California's Constitution, Greedy Developers, and FDR Lock Away LA's Green Space
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- Опубліковано 28 лип 2024
- Did you know that many cities have so many parks that they don't even have parking lots? Yeah, you can just walk to your neighborhood park in those cities; but not in LA.
Los Angeles has some of the best weather in the country, but ironically it's also one of the most park poor cities in the country (most people in LA can't just walk to Griffith Park or Venice Beach). And there are a lot of powerful people who made it that way through bribery, redlining, and constitutional amendments that favor country clubs.
0:00 I really like going to the park
2:17 But LA's parks aren't easily accessible
3:10 Most cities have way more parks than LA
9:17 It's the developers' fault
11:08 Walking is actually really good for you (like reduces cancer good)
13:27 It's FDR's fault
16:51 It's California's Constitution's fault
21:14 No tax breaks for agriculture
22:13 So what are some solutions?
26:50 You deserve better
At one point they tried developing Griffith too. Except the family came out of the wood work and reminded the city that it was given to the city under the condition that it'd be for public use and if sold, any profits would belong to the family, not the city.
Thank you for doing this video! It's INSANE that we are all made to pay more in taxes to subsidize wealthy country club members. And in return their massive golf courses displaces so many potential homes that it makes our rent higher. It's welfare for the rich and it needs to stop.
No offense, but deporting illegal aliens would also free up a lot of land for "affordable housing".
Never mind that all of us who don’t drive have to subsidize your driving habit. Try giving up your car; it’s a lot easier in today’s LA than it was when I gave up mine, in 1989. What’s stopping you?
@Gryphonisle Drivers pay their own way through fuel taxes, vehicle registration fees and road tolls. "Fossil fuel subsidies" are largely a myth.
@@djm5687 Were you born yesterday? The entirety of post-WW2 American governance was centered around subsidizing fossil fuel use. Enormous freeway and road spending, wars in the middle east, parking minimums, single-use zoning. We've been paying out the nose for car drivers for my entire life. Fuel taxes and registration fees don't come close to paying for the roads in America, but drivers use up more of the public infrastructure than non-drivers, so it's non-drivers heavily subsidizing drivers. The societal cost of car ownership is more than the individual cost of car ownership. So that $10,000+ per year you spend on your car, society pays at least another $10,000+ for your ability to use it.
@@mariusfacktor3597 Municipalities, not the federal government, lays for most road construction that tolls don't cover. Roads and freeways are necessary in order to deliver food & supplies quickly.
One thing I've learned about the LA region is that many are intensely opposed to getting rid of any cars or changing anything about the current design. I understand it's terribly difficult to change behavior, but it's actively harming all of us.
Obviously, most of us watching this video are all for the change, but so many who grew up in the area are indifferent, at best. Indeed, what can we do?
I agree! Streets for All is trying to do something about it. I mostly lurk there, but it's nice to feel less alone in thinking this.
Naw bro you gotta get down with breathing brake pad dust and repaving roads constantly /S
Growing up in bay area but living in LA two years ago, this video hits so hard. Any given weekend, I could call up some friends and have an impromptu picnic at one of SF's many incredible parks. It was pretty much the #1 activity. In LA, I've been to a park with friends once. Once!!!!
I could walk to 5 different local parks on an average lazy Sunday, and often did. In LA, my local park requires crossing some terrifying roads and 25+ minutes of walking.
Gah. LA could be so incredible if not for the concrete and cars. Maybe one day.
Keep up the great content!
It seems that the culture of Los Angeles is that common space is for homeless or organized activities, neither of which induces neighbors to use it for recreation and relaxation. Fortunately, most of the burbs to the east and south of the city learned the lessons and have public parks in their subdivisions that are more accessible. I had two decent sized parks within a 15-minute walk in my childhood area of Santa Fe Springs, despite the freeways blocking one.
The Panhandle
Jefferson Square
Alano Square
Alta Plaza Park
Lafayette Park
Moscone Park
George Sterling Park
Francisco Park
Fay Park
Joseph Conrad Square
Aquatic Park Cove
Joe Dimagio Playground
Washington Square
Pioneer Park
Levi's Plaza Park
TransAmerica REDWOOD Park!
Sue Bierman Park
Sydney Whalton Park
Salesforce Park
Guy Place Mini Park
Emerald Park
Rincon Hill Dog Park
Golden Gate
Yuerba Buena Gardens
St Mary's Square
Delores Park
Union Square
Willy woo woo Wong Playground
Huntridge Park
Woh Hei Park
Ina Coolbrith Park
Michaelangelo Playground
I can keep going ......
