We’re getting excited about our Hey, I’m Walking Here campaign—have you backed us on Kickstarter yet? So excited that we made a new video to talk about why walking and walkability is so important for LA. Check it out!

Thanks to Ana Haase-Reed for making us all look and sound good.

When we were thinking about a special gift to give those who supported our Kickstarter campaign, we quickly realized we had to make a limited-edition Los Angeles Walks bandana. This stylish scarf is not only the ultimate fashion statement, it’s a great way to keep the sun off your neck (or the sweat off your face) in LA’s perfect walking weather. It’s what all the cool kids will be wearing as they walk around LA this summer. Donate now to get yours!

Our incredible graphic designer and steering committee member Colleen Corcoran has drawn every type of walker you might encounter on LA’s streets, from the skateboarding teens in Dogtown to the well-dressed flâneur in Downtown (click to see the image a bit larger). She’s also included plenty of landmarks you might encounter while walking in Los Angeles… how many can you recognize? (We particularly love the drawing of the Bonaventure Hotel!)

Make a pledge of $50 or more to our Kickstarter by May 31 so you can sport the Los Angeles Walks bandana on all your warm summer walks! We truly appreciate your support!

But that’s not the only way to show your love for Los Angeles Walks…

And don’t forget our limited-edition posters, available to those who pledge $20 and up. These would look great in the window of a pedestrian-friendly business!

Of course we’ve also got our awesome buttons featuring all Angelenos on foot (because everyone walks in LA). You’ll get a set if you pledge $10 and up to our campaign.

And there’s even more to choose from! Get all your Los Angeles Walks merchandise, plus tickets to our fundraiser dinner June 1, plus custom walking adventures led by our steering committee by pledging to our Kickstarter campaign today!

We’ve told you all about our Kickstarter campaign and the awesome dinner party honoring our pedestrian coordinators that you can attend if you pledge just $100 to our project. But we also have some pretty awesome rewards at the $250 and up level that include a ticket to the dinner as well as custom walking adventures with our steering committee members! We’ll be featuring them here all week. Be sure to back our project before May 31 to grab one of these one-of-a-kind tours and get up-close-and-personal with these smiling faces (and their feet, of course)…

Have a progressive meal in Chinatown with foodie My La
Chinatown is one of the city’s most pedestrian-friendly districts with plazas and alleyways built for exploring. It’s also a great place to eat your way through an afternoon. Discover all the hidden spots as you dine and stroll with My, our food-loving urban planner. My is the Planning Assistant for the Los Angeles Department of City Planning with experience focusing around environmental consulting, GIS, and transportation planning. She has been working on updating the City’s Mobility Element since October 2011. She’s currently a Master’s Candidate of Urban Planning at Cal Poly Pomona where her thesis examines pedestrian collisions and safety in Los Angeles. If you’ve ever wanted to explore Chinatown’s delicacies—from dim sum to French Dip—this is the way to do it!
Go here for a Chinatown food tour with My!

Join an exploration of urban nature with artist and designer Colleen Corcoran
We might think of LA’s topography as parking lots and freeways, but LA’s filled with rolling rivers, hidden meadows and a certifiable mountain range slicing through the center of town. Head out to explore this inner-city wilderness with Colleen, who draws inspiration for her awesome design work from LA’s natural beauty. (She also organized our hugely successful LA River walk a few weeks ago.) Besides designing our amazing Los Angeles Walks merchandise, Colleen has collaborated on design projects with a variety of local organizations including Metro, The City of Santa Monica, Los Angeles Walks, The Museum of Contemporary Art, LA Alliance for a New Economy, Climate Resolve, Center for the Arts Eagle Rock, and many others. She’s also a founding board member of CicLAvia, where she also does all of their awesome branding and design. If you want to take a one-day vacation without leaving LA, join Colleen to discover the wilderness in your own backyard.
Go here for an urban wilderness adventure with Colleen!

