Don Shirley: Pianists make history
Iris Schneider on Annie Leibovitz
City Hall is pushing waivers from environmental studies so Musk can bore a 2.7-mile test hole south to Culver City.
Archive: Mobility
City Hall is pushing waivers from environmental studies so Musk can bore a 2.7-mile test hole south to Culver City.
The crucial transportation link in Santa Monica reopens today after being closed for more than a year.
Numbers are up enough on the newly lengthened Expo Line to stop the decline in rail ridership.
Train service returns to the beach city for the first time since 1953, though the old Red Cars were dead long before that.
There's good news and bad news for Westside drivers in the president's schedule of fundraiser appearances this trip.
Lost LA's Nathan Masters curates a look at the urban carnage wrought by construction of the Hollywood Freeway in the 1950s.
Downtown to Santa Monica (or back) by train for the first time since 1953.
The president has fundraisers in Hancock Park and a taping in Burbank for the Ellen DeGeneres Show.
Just in time, perhaps, because rail ridership is dropping in Los Angeles, not rising.
There could be a train to the Inglewood stadium but the current earliest date is 2035.
They have been talking about it so long, the neighborhoods on both sides have changed.
A bike ferry across Marina del Rey? A pedestrian entrance to Dodger Stadium? Might work!
An untagged male cougar believed to be two to three years old was hit by traffic about 7:30 this morning.
Train versus truck after an illegal left turn at 7th Street and Colorado about noon Thursday.
This training film for parking officers shows a lot of downtown street scenes.
About 400 headed out from Clifton's to conquer the former 10th Street. It's the walk's 10th anniversary.
"We don’t know exactly what’s causing it,” a CHP officer said. “Right now, it’s just a weird thing."
Fourteen events later, CicLAvia says it's the largest open streets event in North America.
The Times won't tell you because, one, it doesn't know LA as well as it should and, two, it hypes to attract web eyeballs.
The City Council says OK but there are some official hurdles still to jump.
Mayor Eric Garcetti on Monday signed an executive order ordering departments to report back with ways to reduce traffic deaths in Los Angeles -- to zero.
What better way to educate Angelenos about the shutdown of a major boulevard than a spoof of SNL's The Californians.
Reports are that Ontario will reimburse LA for its investment at the airport and settle a lawsuit alleging poor management.
Instead of 15 miles from downtown, Sunday's 6-mile route begins in Culver City. Here's the map and some tips to avoid bike and car congestion.
Identity theft, manslaughter and driving under the influence were among the convictions of Uber drivers that would bar them driving an LA taxi.
An Expo Line test train rolls where old tourist cars and freight trains used to run -- and where an Edison cameraman of the 1890s took some of the oldest footage of the LA area.
LA Times analysis of accident records finds 817 intersections countywide the paper calls the "most dangerous" for pedestrians.
The new-to-LA traffic calming tactic is in use at Venice and Robertson boulevards. Check out the instructional video.
The LAPD's street closure guidance for today and Friday stretches from Pacific Palisades to Pasadena and Highland Park.
The California labor commissioner's ruling changes everything for Uber's business model, LA Times business columnist Michael Hiltzik writes.
The city plans to turn on its old cameras and add new intersections in June, bringing the total in Beverly Hills to 15.
San Francisco completed digging two Central Subway tunnels last week.
People on the street in DTLA aren't sold yet on the new parking signs, but a writer at CityLab loves them. Here's why.
The color-colded grids are supposed to be simpler and more logical. That doesn't mean that people like them.
Driving in LA is an art that requires intuition, patience and a sense of the topography, Meghan Daum writes.
Metro is installing the artwork for the elevated station at Sepulveda Boulevard. Westwood/Rancho Park and Palms went first.
The board of Metrolink announced today that Leahy will become CEO on April 20 -- soon after he steps down at Metro.
The Obamajam trope is old and tired, and even I'll admit it was kind of parochial to begin with. But today, the LA Times loves it.
The president arrives Thursday afternoon to do Jimmy Kimmel and a fundraiser, then stays overnight.
Phil Washington is currently general manager of Denver's Regional Transportation District.
In good weather the region has about 10 reported crashes an hour, peaking in the morning. On rainy days, the rate soars to 15 an hour and is worst in the afternoon. Go figure.
Is protesting on the freeway "historically appropriate," as the professor argues, or "insanity," as then-LAPD chief Bill Bratton quipped. Here's the argument.
The New Yorker takes a serious look at the future of Los Angeles taxicabs through the eyes of Eric Spiegelman, the president of Mayor Garcetti's taxi commission, and a believer that taxis can move into the app era.
Turns out that Uber's claim of a serious background check for drivers is just BS to make riders feel comfortable getting into a stranger's car, at least according to the district attorneys. Uber doesn't even use fingerprints to check for wanted criminals.
Joe Mathews writes that the airline that once made getting around the state so easy is becoming a big disappointment -- and making him rethink Gov. Brown's favorite rail project.
The New York Times fashion and style section is back with another of those lightly reported Los Angeles cultural pieces.
Look for a brew pub kind of experience in about a year. The deal is for 20 years.
Image database we posted about yesterday includes this 1928 view of the corner of Riverside and Fletcher drives, showing a long-gone Pacific Electric Red Cars viaduct.
Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Wood drifted into a bike lane while typing on his patrol car screen last December and struck entertainment attorney Milton Olin Jr.
The sinkhole created by that water main break near UCLA has been filled in and as of 20 minutes or so ago was being paved. Update: Sunset reopened early Monday morning.
Obamajam potential looks to be centered in Hancock Park and around the Four Seasons Hotel this afternoon and evening, then tomorrow in Brentwood and downtown at Trade-Tech.
This seems like a twist in the long saga of the 405 freeway improvement project through Sepulveda Pass. Kiewit, the project's main contractor, is suing Metro — not the other way around.
The mother road that brought so many families to new lives in California -- and introduced so many young Americans to their country -- gets an entertaining treatment at the Autry. Treasures on display include Jack Kerouac's manuscript for "On the Road," an entire Corvette and the Getty's print of "Migrant mother" by Dorothea Lange.
Figueroa Street will be closed from 3rd Street down to Pico Boulevard from about 10 am to 1 pm, the city says. The parade starts at noon at 5th Street.
Nothing that you would probably call truly great is envisioned, but the idea is to freshen up the streetscape a bit — in one strip per City Council district.
The northbound carpool lane that was the nominal reason for work on the 405 opened Friday morning. Time to look at what five years of work and $1.1 billion bought.
Garcetti, Yaroslavsky and others witnessed the signing of papers this morning in Washington. "As public transit milestones go, they don’t get much bigger than this," Yaroslavsky blogged.
Mayor Eric Garcetti's staff has posted another set of Facebook photos showing him as a regular guy. This time he's riding a bike to work in Koreatown
Bruce Springsteen played for the president and Conan O'Brien quipped about the traffic impacts of Obama's fundraising drop-ins in LA. Inside: The president's local day.
President Obama will fly into LAX on Wednesday and attend the USC Shoah Foundation’s 20th anniversary dinner in Century City, as well as Democratic campaign fundraisers.
They had a huge turnout last year when the route followed Wilshire and it's the same course — between Grand Avenue downtown (in front of the One Wilshire telecom switching building) and Fairfax Avenue. Here's my guide to interesting sights again.
It's looking like there won't be enough rail cars available to open both the extended Expo and Gold lines and run them at full capacity. Metro buys its cars in Japan.
We do it for President Obama's visits, so take note: Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is coming to town this afternoon. Traffic jams will ensue thanks to closures.
Just when it seems from consuming any media that LA has abandoned its automobile ways — but in actuality hasn't — Los Angeles Magazine decides to zig where the others zag.
Vintage LA on Facebook is posting images released for the first time by photographer George Mann. This cropped photo shows Pacific Electric cars piled up on Terminal Island in 1963
Westside, Valley side or up in the canyons — doesn't matter. Metro officials are urging everyone to avoid driving on the northbound 405 freeway or nearby over this holiday weekend.
Putting stars on bikes: good idea. I had never heard of Susan Peters and her story until the 2012 book, "Hollywood Rides a Bike: Cycling With the Stars," by Philadelphia film critic Steven Rea and my friends at Angel City Press.
Officer Don Thompson, a 26-year veteran assigned to the bomb squad, spotted the wreck, jumped over the center divider and cut the unconscious driver out of a burning Mercedes. Both savior and saved suffered burns requiring treatment.
The rebuilt Mulholland Drive bridge opened this morning across the 405 freeway in Sepulveda Pass.
Uber charged a woman $357 for a Saturday evening ride from the Westside to Hollywood. But it's an app so it must be cool, right? Taxis are looking better.
People who live near an Expo Line station "dramatically reduced the number of miles they drove and tripled their rail ridership" after the new light-rail line opened last year, says a new USC study out today.
UC Berkeley planning Ph.D. student Fletcher Foti animated the data from household travel surveys showing how people move throughout the day, hour by hour. You can view the population by income and mode of travel.
A tentative deal between the Bay Area Rapid Transit agency and its two largest unions will end the latest transit strike there after four days.
Sunday's "heart of LA" CicLAvia route drew a good crowd. The Metro trains in and out of downtown were certainly hopping.
The Westside is starting to slowly wake up from its long traffic nightmare around the 405 freeway construction, known officially as the I-405 Sepulveda Pass Improvements Project.
Soon after work wraps up in January on the new freeway ramps where the 405 crosses over Wilshire Boulevard, crews will begin tearing up Wilshire all over again — this time to add a dedicated bus rapid transit lane west of the freeway.
Invitations went out today for a very exclusive sit-down with the president at a location not yet revealed, says The Hollywood Reporter.
Dwight Sturtevant has been the unofficial, unpaid photographer of the Expo Line extension from Culver City across the Westside to Santa Monica. When he is credited, it has been as Expo Line Fan. Now he's moving away.
All of the streets that the LAPD is warning drivers to avoid during President Obama's brief visit to the area today and Wednesday are out in the Valley. Obama lands...