San Francisco changed my life.
For the better 🤍
So blessed to have spent a decade there. Miss it more than ive ever missed any human place or animal
The best part of my week is when I meet up with friends at the local park for a game of ultimate.
But man, the space is in high demand between AYSO, someone doing batting practice, and couples having picnics….we desperately need more parks!
I absolutely loved this video. As a native of West LA and someone who is extremely passionate about walkability, it feels so great to have someone advocate for the problems that are so important to me and my community. The green space in LA is absolutely abysmal and hopefully videos like this will motivate some kind of change.
Hey you should organize people in Los Angeles through this channel to go to city council meetings, etc to have an impact on our city. I’d join you in a heartbeat!
Check out Streets for All at streetsforall.org!
Every public meeting is dominated by older people that are scared of change and are unwilling pawns for the special interests groups
@@maumor2 right, hence the need for more young people to be there.
@@jackmerrill8424 and also different levels of melanin PLEASE
Mayor Bass spent 10 minutes scrolling NextDoor and changed her mind about the 90 freeway redevelopment. Those people are so nutty and have such outsized power, it's infuriating.
Forreal. Part of me regrets working on the campaign to elect her. Then again, the only other option was a billionaire real estate developer who'd have done the same but worse.
You've been knocking it out of the... park with these last few videos.
Fantastic haiku 😂 this is so depressing. LA is one of the most frustrating cities. Such a beautiful setting and climate and somehow it manages to get effed up with every decision made.
When I was planning to move here, I thought it would be different than it is. Instead, it's worse than NYC but with better weather.
Once again, great video. Some historical context is necessary. At the turn of the last century, Los Angeles did everything in its power to NOT be like eastern cities such as New York, Philadelphia, or Chicago. The idea was that LA would be a city of single family homes - each with its own backyard. Which, at the time, was seen as “forward thinking” and “progressive.” And superior to public parks. And now, in hindsight, an incredibly stupid decision.
Florida went the same route "who needs a park if almost everybody have a backyard"
@@joshuareyes9284all those cities are doomed to repeat the same mistakes. Already Florida is seeing a cost of living crisis not unlike that which has dragged on in California.
This channel is underrated af😤 now im a transit fanatic
We love you, Dr Nimster!
Goddamnit Matt
Fun fact: until about a week ago, I didn't know the LA River was actually a thing. I just thought that referred to the giant paved culvert I've always seen throughout my life. What a terrible thing to do to a river...
The reason it was done is because of the massive flooding that came with the tropical storm of 1939. There's basically no way the river could ever be freed of concrete, because doing that would kill the economy of LA.
We did similar, though with less concrete on the floor, to the San Gabriel River running through the east side of Los Angeles county. I lived along it and road my bike on its crumbling asphalt paths for the service vehicles (people were tolerated but it was not permitted) to get between a few parks without braving the stroads. I wish we could improve the developed land that feeds its most precious renewable resource into it as if it were toxic waste, so the storm water would recharge in place, and we could re-naturalize the river culverts!
The culvert was built after a bunch of floods in the first half of the 20th Century. There's a project from the Army Corps of Engineers whose goal is to restore the river's ecosystem and turn it into green space for the public while maintaining the flood protection.
There are plans to revitalize the LA River into something similar to what was done in South Korea. I can’t find the organization that was advocating for it, but I did find several LA County and other government websites on the subject. It’d be nice if they did this with all of the LA regions large concrete gutters.
@@joshuareyes9284 I’m actually referring to the ground the rain lands on for where it would percolate. Turning the space between the curb & sidewalk into a “rain garden” would help as would directing water from roofs into rain barrels and/or sunken retention areas in the yard.
While it’s nice that the base of the San Gabriel River isn’t concrete, it still can’t percolate the amount of rain that hits the impervious surfaces let alone the open space that is landscaped or exposed, leading to spillover of the damns, as designed. It’s certainly much better than the LA River but also has more area to infiltrate before going down the sewer because it’s suburban vs the more urban LA River basin with higher percentage of paved & built surface.
Great video Nimesh!
Keep up the good work. Makes me grateful for where I live and gives me hope that LA will become more and more livable.
This is a bit of a tangent along the tax evaluation side of things. I have some coworkers in San Diego that informed me their property taxes don't go up with property valuation. Several of them bought their homes decades ago and pay just a few thousand dollars in taxes even thought their homes are now worth millions. Sounds great to them, but now there is little incentive to vote for housing reform. In their eyes the ballot is a button to push property prices up and up by increasing development restrictions and voting in politicians that worsen the housing crisis. Article 13 and other local tax codes that disincentivize efficient land use need to be abolished so California can heal. Thanks for reading my little rant.