Take a tour of LA’s transportation history with policy expert Mark Vallianatos
Have you ever wondered why LA looks the way it does? Interested in learning what laws and policies shaped the city and made it what it is today? Then you’ll love this walking and transit tour surveying the LA landscape with Mark, who serves as the Policy Director of the Urban & Environmental Policy Institute and an Adjunct Professor in Urban & Environmental Policy at Occidental College. (We just call him “The Professor.”) At Oxy, Mark works on issues of food, transportation, urban design, and campus greening and is a co-author of the Next Los Angeles: the Struggle for a Livable City. Plus he loves exploring the region by food, bike, bus, and train—you can often spot him on the streets thanks to his colorful clothing. This would be a great tour for an architecture or urban design class to take together to gain some awesome insight into what LA has been and what it can become.
Go here to tour LA’s transit landscape with Mark!

Learn how to be a FitBit whiz with master tracker Jessica Meaney
Maybe you’ve been meaning to buy a pedometer so you can track your daily steps, but haven’t quite gotten around to it—then this reward has your name all over it! Jessica will show you how to incorporate more activity into your daily routine, working your way up to a goal of 10,000 steps per day. And this reward includes a free FitBit, which Jessica will show you how to use (and host fun competitions with friends and family). Not only has Jessica has lived car-free in LA for 15 years, she works as the Southern California policy director for the Safe Routes to School National Partnership. There, she works on transportation policy priorities like creating equity in communities, data collection and evaluation, and making sure transportation programs receive adequate funding. If she can inspire kids and families to walk to school, just think what she’ll do for you!
Go here to become a FitBit whiz with Jessica!

Plan your car-free commute with active transportation guru Alexis Lantz
If you’ve ever wanted to try walking, biking or taking Metro to work, but you’re just not sure how to do it or which route to take, this is the reward for you! Alexis will not only teach you everything you need to know about commuting car-free, she’ll actually go with you on your first commute to make sure everything goes swimmingly. Why’s she a such expert on active transportation? For many years Alexis was the Planning & Policy Director at the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, where she conducted the first ever citywide bicycle (and pedestrian) count for the City of Los Angeles and had a hand in shaping policies to improve the city’s bicycling infrastructure. She’s currently a policy analyst with the PLACE Program at the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, so she’s extra-interested in seeing people switch to walking and biking to get to work. This would be a great reward to share with your co-workers, don’t you think?
Go here to take a car-free commute with Alexis!

Check out our Kickstarter now or tuned to learn about more of our custom walking adventures—we’ll be posting more here all week!

We know what you’ve been wondering: How could we possibly top last year’s karaoke fundraiser? This year, we are so excited to announce our first annual fundraiser dinner for Los Angeles Walks!

On the evening of Saturday, June 1, we’re hosting a street food-inspired dinner for LA’s pedestrian advocates honoring our very special guests, LA pedestrian coordinators Margot Ocañas and Valerie Watson. The dinner will be held at the beautiful midcentury modern house of our founder Deborah Murphy, designed by J.R. Davidson and remodeled by R.M. Schindler, nestled high in the hills of Silver Lake. In addition to being an urban designer, Deborah’s also a caterer(!) and has planned an amazing meal inspired by iconic street food of LA.

How do you get tickets to this incredible event? Glad you asked! We’ve launched our Hey, I’m Walking Here! campaign on Kickstarter—if you remember the proposal we did for LA 2050, we didn’t win a grant, so we’re funding it ourselves here. And if you pledge $100, you’ll receive one ticket to the dinner.

Go here to back our campaign and get your ticket to the dinner!

But that’s not all! We also have plenty of other ways to support us…

For a pledge of $10-$50: You’ll be the first to receive our new Los Angeles Walks campaign merchandise like buttons, posters and a brand-new limited-edition bandana designed by Colleen Corcoran.

For $100: As we mentioned above, you’ll get one ticket to the dinner.

At the $200 level: You’ll get a ticket to the dinner as well as all our campaign materials (buttons, poster, bandana).