There are a few new details now about President Obama's trip to the Los Angeles area on Tuesday to appear on the Jay Leno show. Here's what we know.
President Obama is returning to California for a two-day swing that will include a stop at NBC in Burbank for his sixth appearance on "The Tonight Show."
Designer Peter Dunn re-envisioned the Los Angeles area freeways and mounted a Kickstarter campaign that raised enough money to print the map on 36-inch by 24-inch heavy stock. He explains inside.
Just when you thought the endless 405 freeway upgrade project was becoming manageable and some of the quote unquote upgrades were opening for use, the freeway gods play a little joke.
The march of appointments by new Mayor Eric Garcetti continues. He names two city councilmen to the Metro board, plus activist "Jackie" Dupont-Walker.
Caltrans officials were able to open two northbound lanes of I-5 at the interchange with the 2 freeway in Elysian Valley in time for today's afternoon commute. The rest of I-5 may open Tuesday, but the tunnel beneath connecting the northbound 2 to the northbound I-5 is closed indefinitely.
The northbound Interstate 5 freeway near Dodger Stadium, and half the southbound lanes plus the connectors to the 2 Freeway, will likely be closed for Monday's morning commute. That's because of possible structural damage to the freeway by Saturday's fire from a gasoline tanker crash.
Metro's newest route map of the rail system includes the busways and rail lines that are in planning or under construction, such as the Crenshaw line and the Regional Connector downtown. If you are a fan of transit, or just a student of Los Angeles, the map is a welcome glimpse into the future.
As I mentioned earlier, the Obamajam potential for Friday's short visit by President Obama is not bad. He's coming in mid-morning and leaving early afternoon so the driving disruption should be localized. But it's still Santa Monica in tourist season, so traffic could be a challenge.
President Obama will drop into Santa Monica on Friday for a Democratic Party fundraiser, but he won't be stopping into the Santa Monica High School graduation like some students hoped. The White House schedule has Obama arriving at LAX about 10:30 a.m. and leaving via Air Force One around 2 p.m.
You'll remember that Metro's position on the Crenshaw rail line station at Leimert Park was that it was desirable, but not fundable. Today the agency's board decided to find the money, with $40 million coming from the Los Angeles City Council.
While the 405 widening project slogs along late and over budget, one nugget of good news if you drive that stretch of freeway. As of Friday, a northbound lane will open for 1.7 miles between the 10 Freeway and Santa Monica Boulevard.
UCLA staffer Annelie Rugg bicycles to her job from West Hills, over the Santa Monica Mountains via Sepulveda Pass. Her route takes her two and a half hours -- or three minutes on video. Check it out.
Richie Trimble's two-wheeler rose 14.5 feet and barely fit under the San Diego Freeway overpass on Venice Boulevard during Sunday's Ciclavia. “Everyone looks at you like your nuts and they’re right!,” he says.
Mark your Obamajam calendars. President Obama will fly in for a series of Democratic fundraisers, including a luncheon at Peter Chernin's home in Santa Monica.
Beverly Hills police are asking for help in identifying the driver of this car who appears to deliberately pin a bicyclist against a trash dumpster in an alley off Wilshire Boulevard.
Many fans are loath to say anything negative about Ciclavia, but USC physics professor Clifford V. Johnson — as enthusiastic a supporter as there is — has some constructive criticism after Sunday's mass turnout across the Westside. One, there were too many bike traffic jams. More inside.
The sixth version of Ciclavia is breaking out of the central city and extending west all the way to Venice Beach. Venice Boulevard and selected other streets will be closed to cars and buses from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
LA Times architecture Christopher Hawthorne continues his survey of changing Los Angeles area boulevards with Wilshire — a street that he writes "has always stood apart from the city it slices through." Let's see what he says.
For a month starting on March 23, the main canyon road connecting the Valley with Beverly Hills will be closed during the day. Coldwater Canyon Avenue needs to be dug up to replace the main water line installed during the William Mulholland era with a new trunk line.
Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne observes that the candidates for mayor have been short on future vision for the city. That's too bad, he writes in a front-page critic's notebook, since there are "some major holes in the civic fabric." It all starts with the mess that is LAX.
Metro, the agency in charge of the massive 405 freeway upgrade and widening project, announced that the weekend work was completed 29 hours early. It went to so well that no full shutdown of the northbound freeway was required, as originally threatened.
Damian Kevitt was riding a bicycle on Zoo Drive about 11:30 a.m. a week ago Sunday when the driver of an older gray Toyota Sienna minivan bolted out of traffic and made a sudden left turn. Witnesses told the CHP that the van accelerated after hitting Kevitt and dragged the biker for 600 feet, then sped away.
Behind a construction fence on Pico Boulevard, what used to be the parking lot for Billingsley's Steak House and a medical marijuana dispensary is now taken up with bridge structures for the second, Westside phase of Metro's Expo Line light rail. More scenes inside.
I intended to post on this a couple of weeks ago, but it slipped with the whole cold/flu/whatever thing. Nathan Masters has done a really nice piece at KCET's website on the train stations that dotted Los Angeles before rail service was consolidated at the "union" station in 1939.
Sometime this summer, the turnstile gates will close at Metro's train stations and riders really will be forced to pay the fare. But before that can happen, the agency is remaking the TAP card system that discouraged honest riders from paying up.
Pity the poor tourists of the future. One of the most minor-league things about Los Angeles is that today's politicians too easily give in to the urge to name things — buildings, freeway legs, intersections — for people. Alive or dead, famous or not.
The Westfield mall at Century City is dropping out of the ranks of Los Angeles malls that let you park free for at least a couple of hours. Starting Feb. 1, it's going to cost a dollar an hour — up to three hours. After that, it's a dollar for every fifteen minutes.
In a piece for Zocalo called "I Blocked Off Wilshire and Angelenos Loved It," Aaron Paley talks about when he and his wife saw the beneficial effects of Bogota's street-closing ciclovía and how the Los Angeles version came to happen here.
Beside Olympic Boulevard in Santa Monica, bridge foundations are rising that portend the demise of a portion of the Bergamot Station arts complex, including the Track 16 gallery where many have attended events through the years. Lisa Napoli pays a little tribute for KCRW.
Of the 2,066 voters who mailed in ballots, 73 percent voted to tax property owners in order to obtain funding for the $125 million loop mostly along Broadway and Hill.
"Progress will continue as Metro remains focused on delivering a dozen new transit projects and 15 highway improvement projects that voters approved four years ago in passing Measure R."
Also: Measure J, the transit tax extension, ends with 66.11 percent of the vote, and needed 66.66 percent to pass. How close did it come? If you take the 2,863,951...
Santa Monica mayor Richard Bloom said he expects to be sworn into the state Assembly on Monday. Measure J creeps closer yet, but almost certainly won't pass.
How's that 110 freeway HOV lane working out for you? A lot of people are flouting the transponder rule, it seems.
The percentage of yes votes keeps going up, but not fast enough to make passage likely. There are only so many votes left to count.
Making Angelenos suffer to park their cars is all the rage in City Hall these days. But if you work for Councilman Mitch Englander and want to park at the Chatsworth Metro station, there are a couple of nice spots right in front. (Updated.)
The California Supreme Court denied a request by Neighbors for Smart Rail for a stay that would stop construction on the Expo Line extension across the Westside to Santa Monica. The supremes agreed with previous rulings that there's no cause to stop work while the homeowner groups press their case that the project's environmental review made mistakes.
This Saturday, the HOV lanes on the Harbor Freeway south of downtown convert to HOT lanes — meaning if you are a solo driver, you can pay to drive with the carpools.
That may not be so controversial, but it means that everyone who drives in the 110 lanes, carpoolers included, have to pay $40 plus $3 a month for a FasTrak transponder.
Average weekday ridership on Metro's rail lines in September soared to 357,096, up nearly 12 percent over the same time last year and 16 percent over 2010. Higher gas prices, plus the opening of the Expo Line and the extending of the Orange Line busway to Chatsworth were all factors.
The White House Press Office advises that President Obama will land at LAX aboard Air Force One on Wednesday evening, go tape "The Tonight Show" and depart again from LAX two hours later. Should be minimal traffic impact.
The "infrastructure" firm HNTB has won the city's international design competition for the new bridge that will replace the decaying concrete 6th Street Viaduct over the Los Angeles River. Here's what they have in mind.
The space shuttle Endeavour was scheduled to leave the field at LAX about 2 a.m. and begin rolling east toward Friday night's crossing of the 405 freeway. A couple of major viewing spots are planned for Saturday before the shuttle reaches Exposition Park.
President Obama arrived at LAX a little after 1 p.m. and went right to a private gathering of donors in Trousdale Estates before tonight's concert and exclusive dinner downtown.
Cindy Whitehead, a former pro skateboarder from Hermosa Beach, had the phone numbers of a bail bondsman, a lawyer and a friend written on her arm — just in case.
Removal of the north side of the original Mulholland Drive bridge over the 405 freeway has gone about as well as expected. Mayor Villarigosa and Metro officials said Sunday evening that the lanes through Sepulveda Pass will open as promised by 5 a.m. on Monday.
Traffic has been a bit heavier than usual for a Saturday in a few spots, especially near the immediate detours around the closed 405 freeway. But for the most part,...
UCLA researchers say in a study today that the benefits began as soon as the freeway closed, and extended for miles around. Since traffic fell everywhere in Southern California, the whole region felt an effect — for a couple of days.
If things go right, there will be fewer media choppers hovering pointlessly above the ends of the closed 405 freeway during this weekend's traffic event. Or non-event, whatever.
By the time Metro decided to schedule the 405 freeway shutdown for this weekend, the Herbalife Triathlon Los Angeles was already on the calendar for Sunday. So there will be closed streets and a lot of people in town.
No, Carmageddon II is still coming this weekend. But the people behind Carmageddon had a ceremony out along the 405 freeway this morning to reopen the rebuilt Sunset Boulevard bridge.