Great video as always! crazy how you found those research papers just lying in a park lol. I lived near a park when I was growing up that my grandmother and I used to walk to it everyday. It made me feel independence as a kid, and it gave me so much to do with my grandmother. It gave me so much more than what a backyard could offer. Having access to green spaces within walking distance is critical to the urban fabric and civic pride.
Sydney, Australia has a similar problem with golf courses paying way too little in tax but recently began to turn half of an inner city golf course into a park - hopefully LA can do the same!
Yeah rich people can drive or fly in their helicopters to golf courses outside of the cities. Turn the city golf courses into parks.
The city of Oakland has some fantastic parks, but it could have been so much more. In the turn of the century, in the garden city period, planners proposed an “emerald necklace” system that would preserve land around all the creeks flowing from the hillside forests to the bay. I think LA had a similar proposal. Olmstead was involved in a plan for Oakland’s own golden gate park that would stretch from Lae Merritt to the forests in the hills that are now among the largest regional parks in the country. Unfortunately the city was taken over by a very pro business mayor that nixed all new parks at a time when development was so rapid
Amazing explainer! JUST 200K (!!) in taxes for giant acres of land in an alpha city is a crime.
We need to get a urbanist minded mayor who pushes statewide to demand an amendment. Or force them to build some housing / covert it to public space.
No wonder we constantly “can’t afford” to build any public resources.
Was reading a Streetsblog article the other day where they estimated that building a protected bike lane only cost about $1M/mile when it’s done at the same time as regular street resurfacing.
So proper taxes from that one golf course alone could essentially fund 80 miles of protected bike infrastructure every year!!
It’s a shame Bass backpedaled on removing Hwy 90. One wonders if the Angelino’s she heard “loud and clear” from were wealthy special interests who threatened to take away her bribe…er…campaign contributions.
Thanks for highlighting Westwood Park! I’ve lived in sawtelle for 3 years and only recently found out about it upon starting to bike to campus. I’m sure there’s a large majority of students/workers that live nearby who’ve never even seen inside. I remember in the past driving numerous times down veteran but never paying the park on the side any mind. It was always just a continuation of the cemetery. Now that i bike through it every day, it gives me the perfect rest stop between the concrete jungles of westwood and that 405 underpassing
Thorough, exhaustive, and you bring receipts. This is one of the very few videos I can say that every person living in Los Angeles should watch. Very impressive work.
I live right by that median poetry walk in weho -- so glad you brought it up. Always thought it was ridiculous to have an AIDS memorial in the middle of one of the area's busiest intersections. Also glad to see you give San Vicente Park a shout out.
LA is in desperate need of more park space, and I had no idea about those golf course tax shenanigans. Sometimes it's really hard to be optimistic about the city, even though it has so much potential.
Excellent. When I lived in New York, I was just 5 blocks from Central Park (in East Harlem). It made a huge difference to quality of life and was treated as everyone’s backyard. That part of the park isn’t touristy. Another park in NYC is probably my favorite anywhere (Bryant Park, small but awesome). Anyway, there’s a small park at the end of the street where I live now (Knoxville TN). It gets fairly heavy use because it has popular pickleball courts, a soccer field, and a walking track that old folks go around and around. The “programming” of any public space is important.
I'm honestly pretty intimidated by your confidence to leave your bicycle out of your line of sight while it's 5 meters away from you... You're living on the edge!!!
Thank you for this video. I feel more empowered and knowledgeable after watching it. As a kid in Boyle Hts and then the burbs I always wanted to know why my brown brethren were left with their nicest park , Hollenback Park with a freeway routed over its southern section including its lake. I know live in Pasadena with much more tree canopy but in areas that were redlined in East Pasadena, Altadena and Northeast Pasadena we see the same problems you described but with complications of areas being in LA County and Pasadena jurisdictions. Pasadena itself has laws and enforcement of protecting and growing the tree canopy, and slow progress is being made in bike infrastructure. Please visit Union St that parallels north of Colorado Blvd that late last year became our first fully separated/protected bike lanes.
How can I, we help?
Totally agree with your assessment of LA. It is the prime example of urban hell IMO and would go crazy without easy access to a park/bike trail. Being a newer resident in San Diego, it also ranks pretty highly on that Park Score website. I would personally agree with the score as a bike commuter here. San Diego is actually a very hilly (or even mountainous) city like San Fran, so they actually reserve many canyons as "open spaces" with dirt trails and act as a local park. These are scattered all over the city, even in the denser neighborhoods east of downtown and very easy to access from tons of housing.
