Park[ing] Day LA
Thread started by
marino at 09.19.07 - 8:19 pm
There are only FIVE rides posted for this Friday so why not post one more?
You know about Park[ing] Day LA right?
Impromptu parks created by citizens just for a day in places where cars usually park.
More info at
http://www.parkingdayla.com/
Quite a few are created by artists/architects and they could be interesting in an ArtWalk kind of way.
The bad thing for nine to fivers is that they are happening mostly during the day on a Friday.
Anyone has time/interest to hit a dozen or two of the most interesting ones this Friday?
I was thinking to start at noon at
Bike Oven
PS: Yes, I had created a ride but this friggin thing will eat your posts if you aren't done editing in two minutes.
Plus I wanted to get some feedback on time and interest.
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the website is pretty darn hungry....
Roadblock09.19.07 - 8:23 pm
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someone's got to set up a kiddie pool..
Roadblock09.19.07 - 8:39 pm
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sounds fun. I may check out some stuff in Silverlake area first though, before heading out to the Oven...since that's where i am.
pippi09.19.07 - 9:47 pm
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It doesn't rain in LA for three fucking years, and then finally it rains...on Park(ing) Day. Nice one, God. You're a real laugh riot. Ha, ha, ha.
OK. So. Just a thought: how about just assembling at the Oven and taking a nice wet ride around town to hit up the sites and see who's actually dedicated and/or crazy enough to go through with these Park(ing)s despite the weather?
Anybody?
(*tap tap tap*)
Is this thing on?
PC09.20.07 - 3:46 am
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I'm in! This is great, cuz I have friends doing the M&A Park in Silver Lake, and I thought....hmmm, wonder if there are any rides? (given that we cant drive to a Park(ing) day!)
I'll be at the oven at noon!
chymaera09.20.07 - 1:46 pm
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Roadblock wrote:
"someone's got to set up a kiddie pool"
It's happening. Next to the Bicycle Kitchen.
See description below:
Alfredo A. Hernandez/East Hollywood Neighborhood Council
855 N Heliotrope Dr
Los Angeles, CA 90029, US
I will be making a small recreation center with sod, a small potted tree and many potted plants, a park bench, a small card table with cards, chess, checkers, dominoes and backgammon available and also have a small inflatable pool from 8am - 2pm
marino09.20.07 - 2:00 pm
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I made my own map because I didn't like the one by Park[ing] Day LA.
Trying to decide on a route: Clockwise or counterclock?
Shall we go from Bike Oven south to downtown or north to Silverlake?
View Larger Map
marino09.20.07 - 4:40 pm
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Where is Stephen and Enci's "Shakespeare In the Park(ing)" Park(ing) on that map?
PC09.20.07 - 5:11 pm
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Right turns. Good point Jeff. Going downtown first seems more logical to me too. Unless we have a substantial number (2+) of SilverLakers begging us to pick them up on Rowena and Hyperion at 1pm, we'll go downtown first.
Russ, I have no idea what you are talking about. There is nothing like that on that on the "parking day" or "illuminate la" websites.
Borfo. See all the blue dots on the map? These are all parking spots reserved for your Hummer. And because it's an environmental thing we can't have everyone drive in their own Hummer. We'll carpool. K?
2 peeps per Hummer.
marino09.20.07 - 10:07 pm
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Here is
a route. 25 miles. Round trip to Bike Oven.
It's in a small geographic area, near metro stations, it would be easy to split early at various points, if you get too tired, too wet or whatever.
It's made clockwise but we can do it counterclockwise too. Up to you.
marino09.21.07 - 12:06 am
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Marino: S & E were going to have a Park(ing) in front of a City Councilman's office (Garcetti?). One of the features was going to be Shakespeare In The Park(ing)--what with Enci being an actor and all. I assume, given the lilliputian scale of the project, that she would/will be standing by herself on a teeny little stage doing soliloquys.
Anyway, I don't see anything like that on the list of Park(ing)s, so maybe it fell through. Too bad, if so. I wanted to see that. Fuckin' slings and arrows of outrageous fortune will get you every time, man...
BTW, according to my man Dallas Raines, the real storm won't hit Los Angeles until late afternoon, with "scattered showers" up until then. So it's on. It's ON! Bike Oven at noon. If it rains, we ride wet. No naysayers.