Sahakian oversees special traffic operations for the city’s Department of Transportation. This makes him the official responsible for planning and executing street closures for all the big traffic-snarling events in Los Angeles — from the Oscars and the LA Marathon to next month's move of the space shuttle Endeavour.
An email to Los Angeles area Obama donors says the concert evening will be "a large scale event with multiple performers and speakers preceding the President’s remarks," the Hollywood Reporter says. Good news on the Obamajam front: it's a Sunday night.
Metro explains what will happen to the 405 freeway over the weekend of Sept. 29-30, and how it's basically the same exercise as in July a year ago.
Somewhere in Orange County is a humbled bicyclist with a shiner and a damaged "$2,000 carbon fiber-and-unobtainium bicycle....(slash) penis extension."
Finding out what's happening on the freeway before you hit the road may have just gotten a bit easier — or at least more accurate. Caltrans has relaunched its QuickMap that lets you see what the observation cameras are seeing on any freeway in California — or read any changeable message sign.
Fun and informative history piece on Los Angeles' first freeways by Nathan Masters on the KCET website. The very first freeway was not the Arroyo Seco Parkway from Pasadena to almost downtown, as many believe. Have you ever seen the Ramona Boulevard freeway?
For more than five years, Sacramento's CBS TV affiliate has been investigating reports by drivers in Northern California who get parking tickets from the city of Los Angeles when they swear they weren’t there. The latest case involves a Sacramento area man who says his new car has never been in LA.
Starting sooner than expected, the condition of the roadway on Wilshire Boulevard may no longer be LA's own inside joke. Repaving of the curb lanes between Wilton Place and Fairfax Avenue will begin this month, says a report.
Two good stories within a week on the uneasy relationship in Los Angeles with lone wolf car services and drivers — through the decades and now.
Metro has decided when to drop the other shoe on the necessary weekend closure of the entire 405 Freeway through the Sepulveda Pass. The follow-up to last summer's disruptive but successful closure will begin about 7 p.m. on Friday, September 28. The freeway will be scheduled to reopen at 5 a.m. on Monday, October 1
The unreinforced brick building that houses Señor Fish at 1st Street and Alameda has to be moved or torn down for the Regional Connector underground light-rail line. It formerly housed The Atomic Cafe and at least one other '80s restaurant.
Gov. Jerry Brown convened the local faithful at Union Station to sign the bill that authorizes the state to sell $4.7 billion in bonds to build 130 miles of high-speed rail track between Bakersfield and Madera. The bill also helps fund LA transit projects.
To the surprise of some transportation experts, the new Expo Line is drawing a healthy number of riders who use it to commute from the San Fernando Valley. They take the Red Line subway to the 7th Street station in downtown, then jump on the Expo Line heading toward USC then west to Culver City.
The LA Times architecture critic's expanded essays based on walking the Los Angeles area's "iconic boulevards" took on Sunset this weekend. He previously visited Atlantic Boulevard.
Basically USC to Chinatown, with feeder legs from MacArthur Park and Boyle Heights.
The knowledgeable Los Angeles history aficionados at the Vintage Los Angeles page on Facebook located this scene as the 1950s at Santa Monica Boulevard and Fairfax, known then as the Crescent Junction on the Pacific Electric rail network. Posted by Jerome Melgar.
Another four miles of the Orange Line busway are about to ready to open between Woodland Hills and Chatsworth. Out-of-service buses will be seen making test runs as soon as this weekend.
Santa Monica is the largest city in the U.S. to convert to parking meters that reset to zero when a car leaves, the New York Times says in a story. Santa Monica officials insist it's not about the money, but UCLA's parking reform expert says of course it's about the money.
Before leaving town for Nevada, President Obama is scheduled to speak this morning at a private fundraising breakfast in View Park, the community perched on the northern side of the Baldwin Hills with the awesome views of Downtown and the Hollywood Hills.
The terminus of the Expo Line will extend to the Culver City station, and the Farmdale station near Dorsey High School, will both open at noon on Wednesday, June 20.
President Obama returns to Los Angeles late Wednesday afternoon for yet another campaign fundraising appearance, this time at the the Regent Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills. The event is a gay and lesbian community fundraiser for Obama. Here is some early traffic guidance.
The Daily Journal's Ciaran McEvoy ran one of the paper's periodic updates on the epic lawsuit between the MTA and one of its subway contractors accused of overbilling — way back on the original subway project. If nothing else, it's a reminder that the path from here to a new subway line is long and fraught with unforeseeable delays and problems.
What was mostly at stake today was where to put the Century City station — the MTA board stayed with Constellation Avenue and Avenue of the Stars, inside the development.
Both LA basketball teams are on the brink of elimination, but Staples Center is warning of major traffic and parking issues around Sunday's noon-start Kings game.
in June, the rebuilding of the Wilshire Boulevard on- and off-ramps will begin a year-long traffic disruption in one of the nation's congested spots that will be so majorly disruptive it's being called The Rampture. We've been warning you this was coming. In case you were hoping it would just go away, it didn't.
Los Angeles City Councilman Paul Krekorian, who represents Studio City, says he has been told that the area south of Ventura Boulevard around Laurel Canyon Boulevard and Fryman Canyon will be pretty much a mess between 8 and 10 p.m. on Thursday. He also confirms that President Obama will stay overnight in Beverly Hills, as on recent trips.
President Obama returns to Los Angeles on Thursday to separate more Democrats from their $40,000. He's going to George Clooney's house in Studio City's Fryman Canyon, but how he will get there nobody's saying. The president will overnight somewhere in the LA area — back in Beverly Hills or does a new hotel get to host Obama this time?
The latest cartoon by Steve Greenberg.
John Fenton came to Metrolink about two years ago, after the disastrous crash of a Metrolink train and a freight train in Chatsworth. He said Monday he is stepping down for family and professional reasons to become the chief executive officer of Patriot Rail Corp.
Several Downtown streets will be closed temporarily and Metro bus lines detoured for May Day rallies and marches today. "Street closures will begin as early as 6 AM for the participant assembly area located on Broadway between 11th Street and Olympic Boulevard, as well as for the rally area located on Broadway between 1st Street and Temple Street," the city says. "Street closures for the rest of the route will begin as early as 9AM." Check the map.
USC professor of physics and astronomy Clifford Johnson has been waiting for a train line to campus. He's been known to pedal his bike to USC and to ride transit all over Los Angeles. On Saturday he finally rode the Expo Line and shot a video.
Since 2000, drivers to Loyola Marymount University have parked for free. That's about to change, but not without controversy.
The grand opening to unveil the new Expo Line light rail train is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. at the 7th Street/Metro station in downtown. That kicks off a weekend...
The Metro board of directors today certified the Westside Subway Extension’s Final Environmental Impact Statement/Report, approving the route and station locations for the first phase out to La Cienega Boulevard.
Flavorpill's Los Angeles bias is showing through again — not that we're complaining. Its Flavorwire site has put Union Station, sometimes called the last great American rail station to be built, in 1939, high on its aggregation of The Most Beautiful Train Stations in the World.
During both days of the book festival at USC this weekend, trains were running on the Expo Line just south of the campus. No riders, though. These were test runs. Would it have killed Metro to accelerate the opening one week with thousands of potential Expo Line users already going to USC?
The Los Angeles Fire Department's news feed this morning noted a car-vs-Metro train collision on South Hoover Street. Unless there's a gypsy train operating out there today, this can only mean one thing. (* OK, it's the third.)
Dennis Romero at the LA Weekly is reporting that Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa stormed out of an MTA board meeting this morning after county supervisor Mike Antonovich, who is also on the board, characterized the mayor's call for extending the Measure R sales tax by saying something like communities are going to be "gang-raped again."
Mayor Villaraigosa and Lu Parker plan to ride in Sunday's CicLAvia. At least, that's what her tweet says. Here's the latest route map and street closures.
Police were reportedly in cellphone contact with Abdul Arian, 19, and his mother during last night's chase across the West Valley.
The inbound 101 at Canoga Avenue in Woodland Hills has been closed all night because of a police shooting following a chase.
There on top of the red van, in the Mitt Romney family pet carrier: those are a pair of geese.
An op-ed piece protests the plan by Metro to raze the Wilshire Boulevard buildings that house the A+D Architecture and Design Museum and nearby galleries in order to stage construction of the Purple Line stop at Fairfax Avenue.
The DWP says that the portion of 3rd Street east of Fairfax reopened about 6:30 p.m. after crews plugged this morning's water main break and repaved the street.
The DWP, which is scrambling to repair a flurry of water main breaks it blames on work at the distant Lower Franklin Canyon reservoir, says that West 3rd Street will remain closed between Fairfax Avenue and Ogden Drive until 7 p.m.
Metro recommends that the Century City station be at Constellation Boulevard and the Westwood station at Wilshire and Westwood boulevards.
Some Arco gas stations in Southern California will change ownership, and possibly the brand they sell under, but the longtime Arco brand will remain on, oh, about 790 stations.
The Arco name has been around the Los Angeles area for a long time.
Manuel H. Rodriguez, a retired teacher at Valley College, writes about growing up in South Los Angeles when the streetcars were his ticket to bookstores, libraries and the movies of Downtown and Hollywood.
The Central Library is getting a three-month rooflift starting today — and the LAPL website is warning patrons, staff and Downtowners that "traffic WILL be affected during this time."
Sunday's Los Angeles Marathon again begins at Dodger Stadium and runs to Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica.
Angels Flight Railway president John H. Welborne announced that the one-way fare to ride the cars up or down Bunker Hill in Downtown will rise next Monday.
The plan is for the Levitated Mass convoy to enter Los Angeles on Thursday night — in hopes of reaching the museum on Saturday morning.
Midnight freeway closures this week and, as of Monday night, one direction or another of Wilshire Boulevard is subject to complete closure over the next week, starting each night at 8 p.m.
LAPD chief Charlie Beck had a bit more to say today about his comments yesterday in favor of issuing a special drivers license to undocumented residents who pass the tests....
Photographer Gary Leonard is really looking forward to the move of that 340-ton boulder to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
"When something doesn't work over and over and over again, my view is that you should reexamine it to see if there is another way that makes more sense," said the LAPD chief.