Balboa Park is a massive central park with good walk/bike access from downtown or the east side, even if highways run through it. Mission Bay and Silver Strands trail are great areas too with good bike paths and parks incorporated along them. Chula Vista is redeveloping their entire bayfront as an open wildlife area with bike paths and a massive new resort being built now.
Your videos are some of my favorites! Thank you!
As soon as you mentioned golf courses and parks I hit like. As a San Diegan LA is closer to family but having 0 green space on the west side gives me pause about moving there. Right now I live next to a great open space where I can let my dog run, but there’s little such area in LA. And while we’re at it, why on earth are all the viaducts paved over and not cute little parks??
Come to Pasadena and check out the Angeles National Forest
Seriously I'm a new San Diego resident and was quite surprised by the open spaces all over the place. Balboa Park may have a highway running through it, but it is still a nice urban park, especially with the pedestrian plaza area near the museums.
The only viaducts in L.A. that I saw in this video are freeway viaducts, 14 lanes wide ( 1 HOV lane, 5 travel lanes, and 1 breakdown lane ) and consuming the whole right-of-way.
@@edwardmiessner6502 I think they’re thinking of all the concrete channels throughout the LA region, of which the two rivers I’m most familiar with, the LA River and Rio Hondo (San Gabriel Valley), are nothing more than giant concrete gutters in most places (though there are a few stretches that are green space).
As an urban planner based out of car centric central Florida, THANK YOU for your content!!! I especcially love your medical, public health perspective on sprawl.
Hey, I live in Sawtelle. The idea about turning Missouri Ave into a pedestrian road to connect Westwood and Sawtelle is great.
I'm an avid golfer and I'm glad you made this video. Private country clubs shouldn't exist and no golf course should be using potable water.
Also, look into the plans to build parks over the LA river. That has HUGE potential to increase green spaces in red lined cities.
Car centric parks are so frustrating. There was one near me that I went to a few years ago, and it's basically tucked behind a shopping center. It's like the park designers were playing city skylines and thought, "oh, if I put a park here, it'll make people happy." But you have to drive to it on this awkward windy road with no sidewalks or anything.
When I got there, I was immensely uncomfortable, because the park is so tucked away, you just feel unsafe. There were a few others there, but they were drinking/doing drugs and I just didn't want to be around that with my little one, so I left shortly after. Ultimately, it really solidified how important design is no matter the civic project, and that building a park just to have a park can be just as bad as building an ugly parking lot, even if it helps the environment a bit.
Shout out to Sun Valley Rec Center and Hansen Dam, which I spent combined hundreds of days at while I was homeless. Though on the other side of Hansen Damn, literally divided like ghettos, is a golf course. And on the perimeter of the golf course when I was going to the area was a column of homeless people living in RVs, which, to me, says that the golf course would be better put to use as housing for the homeless. Koreatown's lack of any type of park or green space (technically there are two small parks that I'm aware of, one that's more of a large front lawn on Wildshire with a few trees) is miserable. I loved living in Koreatown and may move back one day, but there's such an unmet need for parks there.
Redlining affecting shade tree coverage was not on my bingo card but it makes total sense.
you actually don't need to be afficliated with UCLA to use it's green spaces. It's a public university and all are welcome.
It depends. The pool and gym you need to be a student or pay a small fee. The track and the IM field are open to all.
Being in the background of UA-cam can be checked of my bucket list now. Nice vid
Really great work! I lived in Chicago before moving to LA, too. I totally agree that access to green space in Chicago was so much nicer. In LA, I had to rent a car just to go run in Griffith Park because the only people who are walking there own a $2M house. There are some really nice hidden greens spaces, toon LA too. You'll miss them because they are so tucked away. Prime example is Vista Hermoas Nature Park near DTLA right of 1st street. I couodn't even find it at first on foot! And don't even get me started on Pershing Square.
Great job with the history lessons. Great job with talking about how walking is beneficial in so many ways. Why parks are so important. And of course the rampant corruption that benefits the well connected and how discrimination shaped so many problems of the area.
When you initially spoke about reshaping how people live, I was concerned that you were not considerate to all peoples. Only the young, since you were saying how everything should be like a college town. And when you are young and able bodied everything is easy and possible. And imo, it would be foolish to redesign something with only the young in mind. Since, the way I see it, most of your life is spent basically in decline. Of course we all need to take care of ourselves, but youth is fleeting.
Seeing this video I see that you are considerate of all people in all stages of life. Not just the young. You have addressed those that have disabilities in past videos. I am still concerned about accessibility if we take roads away, since some people basically need to be transported only by special vehicles. But it seems from this video that there will still be access for those. And also emergency access.
