People St
Streetsblog LA
Photo Essay: Pacoima’s Opening Celebration For Bradley Plaza
Yesterday, the community of Pacoima celebrated the opening of the city of L.A.'s latest car-free space: Bradley Plaza. The plaza closes to cars one block of Bradley Avenue immediately east of Van Nuys Boulevard in the north San Fernando Valley neighborhood of Pacoima. The plaza is a product of the city Transportation Department's (LADOT) innovative community-driven People St program. Through the People St program, community groups can apply for and receive local plazas, parklets, and bike corrals.
July 31, 2015
Cartoon Tuesday: Yo La Tengo Video Showcases Sunset Plaza
For decades Hollywood has exported Southern California car culture images around the world. That's changing now. Made-in-L.A. commercials, films, and videos now increasingly feature bike lanes, inverted-U bike racks, and, yes, even People St polka-dotted pedestrian plazas. From NPR via Streetfilms' Clarence Eckerson, have fun watching Yo La Tengo's 'Friday I'm In Love' video - showing L.A.'s premiere pedestrian plaza - the Sunset Triangle Park Plaza. Tomorrow we return to serious news.
July 14, 2015
Broadway Dress Rehearsal Project Gets New, More Durable Surface
Downtown L.A.'s "Broadway Dress Rehearsal" project entered a new phase last month. SBLA readers will recall that the Broadway project was a relatively quick and low-cost creation of bulb-outs designed to calm traffic. The project removed space from cars, giving it to people dining and traveling on foot on one of L.A.'s highest pedestrian-volume streets. Broadway's Dress Rehearsal opened August 2014 and every day plenty of people use it, especially the tables and chairs there. Last fall, the city Transportation Department (LADOT) published a study showing baseline conditions on Broadway; this fall LADOT will be following up with comparison data on what has changed.
July 9, 2015
Leimert Park People St Plaza Opens; Stakeholders Debate Building a Cultural Center
"Don't tell anybody I'm using these," Councilmember Herb Wesson said of the blue art scissors he wielded as the moment came to cut the ribbon on Leimert Park Village's People St Plaza project this past Saturday.
July 1, 2015
Eyes on the Street: Downtown L.A. Has Three Great Bike Corrals
A couple weeks ago, I reported that the great new bike corral on Main Street at 5th was the first in downtown Los Angeles. Commenter Steven White correctly pointed out that there are indeed two other on-street bike corrals in the Downtown Arts District. So although it is the first in the historic core, the Main Street corral wasn't the first downtown L.A. bike corral, nor was that my first or or likely to my last error to appear in writing.
June 30, 2015
Saturday! Leimert Park Celebrates 2nd Annual 20|20 Vision Charette with People St Plaza Launch
It is noon on a Monday.
June 26, 2015
People St Opens First Project with Plaza in North Hollywood
What was once an empty alley near the busy intersection of Magnolia and Lankershim Boulevards in the heart of the North Hollywood Arts District is now a public plaza with tables, chairs, green polka dots on the pavement, and sun shade.
February 23, 2015
Damaged DTLA Parklet to Be Repaired, Four New L.A. Parklets in 2015
In July 2014, according to coverage at LAist and CBS, a drunk man made off with his friend's car and, after clipping a couple of parked cars, smashed into a parklet. That parklet is located in front of Downtown Los Angeles' L.A. Cafe, on Spring Street between 6th Street and 7th Street. Sadly, since the collision, the parklet has been closed.
January 21, 2015
Work Underway On Three New LADOT People St Plazas
Los Angeles is reclaiming some car space to allocate it to walking and hanging out. Work is underway on three new plazas, located in Pacoima, North Hollywood, and South Los Angeles' Leimert Park.
January 14, 2015
LADOT’s New Broadway Pre-Project Report Heralds Data-Driven Evaluation
Yesterday, the Los Angeles City Transportation Department (LADOT) released a new report entitled Broadway Dress Rehearsal: Pre-Installation Existing Conditions Report 2014 [PDF]. The handsome 82-page report is full of facts, figures and graphs all detailing the "safety, public life, and economic" conditions on Broadway from 2nd Street to 11th Street in downtown Los Angeles. This stretch of street is where the Broadway Dress Rehearsal project was recently completed. The streetscape project removed a traffic lane to make space for plazas which feature outdoor seating and planters.
November 26, 2014