PILOT PARKLET PROGRAM
El Sereno Street Plaza
Happening Now
Links to select events, campaigns and recent articles
Image Credit – The Big Parade
Event – Happening May 18-19. From the website “The Big Parade is a two-day walk in Los Angeles. It includes about 100 public stairways over 35 miles, from downtown to the Mt. Hollywood. The walk runs on a timetable, and is designed as a series of attached loops, so that people can come and go as they please – join us for a mile, an hour, or an epic.” More at bigparadela.tumblr.com.
Image Courtesy of This Big City
From the Blog – We are redistributing “A New Movement for The New City: Reallocating Space Away from the Car,” which was originally published by This Big City and succinctly explains much of the essence of what Living Streets LA is about.
Click on the image for a larger version of the map.
Event – June 23, 9 am to 4 pm. The new Iconic Wilshire Boulevard route for the next CicLAvia will be much more pedestrian oriented. It will also be better for bicycles with only four car crossings on its 6.3 mile route. More at CicLAvia.org.
The Concept of Living Streets
A brief introduction
The idea of complete streets has evolved into an increasingly visible and broad social movement. Transportation planners, street engineers, public health officers and elected officials—with a range of activist citizens in the vanguard—are working to repurpose our city streets to allow everyone to get around safely and well, even if they’re not traveling by car.
Green LA takes the idea of complete streets several steps further, adding participatory design, reclamation of excess street space to create inviting places for people, incorporation of features that capture rainwater and clean urban runoff, and an emphasis on social and economic equity. The result is our concept of living streets.
Our Strategy for Change
In our experience, the best way to spark change is to lead the way with good practice. Policy change may be a start, but it will not lead to meaningful transformations without well-built model projects. Therefore, we focus our work in three areas:
Demonstration Projects
We design and build demonstration projects featuring a few simple, easily removable elements such as sidewalk living rooms, street porches, and street plazas.
Prototype Living Streets
We develop concepts for and build prototype Living Streets working closely with local residents. These streets reclaim space previously allocated for autos and feature permanent street improvements such as pedestrian crossings, bicycle lanes, street trees and bioswales.
Implementation Blueprint
We monitor and catalogue the main obstacles to implementing living streets, and identify ways to overcome them. In addition, we catalog significant local projects and resources to inspire others and provide needed know-how.
Living Streets Case Study
A more in-depth look at what we do
Learn about the growing momentum for people-friendly streets, read about Green LA’s concept of living streets and some of the challenges to implementing them, and get the details on our demonstration projects along with our unique approach to community participation.
Click here to download a PDF version of the Case Study.
Streets Feed
Browse our curated collection from the social networks to keep up to date on all things streets related in L.A.