-looking young man with a curved spine, hunched shoulders, and gangly arms addressed members of the Exide Community Advisory Committee (CAC), representatives of the Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) and Department of Public Health (DPH), and concerned residents and environmental justice advocates from the communities surrounding Exide Technologies' now-shuttered lead-acid battery recycling facility.

When the driver pulled in behind me in the new buffered bike lane along Vineland, I thought, OK, it's a little weird, but he's probably going to turn right or park.

Twenty-three days is not a lot of time to get community buy-in on a complete streets pop-up event/project and raise $10,000 in support of it. Especially in lower-income communities like Boyle Heights and parts of South L.A., where the stakeholders who would ideally be buying into the projects tend to be less familiar with concepts like "tactical urbanism," are generally of lesser means, and/or are often unreachable via a social media campaign (or wholly unable to make online payments to it).