I 100% agree with you on your hatred and bewilderment of 'luxury' apartments. This is one of the key factors to the rising homelessness of Cali. Starter living arrangements are somehow now a 'luxury'. Not sure how a shoe box apt can ever be considered a luxury. But that's gentrification for you. Also large things like those golf courses can cause traffic, cuz you have to maneuver around them. And since, as you said, they are closed off to the public, pedestrians have to maneuver around them too!
I hope you can reach your goals to make things better for society. I agree with you for the most part. And you seem very well informed on the subject matter. Thank you for these videos and for bringing awareness to the problems that plague that area.
The thing about streets going away is that even if we make them so they are narrower, safer for non-vehicle users and emergency vehicles, they will always be accessible to vehicles. The forces are to ensure we have too much pavement so it’s never a concern for most of us that there’d be access for emergency vehicles and others needing access by car.
Speaking as someone who is middle aged, I am far more interested in living somewhere that is walkable, bikeable, and with good public transit (NOT by North American standards, by European standards, as in buses that DON’T get stuck in the same traffic as cars). Why? Because I will eventually reach an age where I can’t drive anymore and it will be too dangerous for me to continue to do so. Which means that, if I don’t live somewhere walkable, bikeable, and with good public transit, I’ll be stuck relying on crappy transit (and don’t even get me started on the garbage that is paratransit!) or just plain trapped in an apartment or some senior care facility (prison for old people) because it’s too uncomfortable or dangerous to walk or ride a bike anywhere.
Thanks for all the work you put into these videos! Each one keeps getting better and better!
Same in Orange County. For miles squared the only park is the Mile Square Park, and more than half of it is a golf park. Idk how it is here but in some states citizens can petition for more trees to be planted near on in their neighborhood. Concrete jungles cause depression, we NEED green space. Think of how depressing it is for children to be welcomed into a city with stroads, no park space and smog every day. 🤦♂️🤦♂️
I really like your videos. City case studies are way more interesting and informative than some of the blanket urban planning videos I see on here.
Nimesh, I have to remind you that you're a doctor on the Westside of LA. You are only "never going to be part of the country-club set" because you don't want to be. And I respect you for that - you're making great urbanist content rather than making bank writing Ozempic scripts for the A-List.
This is something that I should have clarified in the video. I couldn't join some of these country clubs even if I wanted to. Hollywood stars aren't allowed to join some of these clubs. Politicians aren't allowed to join. You have to have generational wealth and power to be able to join one of these country clubs. It's the equivalent of being royalty, which is the most un-American thing I can think of and why these country clubs are such an insult to the rest of us.
@@nimeshinlosangeles My parents were around when those laws were voted on and neither remember voting on it or what they mean. I an era of more people “suffering from the ills of others”, by their presence or remnants (as I hear from my relatives in the city), I think there’d be a much better chance of passing the repeal of the golf course exemption now.
If I understand it correctly, it would do nothing to change the use, membership or assessed value (could reset the improved value to current if desired I’d imagine), but rather the taxes that they would pay. Put into terms that the membership (naming names of course) get a private playground that you pay for, while your city cuts back on the basic services that are crucial for surviving, I think there’d be a great amount of interest and support, despite the amount of funds these clubs would throw at fighting it.
Add in the provision that these funds would be voted on by the citizens for common space improvements (distributed among the neighborhoods by least served), and I could see overwhelming support. Who wouldn’t want to have a say in how $300m+ gets allocated?!
@@nimeshinlosangeles I don’t know, I tend to think of it this way: if you base it on rhetoric, then it really is un-American. However, if you look honestly and objectively at American history, then it absolutely is about as American as you can get.
The only book from Oprah Winfrey’s book list I ever saw that I thought was worth reading (and still haven’t finished reading, I get through a few pages before being PO’d), is Caste, about America’s unofficial caste system. I think the best part details the black couple, anthropologists, who went into Jim Crow Mississippi in the 30’s and their efforts at trying to publish their findings of the very real racial AND economic hierarchy’s that exist in Mississippi. But they also point out that Mississippi is a microcosm of something that is fundamentally true, and has been true, of America and American life.
I can’t help but think an American caste system has been, and continues to be, at the heart of America and American politics. It’s the reason why I am pessimistic about the future, the fact that we will continue to fail to address, let alone solve, all of our crises (economic, climate, homelessness, racial and wealth inequality, the list goes on).