For just $250: In addition to a ticket to the dinner and all our campaign merchandise, you’ll join one of our steering committee members for a custom LA walking experience. All tours take place in Los Angeles at a time and place which are mutually agreeable to all parties, and yes, you can bring friends:

• Learn how to commute car-free with Alexis Lantz.
• Have Jessica Meaney teach you how to maximize your daily FitBit activity (includes a FitBit!).
• Head out on a transit and walking tour with Mark Vallianatos to learn how land use policies shaped Los Angeles.
• Get a behind-the-scenes look at the Spring Street Parklets with Daveed Kapoor.
• Meet Colleen Corcoran for an urban nature adventure.
• Explore the secret restaurants and alleyways of Chinatown with My La.
• Have Alissa Walker design you an architectural walking tour that ends with ice cream.

And for $500: You’ll join L.A.’s pedestrian coordinator Valerie Watson and our founder Deborah Murphy on a very special walk to learn practical, actionable steps for how to improve a street or block in your own L.A. neighborhood. This would be a great benefit for a school or neighborhood group to share. And you’ll receive TWO tickets for the dinner and two sets of all the campaign merchandise as well.

But hurry… tickets for the dinner and these one-of-a-kind experiences are limited, so back our campaign now so you don’t miss out. Support our campaign today!

The First Annual Los Angeles Walks Fundraiser Dinner
Honoring LA’s pedestrian coordinators Margot Ocañas and Valerie Watson
Saturday, June 1
6:30 to 10:30 p.m.
At the home of Deborah Murphy in the Silver Lake neighborhood of LA
Cuisine inspired by iconic LA street food
Address and directions provided via email to attendees
Tickets can be purchased here
Invite people on Facebook

Please note that your payment will show that it’s going to the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition. LACBC is graciously acting as our fiscal sponsor since we are not yet a nonprofit. That means that they will receive and track all the payments for us, then turn the money over to us. We’re very appreciative of all their help!

If you’d like to purchase multiple single tickets to the dinner only, you have two options:

• Each attendee can log in and back the project separately, choosing the $100 reward.
• You can pledge the total dollar amount ($300 for three tickets, for example) and choose the $100 reward. In that case, please email us at hello at losangeleswalks dot org to let us know to reserve extra spaces for you.

All details about the dinner including address and directions will be sent to backers via email. Read more about our campaign here. See you on June 1!

Thank you so much for your support!

Hosted by the Los Angeles Walks Steering Committee: Deborah Murphy, Alexis Lantz, Jessica Meaney, Colleen Corcoran, Alissa Walker, Mark Vallianatos, My La, Daveed Kapoor, and Tilza Castillo

So maybe KCET heard us when we gave a thumbs down to their SoCal Connected episode on pedestrian safety? This week the public television station debuted City Walk, a new documentary series that explores walking in America. We were delighted to see none other than our city’s great food critic Jonathan Gold interviewed in the first episode, talking about the walkability of Old Pasadena.

Look for us in the next episode, airing on Thursday, May 30 at 10:00 p.m. on KCET when the producers caught up with us during our WalkLAvia at the last CicLAvia. You can also watch the show online.

On Thursday, May 9th from 7-10pm, Hub Los Angeles and thrdPlace invite all LA2050 applicants and Los Angeles Walks supporters to attend a celebratory evening of connections, ideation, and collaboration. The Hub Los Angeles community, a innovative co-working space in Little Tokyo, had 11 of its members participating in the Goldhirsh/LA2050 competition.

Bike Local, Shop Local (Green Octopus Consulting)
LA Street and Sidewalk Entrepreneurs Initiative (ELACC and LURN)
Impact Farms
Isidore Recycling
Filmanthropos
Los Angeles Walks
Media Lab @ Hub LA
Strivers.LA
Take Back the Grid
thrdPlace
verynice design

Together with thrdPlace, HubLA, and us (Los Angeles Walks) we invite you to continue the collaboration around these exciting projects in the spirit of building the future of Los Angeles and join us on May 9th.