PC09.21.07 - 12:36 am
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hey...Linda's making a park at the Sunset Junction (Ragtag-ers or something like that)...
also, I'll be there...though i may skip out early. I'd be inclined to do a slightly less ambitious route in order to make sure we get to the ones that sound the most interesting, but I'm game for whatever. I just think we'll want to stop and hang out a bit at various places...might want to pick 10-ish spots at the most. just a thought.
pippi09.21.07 - 10:03 am
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Dang, wish I could go on this ride; it would be way more fun than what I'm doing . . . working!
mr rollers09.21.07 - 10:06 am
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Dallas Raines doesn't know jack!!
My forecast calls for a highly probable chance of sucking in fumes. With a chance of sprinkled potholes. Also look for a change in green, yellow, and red lights. I see a 99% chance of the day getting darker around 7-7:30pm. My advice, live your day like it's the last Sept 21, 2007 you'll ever see!
User109.21.07 - 10:29 am
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Some of the Silverlake places will stay till 10 PM, While some of the downtown places wrap it up at 2pm That's why we will start downtown and finnish in Silverlake. And yes we are stopping at Sunset Junction. There are two things going on there.
marino09.21.07 - 10:52 am
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yup...silverlake places are open later...
but Materials and applications website says it closes at 7pm...probably due to them going to the afterparty...I wouldn't count on anyone going after 7pm...just fyi.
so, are you guys planning to ride for7 hours-ish?
pippi09.21.07 - 11:20 am
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7 hours????
I was hoping to make it to the first place in Silverlake in 3 hours and then people can hang out at the last few places as long as they want.
Here is the itinerary
************************************************************|
Copenhagen street/park at Bike Oven
3706 N Figueroa St
************************************************************|
North East Trees
2227 N Figueroa St
**********************************************************************|
BlueGreen Consulting with Northeast Trees
*/Confluence/* LA River and Arroyo 9AM-2 PM
Then south on Ave 26, right on Pasadena, right on Broadway
************************************************************|
S.L.A.P. Socialize Los Angeles Project
SLAP will wear gas masks and hand out MTA maps
904 N Broadway
**********************************************************************|
Farmlab
900 N Broadway
Then turn left on College,right on Alameda, left on Traction (btn 2nd and 3rd)
**********************************************************************|
office42 [AT]TRACTION
16 space community park for a day in honor of Joel Bloom, at Bloom Square
735 Traction Ave
*Then East on 3rd, left on Spring, left on 4th
*********************************************************************|
Greenmeme: mikroklimatik
Noon to 3 PM native grass tunnel
107 W 4th St
Then walk back to Spring, left on Spring, right on 7th, right on Olive
**********************************************************************|
Melendrez Olive Street Pocket [Park] 7AM-2PM
Illuminate the potential for the creation of small....
Then walk back to 7th, west (
**********************************************************************|
Downtown TPL Park 11 am-2 pm
In front of Macy's on 7th btn Hope and Flower
Then Go south on Flower, turn left on Pico, turn right on Grand,
turn left on 32nd
*********************************************************************
3PM-5PM The SAJE “Ice Cream Social In The PARK”:
152 W32nd str
Then south on Broadway, right on Jefferson, left on McClintock (past Hoover)
**********************************************************************|
USC School of Architecture/Graduate Architecture Student Association (GASA)
We will be at the intersection of Downey Way and McClintock at the end of a plaza which is paved.
**********************************************************************|
USC School of Architecture/Graduate Architecture Student Association (GASA)
The space is in between two flex car spaces and we intend to make this one into a sort of pool
3668 Watt Way
Then North on McClintock, left (north) on Hoover, left on Pico
**********************************************************************|
A Garden Growing: Creating Environmental Awarness in Pico Union
Site sponsored by Studio Dos es and Latino Urban Forum (S2 UF)
2230 W Pico Blvd
Then back to Hoover, north on Hoover, left on Wilshire, right on Vermont,
right on 2nd, left on Bimini
**********************************************************************|
Los Angeles Eco-Village and CRSP Institute for Urban Ecovillages
117 Bimini Pl
Then left on 1st, Right on Vermont, left on Melrose, right on Heliotrope
**********************************************************************|
Alfredo A. Hernandez/East Hollywood Neighborhood Council
I will be making a small recreation center with sod, many potted plants
855 N Heliotrope Dr
Then North on Heliotrope, right on Santa Monica to Sunset Blvd/Sunset Junction
**********************************************************************|
everything gardens and Rag Tag
4005 W Sunset Blvd
Then north on Sunset for one block, left on Hyperion, right on Hyperion
**********************************************************************|
99 Gallons Per Mile @ Lehrer Architects 2-5PM
2140 Hyperion Ave
**********************************************************************|
ACCORSI ARCHITECTURE Noon to 4
Our coffee shop neighbor will no doubt be happy with this impromptu gathering place!