President Obama is scheduled to land at LAX about 4 p.m. After that traffic could suck for awhile in the corridor from Brentwood to Beverly Hills.
With politicians in Riverside and San Bernardino counties clamoring for an explanation, the local Caltrans chief has re-assigned the engineer on the Interstate 10 repaving project that closed several lanes of the freeway at the height of Sunday's westbound rush.
Sunday's Caltrans-induced traffic jam on Interstate 10 coming back in from Palm Springs was so bad that at least one group of music industry types headed to the Grammy Awards flew into Santa Monica Airport.
Caltrans work narrowed the westbound lanes of Interstate 10 in Banning Pass on Sunday afternoon and evening, creating a monster backup.
I watched a bicyclist get hit by a car today in Westwood Village, right in front of me. So I had bike riders on the mind.
Tests for drugs and alcohol came back negative, so Dodgers first baseman James Loney won't be charged in his November 14 crash on the Ventura Freeway.
I guess it's good news that the president's main venue on Feb. 15 will be in Holmby Hills, at the home of soap opera producer and writer Bradley Bell and his wife Colleen.
The narrow squeeze between the San Fernando Valley and points north shuts down so often that a blog has come up with the, um, Comprehensive Newhall Pass Disaster Planning Tool.
This morning at 9 a.m., Councilman Tom LaBonge and others will gather at the Caltrans building in Downtown to celebrate the first use of Loyd Sigman's SigAlert system.
Long Beach wants to be known as more a bicycle friendly city than Portland, Oregon — and even put its claim of two-wheeled superiority on the wall of city hal
Hard to see today, but Downtown was encircled on at least two sides by big hills that blocked access. As L.A.'s outlying areas grew, the traffic poobahs punched through the hills with tunnels.
Westbound lanes of the 60 freeway were opened about 11 a.m. on Saturday. The eastbound lanes were back in service by about 3 p.m.
The MTA, not surprisingly, didn't care for Reason.tv's lampoon of light rail the other day.
Lots of roads in the higher elevations of Los Angeles County are having snow closures after Monday's storm.
The libertarians at Reason.tv made an entertaining video on traveling by rail from LAX to Burbank, accompanied by their research on how much the public subsidizes the transit system.
Metro says it has no cause yet for the failure of a retaining wall section on the 405 freeway improvement project in Sepulveda Pass.
On January 1, a new amnesty program allows drivers who ignored their traffic tickets before 2009 to pay half of what they owe and clear their record. The Legislature saw...
Kent Twitchell's mural of L.A. Chamber Orchestra players started going up in 1991
Fun story on Off-Ramp over the weekend about architect Arthur Golding's concept of an open-air mercado with cafes spanning the Los Angeles River.
The Expo Line has taken its next big step on the path from construction project to actual light-rail transit line.
The worst of the bunch, in the latest Texas Transportation Institute study, is supposedly the stretch of the 110 Freeway from Interstate 10 to the Dodger Stadium exit at Stadium Way.
Parking at the Getty Museum used to be free after 5 p.m.
Grand Avenue will be blocked in front of Disney Hall on Tuesday, or so the sign says.
A no parking sign of dubious origin, plus evidence of progress on the Eli Broad art museum on Bunker Hill.
The California Public Utilities Commission gave its go-ahead to the grade crossings proposed for the second phase of the Expo Line, west from Culver City across the Westside to Santa Monica.
A website gathers the rear-window plaques for hundreds of car clubs across the U.S., including more than 100 in the San Fernando Valley alone — covering generations of low riders, high riders and more.
Evidence is mounting for the bad health effects of breathing the air in traffic jams and living near freeways, even as the exhaust from cars and trucks gets cleaner.
Time-lapse video of the tear-down work on the north side of the Sunset bridge.
Concrete in the 1933 bridge connecting Downtown with the Eastside is rotting from the inside and the structure is slated for replacement.
It could have been worse. The final segment of Obamajam was avoided when the President flew by chopper from Burbank to LAX.
Rob Adams' video of the scene at the Oct. 9 CicLAvia on L.A. streets.
L.A. gets acquainted with a new level of Obamajam while President Obama himself stops for takeout and politics at Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles.
There's not much new to know since we filled you in last week.
A byproduct of the geological research for Metro's Westside subway extension is that the northern end of the deadly Newport-Inglewood Fault is better understood by scientists.
They're calling it Viadoom, the massive urban traffic breakdown some fear from the nine-day closure of the Alaskan Way Viaduct along the Seattle waterfront.
President Barack Obama is scheduled to arrive at LAX on board Air Force One between 4:30 and 5 p.m. on Monday, the White House just announced.
The show will air next Tuesday, the night after fundraisers in the Hancock Park area.
Metro's experts panel of seismologists, geologists and engineers also says tunneling poses no threat to Beverly Hills High School.
Lisa Napoli, the public radio veteran who stepped out of the rat race a few years back to live in Bhutan, recently began hosting All Things Considered every afternoon on KCRW. That made her a cross-town commuter.
UC Berkeley researchers looked at the the after effects of the state moving hybrid drivers out of diamond lanes as of July 1 — and on Bay Area freeways, the impact was significant.
USC professor and Asymptotia blogger Cllifford V. Johnson rode from Heliotrope and Melrose, the western end of Sunday's CicLAvia route, to the eastern end at Hollenbeck Park.
Here's a quick guide to Sunday's closure of ten miles of streets around Los Angeles.
Requiring drivers to slow to 15 miles an hour while passing a bicyclist closer than three feet is not going to fly.
Before there was Google Maps — and still today, if an Angeleno really wants to know where something is located — there was the Thomas Bros. street atlas, aka the Thomas Guide.
On- and off-ramps serving Sunset Boulevard at the 405 freeway will start closing Friday for 14-day periods of rebuilding. It's the other shoe falling from the earlier demolition of half...
If you were caught in traffic near Sunset Boulevard between Beverly Hills and Brentwood between 9:30 and 10 a.m., that was just President Obama heading for his helicopter.
So far the timing of the president's moves across the Westside seems to be smooth and on schedule.
Coming up on my Monday KCRW commentary: why presidential visits are mainly traffic events for Angelenos, and why they also tend to create the worst jams.
President Obama woke up in San Francisco, is in La Jolla now for a fundraising lunch and will be in L.A. this afternoon.
Presidential visits (of both parties) typically create the most intense surface street traffic jams most of us have ever seen in L.A., but they tend to be localized and avoidable if you just plan ahead.
Check out the car hanging over the edge of a parking structure on Wilshire Boulevard near Veteran Avenue in Westwood.
Historian Richard White provides a dose of reality for the romantic notion of high-speed trains zipping across California, just like in "France, Japan, and now China."
The president and the mayor could benefit from each other's help.
In my Monday afternoon column coming up on KCRW, I praise today's Expo Line groundbreaking in Santa Monica — and the Libros Schmibros bookstore at the Hammer Museum.
President Obama will be in West Hollywood on Sept. 26 for two entertainment-themed fundraisers. The return of Obamajam will be on a Monday night.
Caltrans had planned to show off four new pieces of artwork along Los Angeles freeways this morning, replicas of murals from the 1984 Olympics era that had been defaced by taggers. But overnight, two of the pieces were stolen.
Pop music staffer Todd Martens was in the subway in Hollywood last night when he witnessed a man stab another man, then flee the scene. It was more complicated than...
"The feeling is that this could be much worse" than Carmageddon, says the president of the Westwood Homeowners Association.
Hate to break this to all you miscreants out there, but you've never had to pay your ticket.
The City Council just voted 13-0 to kill off the program,.
Leo Braudy and Timothy Egan on what to take from last weekend's unexpectedly light traffic.
The L.A. culture war between drivers and bicyclists was in full view this morning on KPCC's "Airtalk.
Supervisor Yaroslavsky's website team has pulled together some insightful data points from the weekend closure of the 405 freeway.
KPCC's John Rabe and I share a pet peeve: drivers who take up two curb parking spots by not pulling a few feet farther forward.
Lakers center Andrew Bynum was videotaped parking his BMW across two marked disabled spots at the Bristol Farms store in Westchester.
Now that the big media event is over, it's back to the routine closures that users of the 405 freeway have experienced over the past several months. Here's tonight's partial list.
Carmageddon weekend is taking on the same image of freedom from traffic as the 1984 Olympics has in Los Angeles lore.
It's been real quiet across the Westside with no 405 freeway spewing white noise for miles around. Villaraigosa thanks "the people of Los Angeles for doing their part."
As the traffic experts say, it doesn't take many drivers to change their ways for congestion to go away.
It's not bad out there. I came over Sepulveda Pass about 2 o'clock, and except for what seemed to be a bit of lookie-loo slowdown on both sides approaching the...
Until the tunnel under Mulholland Highway opened in 1930, there wasn't much "pass" to Sepulveda Pass. There was a dirt road and trails, but most of the traffic between...
Traffic along the 405 has been good today. People are self-correcting: good sign. Now this from cartoonist Donna Barstow.
A roundup of news and observations on the biggest story in Southern California: this weekend's closure of the 405 freeway in Sepulveda Pass, potentially affecting a million or more people — but probably only a little bit.
The city Department of Transportation is slapping up new No Stopping any Time signs for Carmageddon weekend on these streets, mostly in the Valley.
The Automobile Club of Southern California Archives have some stunning photos from the years in which the L.A. area was discovering its relationship with the car. Like this one.
I'm pretty sure I swore off the Hitler spoofs awhile back. but this one is worth it — and just very smart about the city's culture.
Carmageddon in the New York Times, from Los Angeles bureau chief Adam Nagourney. You would think that Los Angeles, of all places, would know how to handle a catastrophe. But...
As part of the official choreography of publicity for the 405 freeway shutdown next month, the LAPD asked Ashton Kutcher and other celebrities — Lady Gaga among them — to...
Metro has posted a six-page fact sheet on construction of the Westside subway extension, a project whose future is still tied to decisions yet to be made in Congress.