Thats funny where I live the medical groups recruit doctors with a free realtor and country club membership lol but thats probably because its kansas. @@nimeshinlosangeles
I love your videos, especially since they heavily feature my local neighborhood. It's nice to be able to walk to West LA Park, but the heavy traffic noise and pollution I have to endure make that walk almost unbearable.
I visited New York City as a teenager and thought the lack of nature was depressing. I went back this year and was so jealous of the number of parks and green spaces everywhere. We found so many little parks and great places to sit and enjoy the outdoors.
I've tried to take the metro and adopt less driving, but it's almost impossible. The metro line to Santa Monica has to go through traffic, so it constantly swings between max speed and fierce breaking. I almost threw up from the motion sickness the last time I rode it.
This video needs more exposure!
My old neighborhood has park access, just 30 seconds and you're there. A bit further if you lived in the corners or the lot. Also they built a small square for the kids. I loved living there.
I just found your channel and it’s amazing. This video alone taught me like five new facts I will be annoying everyone I know with. I’ll be sharing this video a lot too. Thank you!
Love your channel, just found it. Thanks for doing this advocacy work. Raising awareness like this is a big step. As someone who spends a lot of time in parks playing disc golf (mostly free and open to anyone), you know where the park deserts are, that is, lots of the city.
I live in LA, near downtown, and usually walk 3-4 days/week. The parks nearest me are a 20 minute walk and a 25 minute walk to get to. My favorite park is a 3 mile drive, and some honorable mentions are a 7.5 mile drive and a 14 mile drive. My neighborhood is not super pedestrian-friendly, so getting my walk in definitely takes a bit of planning!
Here when he was still under 11k. Incredible video, commentary, insight, and everything. you’re a badass 🎉 can’t wait to see more!!!
Another banger. Thanks nimesh!!!
Friends who move to the westside always expect it to be easy to go for a run since so many people are active here... but no, there's barely any connected greenspace! Thanks for shedding some light on the reasons why and making another solid video
Keep up the good work Nimesh!
Next time you’re in sf make sure you visit our slow streets. As of now they still look like regular roads but these spaces would be great with less pavement! 😊
Car dependence and single family zoning is basically the root of nearly every problem LA has. The cost of living is high because not enough housing is built. Not enough housing can be built because we lack the transportation infrastructure. Homelessness is high in part because COL is high. All the traffic contributes to smog. And so on
So interesting thanks for sharing! I used to go to the park but mainly I don’t feel safe or relaxed at parks anymore. If we do go to one we have to get in the car and drive to a non-walkable city with little to no public transit because your less likely to disturb people who are living/sleeping there. I’m from Long Beach so there is the beach which tries to do a lot for unhoused folks. But find an experience like what I grew up with ain’t the same And it’s such a hassle 🤷🏾♀️
Great video as always. Id love it if at the end when you are showing clips of parks you could label them. Just a tiny detail. Similar to how Oh The Urbanity does it on their videos.
Dang! The fence around that park is f'd up! It makes me even more grateful that Hugo Soto Martinez took down the fence around Echo Park. Who is that city councilman? That is outrageous.
Prop 13 was *never* supposed to "protect homeowners" - the legislation in process at the time was. Prop 13 was a con first, foremost and always - it was just *sold* as protecting homeowners, specifically to front-run the decent legislation.
I think there needs to be a law that every golf course be required to set aside a certain percentage of their land for public use if they enjoy the property tax loophole.
This is a great video that should be watched by basically everyone in LA. Even besides the country club tax part, I know a lot of the subrub-y areas of LA county see parks as mostly pointless because people have backyards and don't want to interact with strangers in public. I lived in the poorest area of Long Beach in a studio box with my family for 2 years, and still one of the highlight of the time was how we were like a 5 minute walk from the park and I would take my kid there to play basically everyday. I think a small, private yard space is good just for getting away from people, but having a park that's so close is such a game-changer that most people don't realize.
I hadn't heard of the park score until now though. Walk score is pretty commonly known but now I've found a new website to peruse and be encouraged/depressed about.
Great video and very good presentation. Very important topics for our cities! The lack of non-human life in cities is the first thing I always notice when I visit and the golf course/country club situation is infuriating. So sick of subsidizing the leech elite class. Glad I live way out in the country but that has different problems politically... I'd love to live in a city but its too expensive and I also enjoy my woods. Subscribed!
I watch 40 hours of UA-cam a week and your channel is definitely a top 10
This video is very informative and well researched. I liked the visuals you showed, as well as you being physically present. I am sharing this video with many people.
Glad it was helpful!
Love the video. property near parks have been the most sought after for a very long time. Its crazy that cities in LA haven't prioritized this.