2525 Hyperion Ave
**********************************************************************|
Tracy A. Stone Architect /Choy Associates and Gabriel Renz
Eat Your View 4-6 pm
2552 Hyperion Ave
Then North on Hyperion, right on Rowena, right on West Silverlake Dr,
to Silverlake Blvd
**********************************************************************|
Materials & Applications and Fountainhead 12PM-10PM
1619 Silver Lake Blvd
Then South on Silverlake, left on Sunset, left on Alvarado
**********************************************************************|
Oasis Trailer Park(ing)
Car-Free Cargo Carrying Paradise. Let your inner vagabond play. Expand your mind and your shopping list.
1200 N Alvarado St
**********************************************************************|
Echo Park Film Center 1:30PM - 3:30PM
1202 N Alvarado St
marino09.21.07 - 11:50 am
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Just stopped by the peeps at the Sunset Junction. $5 Guy (not pictured) was there too.
Roadblock09.21.07 - 12:38 pm
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Roadblock and his fancy mobular phones. Looks like fun, maybe I could make it out if I hustled, or maybe I'll go back to sleep. Either way good luck with the rest of the day.
franz09.21.07 - 2:32 pm
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So - how was it?
I didn't get to see any of the Park(ing) Spots - has anybody posted pix anywhere?
ubrayj0209.21.07 - 5:01 pm
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i checked out a couple before work they were cool i got a free tree
forte09.22.07 - 1:50 am
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Incase you're interested, I got to see about 4 or 5 locations before I decided to do a complete somersaut, .....those darn airbrakes!!! and destroyed my front wheel, that's gonna cost!! Anybody know where I can purchase one MAVIC COSMOS wheel? Call me 818 913 0316......Came stock on the Giant??
Also got a descent amout of road rash but nothing broken, amazingly, and nothing compared to some of you guys - Brassknuckles - Portland!!!
Hope you all enjoyed the ride
Thanks Marino and tell me where I can take riding lessons!!!!
Limeyfly09.22.07 - 11:36 am
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Holy mother of fuck! You weren't with us when that happened, were you, Limes? We just sort of realized you weren't with us when we got to the Traction Reaction.
Joseph, I'll see if I can write a mini-review encapsulating the Park(ing) sites we saw yesterday when I have more time. Right now, I gotta go ride my bike.
PC09.22.07 - 3:53 pm
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Joseph,
We got some pics of our Park(ing) spot, and a couple of the Echo Park Film Center's spot. Unfortunately, the gallery pics are slow to load right now.. Check em out.
http://www.cicle.org/cicle_content/pivot/entry.php?id=1529#body
C.I.C.L.E.09.22.07 - 4:22 pm
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Hi Liz and Shay I didn't know Oasis was yours we'd have stopped by. We ran out of time.
It took us 7 hours !!!! (you were right pippi) to see half the places we were planning to see. My comrades were more interested in lying on the grassy patches and chatting with the natives than meeting some quota of X parking spots per hour. And that was fine.
Most interesting spaces we saw were the ones by
Materials and Applications and
Greenmeme
marino09.22.07 - 6:44 pm
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OK, I'm back and I've had a few sangrias, so I'm feeling talkative. Here's my mini-review.
As Marino mentioned, we didn't see as many parks as he had planned because a few of us wanted to actually spend some time enjoying the parks and putting them to their intended use. Toward this noble end, I tried to lie down in every park if at all possible. (Also, I just like lying down a lot.) Some of the parks were more conducive to this than others.
There was a pretty noticeable diversity among the parks in the way that they were conceived and executed. There was also some diversity in quality, if you catch my drift. I'm not saying that we saw any
bad parks, only that some of the creators were clearer on the concept of transforming the space, and drawing people into it, than others were.
The most ambitious park had to be the Traction Reaction, on Traction Avenue in what some people still call the Arts District. These guys, not content merely to take over a parking space, took over a small parking lot on a triangular sort of traffic island and furnished it with sod, turf, plants, unusually large trees, and wood pallets that suggested decks or jungle gyms. What I liked best about this park was that as soon as you spotted it, it became impossible to conceive of that spot being anything
but a park. If you had never been to that neighborhood before, you would never know that there wasn't "really" a park there. It just seemed so right. I know that a lot of what makes Park(ing) appealing to people is the transgressive nature of the project--brashly setting up little social spaces in the street in overt opposition to the dominance of the car there--but there's something to be said for a project that quietly and through demonstration sends the message: "A permanent park in this location would make perfect sense."
