Behind LA Mayor Garcettis “Greet Streets” initiative is a hard calculation: Los Angeles lacks the money and the space to add the types of transportation that would significantly reduce traffic congestion, such as widening streets or adding expensive mass transit. WAIT...SHOULDNT LA DRIVERS HAVE REALIZED BY NOW ADDING MORE LANES DOES NOT REDUCE CONGESTION? So Garcetti is pursuing the reverse strategy: bring enough amenities to a neighborhood so that residents stay closer to home and, quite possibly, avoid using their cars altogether. To Garcetti, all of the streets in his program have something in common: They are falling short of their potential. These are places that people collectively want to bring back or, for the first time, kind of bring up. What an incredible concept; take what exists, enhance it, and connect people with it. Wow, create main streets with a sense of pride and ownership from the community. Have our bigger, wider, and faster roadways really stolen our unique local community identities? Do we now have generations of people that are not connected to their communities, neighbors, and local businesses and do not know what that feels like? Are they really willing to passionately fight for access to their freeway (which is a parking lot of asphalt/concrete anyway) rather than the vibrancy of their community moving in the direction of its potential? Does your City have streets that are falling short of their potential? Maybe if we helped our streets move in the direction of their potential we could actually afford to maintain them? Tough decisions require great leadership from elected officials. Changing the paradigm involves creating a campaign and vision that people can get behind. What are you doing to improve your community? latimes/local/la-me-adv-great-streets-20140727-story.html#page=1
Posted on: Mon, 28 Jul 2014 19:37:14 +0000
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