Man, what a super interesting a niche video. I am a huge fan of publics parks. I live in a suburb of Boston where, although we have lots of nice parks that are extremely walkable, I never noticed how many of them have parking as well. I'm never at a loss for green space when I want it, but it's amazing to think city planners and citizens to some extent couldn't imagine a world where ppl couldn't drive to a park.
(For clarity, I mean there is much more parking than the amount necessary for ADA compliance - disabled people deserve parks too)
i need to get out of LA. this is hopeless
This video makes me want to move back to Chicago
thank you for doing this video! I was so perplexed by how golf courses (some are so tiny to begin with) take up so much valuable public space in LA
Growing up in LA, the thing I remember most are the parks. Silver lake, Echo park, Elysium Park, Griffith park. The natural environment of the LA area is unmatched where it is conserved, reclaimed, even built a new.
Great work Nimesh
This is a fantastic video, found a new favorite channel!
29:18 noice work Nimesh!
At 29:53, if I'm recognizing that as the Hermosa Greenbelt correctly, interesting tidbit is that the lovely park/jogging path was built on a portion of the abandoned Los Angeles streetcar system.
Just like many large medians in LA!
Hey, LA native here. Parks are actually everywhere they are just not safe.
Thought provoking video. It really exposed how park-poor my neighborhood of Highland Park is. In spite of some really great and beloved parks. I'm inspired to put a petition together for our city council member. Do you know of any mapping tools (e.g Walk Score) which show how close the nearest public park is?
1950s public housing advocates in the LA were slandered as "COMMIE" during the McCarthyism, simply beacuse they might brought down the housing price and questioning the ideology of homeownership, ironically the mayor never hesitated when compulsory expropriating the poor (and mostly non-white Hispanic) guys' property for that soulless Dodger stadium.Nixon and Reagan were all residented in the SoCal area, no wonder the LA have a level of inequality like a failed state(gini coeffcient is as high as 0.5).
I had that when i lived in Brooklyn. I could walk to one of several smaller parks or take the bus or subway to Prospect Park or Central Park or even Fort Tryon Park. I have a yard but it isn't used (I'm only renting a room so have no control).
8:38 thank you for mentioning this!! Green spaces act as important drainage and filtration sites in cities! Obviously, once urban runoff funnels out of storm drains, it directly hurts wildlife, water quality, aquatic life, and promotes erosion given the speed at which it drains. This is the water we’re drinking, so it’s important we develop adequate infrastructure. A lot of cities are moving towards low impact development, which actually allows water to drain like it would in nature rather than a concrete desert. LID also simply just beautifies cities!!. As climate change proves to increase severity of storms, it’s integral to have the infrastructure to handle the excess runoff we’ll get. A paper I read for one of my research projects in school modeled some of LID’s effectiveness in Seoul based on climate change precipitation increases and proved to be pretty good at handling runoff! If poor water quality and harming wildlife is not reason enough to care, people will start caring once their property is damaged due to preventable excess of water. Great video!
Thanks for sharing; I just discovered your channel and quickly subscribed!
Talking about street medians, Sepulveda blvd from Ryan to towards the I-118 and I-405, there's a project called Mission Mile were I'll add walking and biking to the median of the street.
Thanks for a such a great thorough video! Writing a UCLA college essay on this topic right now.
thank you for this video Nimesh, fantastic work as always.
Love from Toronto! I hope more parks, parkettes, free-to-access (not those that charge u fees in the weekend) public space will be created throughout LA.
I'm intrigued by your choice to add the clip about choosing to not include shops along the High Line into your video. I was having the same conversation with my family, as the Atlanta Beltline is a linear park that also includes connections to shops, but is mostly green. I feel like better connection to the neighborhood and attractions are key to increasing usage along a greenline, as my local greenline is pretty lightly used. But, the High Line checks these boxes by being well connected and an attraction in its own right.
I think developers wanted property on the High Line, as opposed to adjacent to it. Once you put property on the green space, it's just a game of "Oh, you put a shop here, why not another one there, and another one there" and before you know, it's not a park anymore, it's a mall.
nice video, I begrudgingly live in Pasadena and we need more greenspace
Thanks for making this video. I live in LA and agree these are things that would make the city better if they were improved!!!!!!
I want to see these changes. More parks, more pleasant walking.
Man LA has so many issues. Best of luck with fixing this. The freeway 90 story is just sad.
I am a fan of the idea to convert the giant concrete gutter than is the LA river back into a proper river. Along with all of the other concrete gutters in the LA basin. Bring back the creeks and rivers, and all of the tributaries needed to “slow the flow” so they don’t get inundated by storms.