The Greenmeme park at Fourth and Main downtown was one of the better-executed conventional (one space along the curb) parks. Simple in design, it consisted of nothing more than some hay bales assembled into two loveseats facing each other, with turf on the ground, surrounded by some reedy grassy stuff to create an instant intimacy inside the park (but not so much as to cut it off from the life of the sidewalk). It was really easy to relax here--so much so that at one point, I was startled to realize that if one of the cars whizzing by were to swerve twelve inches to the left for some reason, I would be roadkill. It really doesn't take much to create a place that people want to visit. You just have to understand what makes us tick, a little bit.
The SAJE (Strategic Actions for a Just Economy) park at 32nd and Broadway was a good one for a different reason. The park itself was really nothing more than some turf and a plant or two, but their Ice Cream Social idea made the park a welcoming place not just for us, but for the neighborhood kids as well. There's more to creating a sense of place than simply laying down infrastructure, I guess was the lesson here.
The Materials & Applications park on Silverlake Blvd., just down the street from Spaceland, seemed like one of the most "social," for lack of a more accurate term (sorry; maybe it's the sangrias making me fuzzy) parks. When we got there at about six? six thirty?, people were hanging out, shooting the shit, drawing passers-by into conversations, and discreetly cracking beers. The park was a wooden deck with two sorta vacuform-Modernist plastic chairs, next to a fountain about the length and width (but not the depth) of a hot tub. I don't know what it was about that place--I suppose it could have been the beers--but the people there were just really friendly, and neighbors kept dropping by to see how things were going. Former City Councilman Michael Woo came by and snapped some pictures, people kept asking me questions about my bike (who knew that a fixed gear bike could still be any kind of a novelty to people in Silverlake?), and we met a Killradio DJ who seemed to find everything and everybody uproariously funny. I could have stayed there all night, even with the rain.
Obviously, those weren't the only parks we visited on our little tour. Those are just the ones I thought were most deserving of mention.
Oh, and can I say that the article in the Times was kind of stupid? It was. That was great that Veronica J got prominently quoted, of course, and that some people we all recognize got their pictures in the paper, but the reporter seemed to have gone out of his way to quote people who were hostile to, or confused by, the parks. Clearly he and I had different experiences yesterday, or else he felt bound by the ol' fair 'n' balanced he-said-she-said standard of bullshit "journalism" that rules at the Times. Honestly, my internal douchebag alarm started going off as soon as the guy walked up at the Oven. It's because of guys like him that I don't talk to reporters.
OK, that's it.
PC09.23.07 - 6:33 am
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That wasn't very mini at all, was it. Sorry.
PC09.23.07 - 6:34 am
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haha - I didn't know about the photo thing until late last night... My roommate's park was AWESOME! and yes - the article was lame lame lame...
redridinghood09.23.07 - 1:08 pm
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Hey Russel,
that was a laconic review, next time, please put more effort to it.
Some people were asking about pictures. You can find them
here and
marino09.23.07 - 1:56 pm
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I f***d up my HTML
Let's try again
Pictures are at:
MR
and at
my site
marino09.23.07 - 2:00 pm
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It's OK to spell out the word "fucked" on this site, Marino. Fucked fucked fucked. And a good thing, too, as it's a fairly apt description of most of us.
PC09.23.07 - 9:46 pm
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well in that case, go fuck yourself.
-kiss <3
Joe Borfo09.23.07 - 11:47 pm
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Get borfed.
*smooch*
XOXOXOXOXOXO
@}-,-`-.
:-)
LOL
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
PC09.24.07 - 2:33 am
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Marino,
I can't believe that you didn't stop by.... our feelings were totally hurt. Just kidding :P Anyway... you know where to find us, and you should come check out our new mini teardrop.
S n L
C.I.C.L.E.09.24.07 - 8:50 pm
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Let's try this again..............
For those that wanted to see some pics of this day.......
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosebug/sets/72157602160534545
http://www.zooomr.com/photos/44333@Z01/sets/22836/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13665495@N00/sets/72157602168067571
http://www.flickr.com/groups/parkingdayla/pool
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3nay6sGM4E
Comments
http://la.curbed.com/archives/2007/09/parking_day_la.php
http://blogdowntown.com/blog/2879#comments
User110.2.07 - 12:30 am
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-->
Ridazz Roulette!
Hot momma! See you in the pool!
Hey! Where are WE supposed to park?