The latest news and gimmicks on the coming 405 shutdown, including the LAPD asks a favor of Lady Gaga.
Here's one minute of Sunday afternoon traffic looks and sounds like on the 405 freeway in Sepulveda Pass. No wonder there's talk of carmageddon.
KPCC's John Rabe seems a little perturbed that the police commission has overruled the LAPD staff and voted to discontinue the red-light cameras that spew out dubious tickets at 32 intersections around Los Angeles. It's moire about L.A. drivers though.
The Los Angeles Police Commission voted unanimously Tuesday to reject a new contract the LAPD wants with the firm that runs the city's 32 red light cameras.
Ted Soqui checks out the seven-mile stretch of Angeles Crest Highway above La Cañada-Flintridge that reopened Friday
How LAX is planning for the worst weekend ever. Isn't it weird how the best job of covering the 405 freeway construction disruption so far hasn't been by any traditional media at all, but by the websites of Metro and of Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky?
A three-car train is due to be tested on Metro's new Expo Line between today and Thursday.
In his quest to read 25 books about Los Angeles this year, LAT architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne is up to David Brodsly's slim 1981 work "L.A. Freeway: An Appreciative Essay."
When was the last time you saw a news release issued jointly by Caltrans, Metro, the California Highway Patrol, the Los Angeles Police Department and the L.A. Fire Department?
The MTA board passed its largest annual budget ever, held fares at current levels, gave support to — but declined to fund — a Crenshaw rail station at Leimert Park, and approved 7.7 miles of interrupted peak-hour bus lanes on Wilshire Boulevard.
Jimmy Price will officially retire on June 4 from the LA Department of Transportation, several years ahead of his planned exit, Joel Grover reports.
It's going to get a lot worse before it gets better — and be prepared for two years of disruption near the busiest intersection in Los Angeles.
An Expo Line train being tested on the new bridge over La Brea Avenue.
Good lede from Channel 4 investigative reporter Joel Grover on his latest story about L.A. traffic officers behaving badly.
When Controller Wendy Greuel was on the City Council, her office made use of the special desk to handle, um, delicate requests from elected officials for special handling of parking tickets.
Inland empire columnist David Allen got to Monday night's Dodgers game in the second inning and left in the eighth, but he can say he successfully took MetroLink and the Union Station shuttle.
Tonight's KCRW column, airing at 6:44 p.m. talks about the massive I-405 freeway makeover and the plans to close the freeway for a weekend in July.
All lanes of the freeway will close in Sepulveda Pass for an enitre weekend in July. You've been warned, but you will be warned again.
Westwood architect Jamie B. Myer has designed an innovative solution to the bottleneck that forms along Santa Monica Boulevard where it crosses under the 405 freeway.
The city's Department of Transportation sent out a Sunday afternoon press release saying it had "launched a full investigation" of that KNBC report about two traffic enforcement officers appearing in a porn film while on duty and in uniform.
NBC 4 tonight at 11 p.m. will air an expose showing two uniformed Los Angeles Department of Transportation traffic enforcement officers appearing in a porn film.
The first time I snuck into the vacated Fred Harvey cafe at Union Station, maybe 20 years ago, I could almost smell the 1940s cigar smoke. The room and adjacent...
Pool reporter from the LA Times gets the name of Obama's restaurant wrong. Can't say she wasn't warned.
President Obama is scheduled to land at LAX at about 2:45 P.M. Thursday. He then has to get to the Sony lot for a 4:30 fund-raising appearance, then up to Tavern in Brentwood for dinner and another fundraiser.
President Obama will visit the Sony lot in Culver City and Tavern in Brentwood to meet with Hollywood donors.
Use of the MTA's buses and trains is down about three percent compared to last year. Some data and graphs.
Metro's blog The Source has become in 18 months one of the MTA's main ways of exciting the base of L.A. transit enthusiasts and responding to rail critics. Now the...
Click on the map above to see the street closures for Sunday's second CicLAvia.
One of the little quirks about Downtown L.A. is that a major north-south street, Hope Street, stops at the Central Library. Yet Hope Street predates the library.
Last week in the Valley, something like 450 people turned out at a raucous community meeting called to discuss the restriping of upper Wilbur Avenue to add left-turn and bike lanes.
Shuttles between Union Station and Dodger Stadium will begin with the March 28 exhibition game. Buses will run 90 minutes before games and 45 minutes after the final out. Dodger...
I missed that longtime KNBC reporter (and the ex-anchor of "News Conference") Laurel Erickson returned to the local air waves last month as the correspondent on an episode of KCET's "SoCal Connected." She also has a piece this week.
The Jewish Journal cover story this week poses the question to the community: will Jews support the expansion of Metro's subway, other rail lines and busways?
Streets around City Hall and the cathedral will be closed Friday morning for the funeral procession and service for Glenn Allen, the LAFD veteran killed fighting a fire in the Hollywood Hills last week.
Part of the 55 freeway in Orange County is now the Paul Johnson Memorial Freeway.
Our Valentine's Day mystery about the present-day status of L.A.'s Lovers Lane from 1871 appears to be solved
Here's our modest contribution to Valentine's Day.
Lowriders from around the West caravanned through East Los Angeles on Saturday in a funeral procession for Jesse Valadez, co-founder 45 years ago of The Imperials car club. His red...
Bikers aren't happy about rumble strips being added to the loop of canyon roads off Mulholland Highway where motorcyclists have raced for decades.themselves or others. T
The proposal to dedicate a lane each way of Wilshire Boulevard to Bus Rapid Transit during the hours when the street is already at its most packed has picked up a new obstacle in Westside Councilman Bill Rosendahl.
Joel Epstein, one of the more single-minded transit advocates in town, argues that fans of the rapid express buses on Wilshire should stage a massive work slowdown before Friday's City Council meeting to vote on the boulevard bus lane.
After a three-hour closed-door session, City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana said the City Council had voted unanimously to submit a parking garage concession agreement to potential private operators. But no details.
John Rabe, the host of KPCC's Off-Ramp, picked up and ran with my suggestion that parking garages be required to open the gate and let people go if the queue to pay reaches five minutes.
In the real world where Angelenos live and drive, the city's sell-off of parking garages in Hollywood and Westwood would let rates triple over five years.
The CHP is letting drivers cross in and out of Southern California again on Interstate 5 through the Tehachapis and on I-15 in Cajon Pass.
The CHP closed I-15 through Cajon Pass after 10 p.m. due to the snow, ice and sliding cars.
It figures that on the last day to get back in town for many Angelenos, Interstate 5 is closed by snow over The Grapevine.
Joe Lumer is the name behind the Joe's Auto Parks lots so ubiquitous in Downtown Los Angeles.
If you have any plans to hit Big Bear or Running Springs this winter, you will be going the long way around.
The plan to sell off the city parking garages is not going over well in Westwood Village.
ESPN's Rick Reilly spent a day tooling around L.A. in Ron Artest's Cadillac Escalade, talking about the Lakers, therapy, and a bunch of other things.
This might be the biggest thing to help Westside traffic congestion that is in the works.
Once a preferential parking district is approved, it costs you $34 a year for each permit to park on your own street.
Three members of the Imperial Stars band were charged by District Attorney Steve Cooley, for blocking the Hollywood Freeway last month.
The Santa Monica Mirror's Slav Kandyba found out the hard way that unpaid parking tickets can be a bummer in Los Angeles.
Jose Rodriguez, Harold Katz and Danny McDevitt.
Let's hope Steve Lopez didn't really mean to say "west of the 10 freeway."
Today's MTA vote approving the Wilshire subway route leaves out the West Hollywood detour and the politically sensitive Crenshaw station, leaves undecided the dicey political question of just where the tunnel will go under Century City and Beverly Hills, and should put to rest for now Mayor Villaraigosa's inoperative "subway to the sea" meme.
Crowds are already forming, and streets already closing, in the USC area for President Obama's campaign rally this afternoon. But some new plans to be aware of: the White House...
My KCRW column tonight wades into the big divide in Los Angeles between those who see L.A. as a car culture city and those who crave a more transit-fed urban culture. There are no winners in the debate, only a need for co-existence.
Harry Pallenberg, longtime producer for Huell Howser and the director of "Shotgun Freeway," is making a documentary on the racing years in Southern California, based in part on Harold Osmer's book "Where They Raced."
A truck parked across three lanes of the Hollywood Freeway near Sunset Boulevard and a band climbed up top to play a song, "Traffic Jam 101," that it says is about raising awareness of homeless children.
Tonight the giant concrete muncher begins taking down the northern side of the Skirball Center Drive bridge over the 405 freeway deep in Sepulveda Pass.
Here's the 7½ route of city streets that will be closed to cars on Sunday for the 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. event.
Tony Castro at the Daily News gives the quick tour of new security features.
Caltrans and Metro have all but finally decided to alter the way the impressively high, 1959-era Mulholland Drive bridge is replaced during the I-405 widening project. It's a simple change that will reduce headaches and could save $10 million.
City Controller Wendy Greuel will release an audit tomorrow of the city's 32 red light cameras, discussing why they weren't placed at the most dangerous intersections and concluding that the program "cannot document conclusively an increase in public safety."
Channel 2 has mapped the locations of what it calls the only cameras in the state placed to catch drivers running stop signs.
The Daily Journal's Ciaran McEvoy seems to have this alone, in today's paper.
The Strand, a program on the BBC World Service, features a segment on One-Ten, the opera being composed in serial form along and about the Pasadena and Harbor freeways by Los Angeles Magazine.
The image of a girl painted on the pavement is being tried in lieu of speed bumps, or humps if you prefer.
Complying with the parking limits isn't enough to avoid a ticket at the city's new "smart" meters — which have more ways to fail than the old ones.
The Eric Owen Moss art tower beside the Expo Line, as observed by John Rabe, Mark Peel and Scott Timberg — and Moss.
Well it could happen, right?
Adam Nagourney's first piece as L.A. bureau chief: traffic on the 405.
The Beverly Hills PD cracked down on drivers failing to yield to a plainclothes officer crossing Wilshire Boulevard at Palm Avenue, the intersection where the city says it gets the most complaints.