Thank you for your videos!
You forgot the other category of undeveloped land in Los Angeles: flood plains
Sepulveda Basin, Hansen Dam
Love the spotlight on sawtelle! I remember seeing all those luxury apartments as they were being built.
Hey Nimesh, I love you channel. I am moving back to LA this summer and am hoping to stay long-term. One of my goals to help make LA greener, more walkable, and more affordable. Are there any good activists groups you recommend getting involved with?
You should check out Streets for All at streetsforall.org!
I totally agree with you. I have lived in LA. I now live right by Central Park in New York. I use the park as much as I can. A life saver during the pandemic. Have lived near Hyde Park and Holland Park in London. Love Englisher Gardens in Munich. I am afraid any Park in LA will become needle Park with drug communitys like Echo Park has become.
Parks are the only good thing Irvine has to offer or should I say Irvine Company.
I’m a Southern Californian, but I also lived in Chicago. I LOVED the amount of green spaces there were; my local park was 3 buildings away from the front door of my apartment. The feeling of stress relief you get from literally touching grass instead of concrete or asphalt shouldn’t be understated.
This is truly a FANTASTIC and informative video. I learned a lot and thank you for the effort you put in and the great research you presented
Glad it was helpful!
I appreciate this video of yours. . . particularly because I’m not really on the same wavelength of those who lament about LAs lack of parks and that Chicago is such an awesome city. Im originally from the Chicago suburbs and move to LA over a decade ago and love LA, and find Chicago overrated. I needed this explained to me.
I’ve grown to understand what people are saying more now.
I first understood it as an equity issue. Lower income areas of LA have abysmal access to green space. (Where sone of Chicagos biggest parks happen to be on the south and west sides. A legacy of Daniel Burnham over 100 years ago). So I get that.
But then people who have good jobs in nice parts of LA expressed the lack of green space and I was further confused.
Now I get it. For me - I absolutely value building public transportation. I’ll always vote for it, I use it . . . but I’m always going to want a car for exploring areas beyond public transit access. I value it for reasons of carbon footprint, equity/access, but I typically value cities for what is AROUND the city as much as what’s in it.
The parks I use I want to be big, wooded, or mountainous enough to actually have wildlife and to feel like I’m not anywhere near a city. A park that makes you feel like you’re transported out of the city. And I’m willing to drive for that. (I’m one of those that brag about Griffith Park, Topanga, and the beaches as far as why I love LA). (Even Central Park in Manhattan offers this, but Chicago city proper just doesn’t at all, the lakefront is beautiful but it’s narrow and mostly lawn/turf).
I love the narrow strip parks such as Palisades park in Santa Monica or along SM Blvd in Beverly Hills, even though they’re too small for sports I like how they just line boulevards and are a place just to sit or meet someone. Even tree lined neighborhoods consisting mostly of tree surrounded private yards that I enjoy walking around even though Im limited to the sidewalk as they’re private property.
It’s true that in Chicago you do have all these small parks scattered in every neighborhood in the city that are a short walk from no matter where you live, but they’re mostly taken up by baseball/softball fields and I’ve never been interested playing baseball/softball. So it’s really not any use to me. In fact I’d rather have golf courses (even if they’re less accessible to me) because at least they’re the size of actual farm fields and I can gaze across it and not see the city easily. I literally subtract out ball diamonds out of the park area equation I have so little interest in them.
So thanks for explaining all this to me.
Thanks for making the videos that you do. It is super educational and it inspired me to get out there and try to learn more AND to be active in our local political system to try and make a change.
I do think changing Missouri Avenue into a linear park would push the cost of apartments here even higher. I love the idea, but the cost of renting is astronomical. Having a park here would also mean only people with high incomes could take advantage. We need more walking parks and more housing everywhere.
It would be great to see you to a collab with Not Just Bikes. He has a number of videos talking about how cities can have multi-use streets that are better and safer for pedestrians.
"Trees are only for road medians" is one of the things I hate most about living in LA. At least I can bike through a fancy people neighborhood with trees.
thanks Bro...youre absolutely right! LA and LA CO is a segregated city of classes...city police departments are at faulty through out history chasing ppl out and doing the "work" for the city officials. But now you have ethnic communities being gentrified and kicked out, or they are enticed by the wealthy to sell and move to arid desert cities or even Vegas! But over all no great open spaces for the youth or families to be free -besides the beaches bit then your restricted, not free, gotta follow rules and hours opened, can not drink and they kick you out ..no one can afford the parking.
Lmao how in the world did rich golfers pull a fast one on the California public so hard that they got a CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT passed. Wild stuff