Sahra Sulaiman

When is a public park not open to the public? Or even a park?

TONIGHT! The Crenshaw Line, Neighborhood Bike Ambassadors, and Fracking -- way too much fun for one person to handle!

As everybody gathered in the middle of Crenshaw Blvd. for a group photo at the end of the King Day parade, an African-American freelance photojournalist came out to where I was positioned with my camera.

There is much going on this weekend in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., so do yourself a favor and get yourself to South L.A. at some point.

The first time he shot somebody, he says, another gang member helped him hold his hand steady as he aimed the gun out the window of the car they were sitting in.

WHEN I BEGAN MY GRAD PROGRAM at USC in 2001, I lived north of campus a few blocks on Hoover Street. As my daylight hours were generally occupied with classes and teaching responsibilities, I tended to get my long-distance runs in well after dark. Instead of being able to clear my head as I did figure-eights around campus and Exposition Park, however, I was often stopped by police who wanted to know what the hell I thought I was doing.

Do you live in or travel through Watts? Are you stymied by the potholes there? 15th District Councilman and Chairman of the City Council’s Public Works Committee Joe Buscaino  plans to come to your rescue.

Soon after taking some city planners on a tour through Watts, a new bike lane appeared along Central Avenue, between Century and 95th St. A week or two later, the owner of the Watts Cyclery, Stalin Medina, told me that parking had been removed from in front of his shop at 112th and Wilmington and yield lines (a row of solid white triangles pointing toward approaching vehicles) had been painted at the crosswalk there.

At the end of 2012, LA/2B, the project to revamp the Mobility Element of the General Plan for L.A, announced they had narrowed down the feedback gathered during more than a year's worth of public engagement to six draft goals and their corresponding policies.

Just before the Christmas holiday, the Department of City Planning released the Preliminary Drafts of the New Community Plans for South and Southeast Los Angeles. The plans, along with those for the West Adams-Baldwin Hills-Leimert Park area, together comprise the approximately 45-square mile South L.A. Planning Region. It is an area that Principal City Planner Faisal Roble acknowledged to Curbed in May 2012 had long been neglected with regard to planning (with the Crenshaw Corridor being the key exception).