Steven Slater, the Jet Blue flight steward who quit so dramatically after being hit on the head by a passenger's bag, has been posting over the past year about the trouble caused by the increasing number of bags in airliner cabins.
Last week's video of the future Expo Line route across part of the Westside is the starting point for tonight's LA Observed column on KCRW.
Clifford V. Johnson, the blogging and bike-commuting USC professor, speaks up for bicycle sharing after seeing it in London.
Immigration rights protesters in chains have blocking the intersection for several hours, but the LAPD has issued a dispersal order. Media reports have the cops moving in to cut chains...
Say that Metro Rail ever reaches as far west as Westwood Village. It's going to need a station. But where should it go?
Food writer Barbara Hansen watched last night as a guy pulled into a parking spot on a trendy block of Beverly Boulevard, wrapped a shirt around the parking meter and strolled away with two women. She got a photo.
he Sunset Boulevard bridge over the 405 freeway in Brentwood is being torn down, piece by piece, for replacement. When it was completed in 1956, the road was still being called the Sepulveda Freeway.
Mark posted this earlier at LA Biz Observed, but everybody I've shown it to loved it so much here it is again.
Maybe it's more like a flackable moment, an easy way to throw a bone to bicyclists.
County Supervisor Don Knabe is the chair of Metro this time around and, as such, learns how to drive a bus.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was riding in a bike lane on Venice Boulevard in Mid-City before 7 p,.m. tonight when a taxi pulled in front of him.
A head-on crash this afternoon involving a semi-truck and more than one car blocked all lanes of Sunset Boulevard for awhile at Bellagio Road, adjacent to the north side of UCLA in a spot called Dead Man's Curve in L.A. lore.
That $1 billion project to mess up traffic across the Westside and Sepulveda Pass for years — oops, I mean add a carpool lane to the 405 freeway and modernize...
Lane closures after 10 a.m. at Sunset Boulevard.
Gayle Anderson's segment at Santa Monica beach went on despite a parking officer scribbling out tickets, perhaps not knowing she was on live across Southern California.
Mike Barbour, the project manager on the big 405 freeway rehab and widening project from the Westside through Sepulveda Pass to the Valley, will take questions on the Metro website from noon to 1 p.m. on Wednesday.
There's some kind of demonstration on Wilshire Boulevard in front of the Westwood federal building
My KCRW column airing this evening at 6:44 p.m. talks about the San Diego's place in the delicate organism of Westside traffic and more broadly how it has shaped Los
Angeles.
Photojournalist and blogger Ted Soqui was riding with the L.A. Wheelmen on Mulholland Drive when they came across Jay Leno, loading his 1963 Porsche onto a truck.
Expect a busy night of work and traffic disruption on the San Diego Freeway below Sepulveda Pass (on the Westwood side, not the Valley side.) Here are the scheduled closures.
I've ranted a little bit before about the second-rate practice of naming freeways and other big public works for minor political players and less-than-extraordinary do-gooders — I believe I said...
The 10,000 fancy new parking meters being introduced around the city are getting most of their attention for being solar powered and taking credit and debit cards. But the fanciest thing about them is that they will let the city raise parking rates block by block and hour by hour in response to demand — or the desire to alter behavior.
The 405 freeway widening project begins a new phase this week, and you're not going to like it. Got to be done, but still — beware if you can. There will be full freeway closures at night this week and next heading up into Sepulveda Pass from the Westside, for restriping of lanes. That's because this month a giant "hoe ram" — a crane equipped with a massive jackhammer — will begin smashing the Sunset Boulevard bridge over the freeway.
Crushable nose cones, engineers placed above crash zone, other improvements.
TV loves to "investigate" valet parking in Los Angeles, but this time Channel 4 turned up the interest factor to show that there are few rules governing valets and fewer protections for drivers. Ana Garcia became a valet.
We're locked in pre-June gloom on the Westside these days, but Katie Keating had a ray of virtual sunshine find her on the freeway this morning.
Patt Morrison is stretching but only a bit when she writes that Monday's closed-casket viewing at the Police Administration Building — and Tuesday morning funeral at the cathedral — "will be the closest thing to a state funeral that Los Angeles could have."
That planted rectangle on the 110 near Downtown that Caltrans sold to Toyota last year for a Prius ad is being given a baseball-themed message.
President Obama will arrive a little before 5:30 p.m. Monday to raise L.A. campaign cash for the Democrats — Sen. Barbara Boxer and the DNC specifically — and wreak a little unfortunate havoc with local mobility. At least it will be a Monday, so the natural afternoon traffic should be a bit lighter than usual — but there's a Kings playoff game at Staples Center at 7 p.m.
Mandalit del Barco of NPR's Los Angeles bureau has the latest story, airing today on "All Things Considered," on the mixed bag you get with red light cameras.
The news blog of the Glendale News-Press and its sister papers has a story up about a local car reaching 500,000 miles — and it's the car driven by the husband of the managing editor of the La Cañada Flintridge paper.
Five people, possibly four of them children, died in the crash during a rain downpour just after midnight where I-5 and the 14 meet in the Newhall Pass entrance to...
Tina Dupuy at Fishbowl L.A. says the runners she has heard from had tons of horror stories about pre-race traffic, the course and the experience for runners after they finished the race. Especially the traffic.
Marathon organizers are advising runners to get out early Sunday since getting to Dodger Stadium could prove difficult: "ARRIVE EARLY! We suggest you be there by 5:30am.," says an official tweet. Plus street closures, bus changes and more.
In honor of Angels Flight re-opening Monday to paying passengers, let's return to the days when the funicular originally called the Los Angeles Incline Railway was an integral part of Downtown life.
A $300,000 grant from the South Coast Air Quality Management District will pay for free shuttle buses this season between the stadium and Union Station. The service was cancelled last season when neither the city nor the Dodgers wanted to pay for it.
You'll start to see K-rails brought onto the San Diego Freeway tonight as part of the carpool lane and bridge repair project in and around Sepulveda Pass.
KCAL's news went out in the field this afternoon for a report from that Prius flower patch beside the 110 freeway where that makeshift memorial to Toyota victims was taken down — four days ago.
White crosses were laid out over the former site of Toyota's floral ad for the Prius beside the Pasadena Freeway near Downtown. A sign reads, "You Reap What You Sow."
No criminal charges are expected in the death of Julia Siegler, a 13-year-old eighth-grader at Harvard-Westlake School who was struck by two cars Friday morning while crossing Sunset Boulevard.
Metro just tweeted that restriping of the northbound lanes has been completed for now. Southbound restriping won't begin until March 3 at the earliest.
Northbound freeway traffic was snarled briefly near Getty Center Drive.
A car got in the way of a northbound Gold Line train about 1 p.m. at the Glenarm crossing north of Mission Station. At least one person is injured.
Now that the Metropolitan Transportation Agency has spent 15 years and $32 million fighting the giant engineering and construction contractor Tutor-Saliba-Perini, staff writer Gabe Friedman asks a reasonable question in Friday's L.A. Daily Journal: what price is too high for a legal victory?
When work begins Wednesday night on the Sepulveda Pass Widening Project — the first full closure of the northbound freeway is after midnight — Metro's man in charge will be an Iraq veteran.
Superior Court Judge Scott T. Millington expressed doubts about Dr. Christopher Thompson's remorse for stopping short and injuring two cyclists on Mandeville Canyon Road. Millington also claimed the five-year sentence...
You have until Jan. 31 to pick up your car.
Cruising the canyons in a Gullwing and telling tales of Steve McQueen drag racing.
Think the new construction project only affects the freeway? Ho ho ho.
Thirty-two Los Angeles intersections now have cameras installed to generate traffic tickets and, thus, revenue for the city and the company that runs the cameras. Contrary to the original intent,...
Yeah, Metro CEO Art Leahy changed course and approved running free all-night service on the Metro Orange Line this New Year’s Eve — after the Daily News reported that the...
The 8½-mile light-rail line would run from the Expo Line at Exposition Boulevard to the Green Line at Imperial Highway in El Segundo. The route chosen today follows Crenshaw Boulevard...
The highway is now open through the San Gabriel Mountains, though caution is urged due to crews clearing rocks and high winds....
An elevated portion of the Gold Line today runs past the Capitol Milling Company plant in Downtown. From 1889 to 1896, the Cape Horn Viaduct also carried passengers past the...
Some streets are already closed for Sunday's Hollywood Christmas Parade, aka the parade that refused to die. Hollywood Boulevard from Orange Street to Highland Avenue and Orange from Hollywood Boulevard...
Caltrans has quietly installed new directional signs over the northbound 110 freeway out of Downtown, in the process taking down one of Los Angeles' all-time great guerilla art installations. In...
Cellphones, GPS and the struggling economy are conspiring to begin the die-off phase for regular traffic reports on your car radio, says Daisy Nguyen at AP. (She could have cited...
The inveterate urban explorers at Southern California Transit Advocates came up with a pretty cool Day After Thanksgiving outing this year: they will ride all four Metrolink lines on Friday,...
More LA Sketchbook by Steve Greenberg...
Tough situation in the mid-city area, Susan Kennedy's future with Schwarzenegger, Playboy's possible sale and more after the jump — including a Larchmont shop trying to change the rules it...
CBS 2's David Goldstein and team got the data from the city and found that instead of fewer accidents, the number of traffic accidents has gone up at most of...
After the city built its plans for a Downtown clean-tech corridor around Italian rail car maker AnsaldoBreda, and the MTA bent over backwards to work with the company despite its...
TMZ's cameras caught Maria Shriver, the wife of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, parking her Escalade in a Santa Monica red zone for almost an hour. She released a statement this afternoon...
The first is more of a website than a blog, by ex-Los Angeles Daily Journal editor Martin Berg. He's editing Where's Our Money? for Harvey Rosenfield's Consumer Education Foundation, billed...
There's no need for a special law banning options other than a tunnel for extending the 710 freeway from Alhambra to Pasadena, Gov, Schwarzenegger's veto message said. South Pasadena had...
