South LA

A standing room only audience descended on the Fashion Institute of Design on South Grand Street to listen to a presentation from the embattled Community Redevelopment Agency for a ground breaking and popular proposal to transform the South Figueroa Corridor.  When people discuss Los Angeles' streets, they usually use terms such as "car-oriented" or "ugly."  The new South Figueroa, aka My Figueroa, would be a truly beautiful street designed for people to walk, bike wait for transit or just enjoy life outside as well as a way to shuffle cars from one area to another.

Making Cities for People, the official blog of Copenhagen super-architects Gehl Architects, gives us another look at the Figueroa Corridor as it is and as it could be in South Los Angeles. The above image shows how our city's lifeblood is literally being drained away by the collective demand for car parking. Even Gehl's team, which has worked on street projects around the world, seems taken aback by the over-abundance of car parking offered in Los Angeles.

I have to be honest.  If the My Figueroa project ends up fulfilling its mission of designing a people-friendly Figueroa Street from the southwest corner of Exposition Park to Downtown Los Angeles only by adding a couple of trees and repainting the crosswalks, I'll be extremely disappointed.

Last week, at a packed meeting of the City of Los Angeles Planning Commission, the Commission punted on a proposed $250-million residential development known as the Lorenzo.  The developer, Geoffery Palmer of Palmer Construction, is known for his other Italian-themed apartment developments Medici, Visconti, Orsini and Piero.

The debate over whether or not to allow a Fresh & Easy to open a new store on Crenshaw Boulevard at the intersection with 52nd Street with a large parking lot facing the street heads to the full City Council this Wednesday morning at 10:00 A.M.  The matter was moved to the Full Council by the Council's Planning and Land Use Committee without recommendation, despite the development's strong support from the local Councilman, Bernard Parks.

Last week, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announced a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) for the proposed Farmdale Station for the Expo Line, clearing the Expo Construction Authority to begin construction of the station.  The Notice of Availability for the FONSI can be found at the end of the article, or you can link to the relevant documents at the Expo Construction Authority's website.

The Segundo-based Fresh & Easy grocery store chain has earned high marks from environmental advocates for their LEED certified green building designs and hybrid-diesel trucking fleet.  However, the issue of where they place their parking lots and the impact that placement has on urban walkability may trip the green giant's plan to open a store on Crenshaw Avenue.

Yesterday, the New York Times published a piece on the coming Expo Line and what it's going to mean for development in South L.A. and West L.A.  In truth, you should find time to read the entire article, but here's a quick summary in the mean time.