I joined some media and blog folks at the KCET studios the other morning for a preview of the second season of "SoCal Connected," the PBS station's weekly news program....
Matthew Fleischer was in the audience last week for Talking Heads founder David Byrne's appearance at Aloud to talk about his new book, "Bicycle Diaries,” and Los Angeles. The event...
An L.A. Times investigation found that Metrolink trains have killed 244 people in 15 years, and that unsafe conditions have been allowed to continue at some intersections and rail crossings....
Mayor Villaraigosa and the unions got their way — the Italian rail car builder with the spotty record will now be the provider of choice for L.A.'s transit future. The...
An LA Observed reader driving north on the 110, somewhere below the Santa Monica Freeway, emails that the Caltrans info sign that predicts travel times was for once indisputably accurate:...
Phase 1, going from downtown to Culver City, was supposed to be finished in 2010, but now they're talking about only a partial opening. Spokesperson Gabriela G. Collins tells Curbed...
A doctor jaywalking across Sepulveda Boulevard near LAX was struck and killed Wednesday night by a passing car. The car was driven by another doctor, who stopped to render aid....
Always allow one plane length between cars on the freeway, LA Daily wisely suggests....
This week's exploratory subway drilling is scheduled for Monday and Tuesday at San Vicente and Gracie Allen (that's near Cedars-Sinai), Wednesday in UCLA parking lot 36 near Wilshire and Veteran,...
When visiting Venice, notes the blog Yo Venice, "it is advisable not to block a driveway when you park your vehicle. Odds are that two towing trucks, two parking enforcement...
This morning there was the guy running from Burbank to Texas. Now KPCC's John Rabe, riding his bike into work today, ran into a South Korean native named Shine who...
Eerie media silence regarding the return trip to wherever Michael Jackson goes now, and the continuing buildup of costs for public services. Will freeway closures occur again this afternoon? 1:28...
Several dozen black limousines (and other vehicles) are starting to move away from the Jackson family home on Hayvenhurst Avenue, presumably headed toward Forest Lawn. They have a police escort,...
Freeways are uncommonly bad out there today, especially the 405 north due to truck crash in Sepulveda Pass. Incoming councilman Paul Koretz signed his chief of staff: Rich Llewellyn,...
My mention last night of UCLA students protesting a Rose Bowl snub on the San Diego Freeway in 1966 prompted an LA Observed reader to remember a photo he'd seen...
After my observation the other day that the freeways have come into play as spots for protesting pedestrians to swarm, a reader pointed out this article saying the practice has...
Zach Behrens at LAist has gotten together a map showing the overlapping ranges claimed by the seven mountain lions believed to still inhabit the Santa Monicas, Santa Susanas and Simi...
You can now search the websites of Los Angeles County and all of the cities in the county simultaneously, using this custom Google search by Matthew Barrett of the MTA's...
Susan Kitchens was in the fast lane on the 605 last night when a driver sped by in the adjacent carpool lane — going the wrong way! She writes: I...
KTLA reporter Eric Spillman thought he had a good case so he fought the ticket he received via red-light camera while exiting the 2 freeway in Glendale. He won and...
The folks at Discarted take umbrage that a Los Angeles parking officer camped out in a loading zone during her lunch break in East Hollywood....
New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff includes Los Angeles in an essay arguing for steps that should taken in four U.S. cities that would begin "making our cities more...
LA Observed's TJ Sullivan was credentialed into President Obama's town hall this afternoon in Costa Mesa and sent along some photos. He'll have more later at his website. In the...
While you haven't been watching your politicians at work in Sacramento, they have added some unrelated charges to the cost of a ticket. Here's the breakdown of the tab for...
It's not what you think — perhaps, though, it's the logical Darwinian outcome of car culture? Observed Sunday on Reseda Boulevard in Northridge. Video link More LA Observed video: Downtown...
Eric A. Morris, a former writer for television and the Harvard Crimson, is a recurring guest blogger for the New York Times' Freakonomics blog. In his hats as a doctoral...
A wrong-way head-on in the eastbound lanes near National Boulevard about 5 a.m. killed two drivers and still has the area gummed up. The freeway's eastbound lanes and the connectors...
Journalist Joe Mathews has become the latest advocate of a narrow SoCal position to argue that taking his side is somehow a test of whether President Barack Obama truly means...
Say you live on one of those Los Angeles streets with permit parking. Say you want to get a couple of visitor permits so friends or family can visit you...
LA Observed contributor TJ Sullivan talks about the new parking regulation controversy in Los Angeles with Warren Olney on "Which Way, L.A.?" on KCRW at 7:30 p.m. He's up against...
A new staff report from the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority sort of confirms what people involved in the transit arena knew, but may come as a shock to...
Roger Snoble announced today that he will leave soon after seven years as CEO of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Release after the jump....
Bryan Olive, a staffer at the Ayn Rand Institute in Irvine, turned in his leased car last March. In August, the car got a parking ticket in Los Angeles. In...
Steve Hymon's Bottleneck blog is the latest Times staff blog to be folded into L.A. Now, which the paper is trying to deepen and finally build up in hopes that...
You really can't see anything near the coast, and there's a fog advisory in effect until 9 a.m. as far as Downtown that is expected to be a factor for...
Our own Bill Boyarsky, writing at the L.A. Times Op-Ed page, says the crashing economy and the voters' approval of so many funding measures on the November ballot provides an...
There are said to be a handful of minor injuries, plus some disruption of Metro Link service in the Inland Empire. L.A. Now...
Demonstrators upset by the passage of Proposition 8 began at the Mormon temple on Santa Monica Boulevard and have moved to Wilshire and Westwood boulevards, closing both streets. They're targeting...
With officials concerned that commuters will abandon Metrolink, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa plans to meet the buses arriving at Chatsworth station from Ventura County at 6 am. He will then ride...
Supervisor Gloria Molina joined the two Republicans on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to reject placing a sales tax increase question on the November ballot, citing friction between...
The blogger behind MetroRiderLA says the competition from professional transportation blogs and the need to make money — plus plain old blog burnout — nudged him to call a time...
By Bay Area tradition, references to freeways don't carry an article. In Los Angeles we "take the 101" (or "the Ventura Freeway") but up north they just "take 101." Times...
This winter skiers and snowboarders will be able to fly to Mammoth for the first time in years. Tickets go on sale Monday for new Horizon Airlines service from LAX...
Christopher Thomas Thompson, who turns 59 today, has been charged with two felony counts each of reckless driving causing injury, battery with serious bodily injury and the special allegation of...
NPR's Culver City-based show "Day to Day" is running a web series on what gas prices and changing interests are doing to the traditional car-based California culture. The producers have...
From now until November, expect the presidential candidates to be a giant pain in L.A.'s butt. Motorcades shutting down entire freeways, etc. For Barack Obama's appearance Tuesday night at the...
I don't know if National Public Radio's "Bryant Park Project" airs here at all, but if you're interested the show has done a story on the riders who demonstrate by...
David Willis' story was about Los Angeles commuters switching to the tube, if we can call it that, because of the high price of gas. This week I did something...
Most of the tickets issued off cameras in the city of Los Angeles — 80% — are for rolling right turns. Still legitimate violations, but not the super-dangerous red light...
D. J. Waldie rides the bus around Los Angeles by necessity but enjoys it less. The price of gas is pushing more people onto buses at the same time the...
The city of Los Angeles has to complete a thorough environmental impact study before resetting the traffic lights to make parts of Olympic and Pico boulevards function as something like...
The boulevard is closed to traffic from Harvard to Western, and booths have been put up to celebrate Earth Day with a car-free street festival and "special musical yoga experience."...
How many private cars, trucks and other vehicles would you guess are registered confidentially in California, able to escape parking tickets, toll road fees and those red light cameras? Would...
I've received a couple of emails from fans who did just fine getting to the Coliseum game on Saturday, by avoiding the Dodger Stadium shuttles. The funny thing about Saturday...
Take a look at the line for the Dodger Stadium shuttle bus to Saturday's Coliseum game. Jon Weisman blogged that when he left the game early, the line to return...
Last weekend's New York Times did a nice spread on J. Michael Walker and his one-of-a-kind Los Angeles book, "All the Saints of the City of the Angels: Seeking the...
Slope slides down to the street, knocks out power and pretty much screws traffic in that part of Westwood. LAT Also: Commuting isn't fun on Pacific Coast Highway either....
In the course of advising Los Angeles what it needs to become a super-city like London, New York or Shanghai, Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne (in the Sunday magazine)...
The newly completed Mid-Wilshire Signal Sync System, bounded by Hollywood Boulevard, Western Avenue, La Cienega Boulevard and Wilshire Boulevard, synchronizes a total of 256 traffic signals and spans 12-square miles...
With seven residential projects containing 900 units already under construction — and another two dozen projects approved — the most upscale shopping street across the Valley is evolving. But the...
Today is when Hollywood and Highland really starts to feel the pain of hosting the Academy Awards for another year. Hollywood Boulevard is set to close to traffic at 10...
Enough members of the City Council are attending this morning's services for slain LAPD officer Randal Simmons that the regular Friday session was cancelled. TV stations have agreed on pool...
Mayor Villaraigosa told the city DOT today to bar most rush-hour parking as far east as Fairfax and to re-time the lights on Pico to favor eastbound traffic and Olympic...
Here's a nice little story from writer Mark Evanier's blog, called modestly News From Me. Seems he began teaching a humor writing class at USC yesterday, but his car broke...
Gene Maddaus at the Breeze delves into the decision long ago to spend $700 million building the Green Line light rail for 20 miles from Norwalk to Redondo Beach, then...
The Santa Anas are back and the LAFD has declared a red flag day in the hills for Wednesday. Those who live there know what it means: no parking on...
Larry Mantle this morning took on one of the lesser issues of our time, but one that's still interesting and perplexing for locals: should we refer to freeways by their...
Sue Doyle compiles her realities of driving for the Daily News, and some are just so true: If you're waiting behind cars in a left-turn lane, never expect to go...
CityBeat columnist Alan Mittelstaedt FOI'd the chancellor of UC Irvine trying to find out who pressured him to un-hire Erwin Chemerinsky as dean of the new law school, before eventually...
A new book released this week, The Driver: My Dangerous Pursuit of Speed and Truth in the Outlaw Racing World, describes a wild cross-country drive that broke the previous record...
* 8 am update: Lanes were open in both directions this morning. Caltrans district chief Douglas Failing said the southbound lanes of the freeway would be opened through Newhall Pass...
Don't plan on sailing in or out of Los Angeles on Interstate 5 (or the Antelope Freeway, for that matter) any time soon. Last night's conflagration in the truck tunnel...
Richard S. Chang, writing in today's New York Times Wheels section about the pleasures of driving a stick shift: I was living in Los Angeles. Even though stopping and starting...
Transportation planners get mounds of daily data from all the sensors installed beneath Los Angeles streets, but they throw it all away after a few days. The Times reports that...
In response to today's Breeze article on new computerized traffic signals across the South Bay, an LA Observed reader wrote to the Breeze reporter, Gene Maddaus: I noted in the...
All those residential and commercial developments that planners and politicians like to promote near transit lines make getting around harder, since most occupants choose to drive and the businesses attract...
It's illegal to turn right onto La Brea from Clinton Avenue during rush hour, and so many Hollywood traffic cops lie in wait that it has become fun entertainment for...
Highway crews and flagmen working on the widening of California 138 across the Mojave Desert have taken so much physical abuse from motorists that the stretch between Lancaster and Victorville...
Franklin Avenue spotted handwritten signs today on 6th Street near the mayor's mansion in Windsor Square posted to beseech drivers, Burma Shave-style, to SLOW... THE... F**K... DOWN! Photos at the...
Scaffolding has been spotted around the vacant stores at the northeast corner of Wilshire and Barrington, alerting tipster Doug that his commute through the habitually jammed Brentwood-adjacent intersection is about...
Another Gran Marcha to support immigrants begins Tuesday morning at Broadway and Olympic, moves north on Broadway starting at 10 am, and heads to City Hall via 1st Street. Fewer...
John Stodder was one of the smart ones who got to Dodger Stadium early yesterday and was able to observe the mess with somewhat detached eye. He pulls from his...
President Bush has an evening fundraiser in Brentwood, there are accidents on both sides of the 405 near Wilshire, and the northbound Pasadena is backed up near I-5. Luckily, Bush...
Film director Bob Clark and his son Ariel were killed in the crash that kept Pacific Coast Highway closed through the Palisades during today's morning rush hours. Clark directed A...
With this year's new L.A. Marathon route, a lot of people are going to head out Sunday and run into street closures. The map and timetable is more complex than...
Squeaky wheels do get the grease, it turns out. The state transportation commission rethought its earlier decision to leave the freeway out of the spending plan. Also: The day's headlines...
Pasadena keeps the Rose Parade route open to the public pretty much until show time. Ditto for the Los Angeles Marathon. But for some reason, busy Hollywood Boulevard has to...
Throttle Jockey columnist Susan Carpenter walks, talks and rides on her video reviews on the Times website. Today's installment covers three-wheeled bikes and scooters and shows Carpenter whizzing around downtown,...
A crane that fell onto the northbound San Diego Freeway just before the Ventura Freeway in Sherman Oaks about 1 pm has the area a big Friday afternoon mess. The...
Michael Dukakis's campaign to free Westwood of the plague of apron parking — parking in driveways so as to obstruct sidewalks, for the uninitiated — has hit a snag. City...
Protesters against the Iraq war will assemble at noon tomorrow in front of the Democratic Party headquarters at 9th and Figueroa, then march to the federal building via this route:...
→ The Times' Robin Abcarian is filing video updates (left) from Sundance on LATimes.com. → Variety's Gabriel Snyder is jumping to the Los Angeles bureau of W. He will be...
Free today at WSJ.com, economists Peter Gordon of USC and Matthew Kahn of UCLA discuss the costs of traffic congestion: "the problem it poses -- or doesn't pose -- for...
One of the traffic engineers being arraigned today for shutting down four intersections on the day that EAA went out on strike was featured last January in a Downtown News...
What a story. Two high-ranking city traffic engineers, Gabriel Murillo and Kartik Patel, were charged Friday with breaking into the city's automated traffic system and disabling the lights at four...
I won't repeat my rantlet (and here) about casual abuse of the word 'gridlock' by local media and pols. Just check out this photo of the real thing from Xiamen,...
Meant to re-post this oldie but goodie from 2004 for New Year's. On Dec. 31, 1897, a cameraman for Thomas Edison shot movie footage of the street scene in the...
You can ride the buses, Red Line and light rail lines for free from 9 pm Dec. 24 to 2 am on Christmas morning. The fare gets dropped again from...
Laura Mecoy, the Sacramento Bee's Los Angeles reporter, weighs in today with a longish piece on L.A. transit pegged to the revived talk of a subway out Wilshire Boulevard. Mayor...
Brief history lesson and somewhat optimistic view of the future from The Economist: In the past 15 years the city has gradually built a skeletal subway and light-rail system. Thanks...
LA Observed contributor Cari Beauchamp posts at Native Intelligence on the frustration of trying to wrestle answers about her cable service from the voice(s) on the line at Time Warner....
Michael Dukakis, the Democratic candidate for president in 1988, lives in Westwood's North Village during his part-time teaching gigs at UCLA. For two years, the LAT says, he has been...
Item: A big rig rig on the northbound I-5 struck and killed a pedestrian this afternoon near Zoo Drive in the Griffith Park area. Two lanes are blocked. Item: A...
Germany recognizes 648 valid traffic symbols, but all that instruction can leave drivers confused or, perversely, encourage them to drive unsafely. Now seven cities in Europe are going naked —...
Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky says he's actively looking for support to put a county executive initiative on next year's ballot. Voters have rejected the idea of an elected county exec before,...
Veronique de Turenne gives bicyclists their space on Pacific Coast Highway, but asks the same in return. "Share the road, you arrogant cyclists. Sure, it's narrow, sure it's scenic, sure...
Just last September John Catoe withdrew from consideration for the top transit job in Atlanta to remain with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Now today's Washington Post reports that Catoe has...
Mixed in among the nine-hour parking meters on Colorado Avenue in Santa Monica, TJ Sullivan found a stretch of nine-minute signs. It pays to check the details twice. At Native...
Filming for Live Free or Die Hard has been postponed a couple of days, so the production won't be shutting down Imperial Highway beside LAX until the weekend. Previously: Vengeance...
Live Free or Die Hard received the permits it wanted and will be disrupting traffic in El Segundo and the south side of LAX starting Thursday. And not just a...
U.S. District Judge Terry Hatter ruled today that a ten-year-old legal agreement with the Bus Riders Union that prodded the MTA to spend $1.3 billion to improve service for the...
The worst is over on the southbound San Diego Freeway between Sunset Boulevard and the Santa Monica Freeway. After more than a year of orange cones and restricted flow that...
Mayor Villaraigosa returned to City Hall today almost giddy from his fortnight in Asia. Flanked by twenty fellow travelers, the mayor met the media this morning and talked about the...
It just gets worse. Besides the major sporting events that will overlap, officials are warning that the LA Weekly's Detour Festival in the Civic Center and the Grand Avenue Festival...
UCLA has revised the traffic alert for this afternoon that I called unhelpfully vague yesterday. They still won't say that the president is the reason that Westside traffic will bite...
The president of these here United States is going to be on the Westside again tomorrow for a Republican fundraiser. UCLA has given its folks a day's notice, in an...
As of yesterday, the city of Santa Monica is seeking out people who overpaid on parking tickets to give them refunds. The city has collected and quietly held on to...
Times critic Christopher Hawthorne welcomes the revived interest in tunneling a subway under Wilshire Boulevard all the way to the ocean. He writes today about its possible effect on the...
The most meaningful stat in the Times' Sunday page one story about the Westside's awful traffic is that it takes an average of nineteen minutes to travel one mile on...
For his interview on today's "Morning Edition," How To Live Well Without Owning A Car author Chris Balish took the Metro bus to Venice Boulevard and Hughes then rode his...
The weekly Highway 1 section in the Los Angeles Times always skews toward the few who are buying a vehicle and usually has little if any information or fun stuff...
Members of Southern California Transit Advocates like to challenge themselves — and explore the region — by taking long group excursions on public transit. They have gone as far as...
If you watch traffic maps online or listen to radio reports, the earliest freeway snarls are often out in western Riverside County where commuters get up early and begin slogging...
Red-light cameras will be turned on in August at two intersections, LADOT officials said today. The first two corners where tickets will be issued are Laurel Canyon at Ventura boulevards...
Tales about riding Metro Rail and buses make up a growing subset of the L.A. blogosphere. Doc on the Train is written by a resident at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center who...
Los Angeles airport chief Lydia Kennard today described $1.2 billion worth of coming improvements to LAX: an expanded Bradley International Terminal, realignment of the southernmost runway to improve safety and...
The Daily News' Mariel Garza blogs about the physical effects of trading her car for the bus this month. I have two blisters on my left foot -- one on...
My favorite reads of the week have been Thomas Curwen's musings on Los Angeles and the automobile in the Times' commemorative issue of the Highway One section. About Mulholland Drive,...
After two weeks of riding the MTA, Daily News columnist and editorial writer Mariel Garza blogs that she drove her car. "I need to drive for work," I told myself....
At 4 pm, Mayor Villaraigosa will emcee the ceremonial rollout of his Gridlock Tiger Team on Wilshire between Normandie and Ardmore. The office all but promises the media that they...
New at LA Observed
Clinton fundraises in LA
Jim Henson Studios on La Brea became a presidential campaign stop on Thursday.
Brown declares disaster area
The natural gas leak above Porter Ranch now qualifies for various government actions. Story
Performing arts with cheer
Donna Perlmutter closes out 2015 with productions downtown and on the Westside.