The goal of the night is to provide a friendly place for applicants to share ideas, challenges, calls to action, and find support from those that share their mission. Hub LA will be showcasing our 11 member applicants, and we will help facilitate and host eight roundtable discussions for each proposal to see what we can move forward together to extend the impact of LA2050.  Come join us as we brainstorm how to launch our “Hey! I’m Walking Here!” campaign.

Join us for an evening of celebration (light food and drink provided!) and collaboration. The event is free; kindly RSVP your attendance.

Thursday May 9th, 7-10pm HubLA 830 Traction Ave, a few blocks walk from gold line Little Tokyo Metro station.

On April 21, during the last CicLAvia (to the Sea!), we organized a Westside WalkLAvia from the Culver City Expo Line station all the way to Venice Beach, about five miles.

About 30 walkers started the WalkLavia, but due to the looooooong distance and because there was so much to do along the way (so many great hubs!), we started to spread out quite a bit.

Luckily we ended up recruiting lots of walkers along the way, encouraging folks to walk with us (or walk their bikes) for a few blocks.

We had plenty of great LA Walks signage thanks to our captain of flair Jessica Meaney!

And we were even trailed by a documentary film crew! More on that later!

We weren’t the only ones walking CicLAvia, we saw lots of joggers and several marching bands.

Plus walking put us at just the right speed to take in all the entertaining elements of the day. Like the costumes!

And our Los Angeles Walks mascot Fiona was a star of the street, of course.

After five miles of walking, our trek to the sea wouldn’t be complete without a quick dip in the Pacific Ocean! Thanks to warm temperatures and sunny skies it was a perfect day at the beach.

We were honored to have the awesome Bob Inman lead the walk. You can join his regular walks throughout LA, including the “prologue” to the Big Parade, coming up on Friday, May 17.

While most of the walkers peeled off in Venice, Bob’s walk included a return trip through the beautiful walkstreets and canals of Venice, as well as a few public staircases in Mar Vista. Eight walkers logged an incredible 15 miles during the day!

Check out more photos on our Flickr or over at Facebook (thanks to Bob for some of these great photos)! And yes, we’re definitely planning another outing for the next CicLAvia on June 23—save the date!

Late in 2012 the Los Angeles Departments of Transportation and City Planning released their revised Mobility Element plan looking at new ways of moving around the city by using its streets for mobility and beyond. You can see all their recommendations at the LA2B.org site. In January, Los Angeles Walks responded to their Recommendations for a Pedestrian-Enhanced Network with this letter.

The city held two meetings to present the documents, which we attended. They are looking for public comment throughout May, so please read more about how to submit comments or email my.la@lacity dot org

Claire Bowin and My La
Los Angeles Department of City Planning
200 N. Spring Street, Room 667, MS 395
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Re: Comments on Mobility Element EIR Scoping Documents Regarding Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts and Vehicle-Enhanced Networks

Dear Ms. Bowin and Ms. La,

Los Angeles Walks is writing to provide comments on the Scoping Documents of the EIR for the City of Los Angeles’ Mobility Element Update. Los Angeles Walks is a volunteer supported organization dedicated to promoting walking and pedestrian infrastructure in Los Angeles, educating Angelenos and local policymakers concerning the rights and needs of pedestrians of all abilities, and fostering the development of safe and vibrant environments for all pedestrians.

We would like to reiterate our support for the Mobility Element Update, and its embrace of complete street principles, that we shared in our comments submitted in January of 2013. In that letter, we expressed the need for a pedestrian-enhanced network in the Mobility Element. Los Angeles Walks is pleased that the City has developed a concept for Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts.

We are submitting these follow-up comments to share our thoughts on the Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts Guide and on the Vehicle-Enhanced Network Guide. We view the former as a positive step towards building a more walkable Los Angeles and we are providing feedback on expanding the treatments and policies that can enhance the walking experiences in these districts. Los Angeles Walks opposes the establishment of a Vehicle-Enhanced Network as written since some of the measures identified for the network would endanger pedestrians and other road users; reduce the walkability of streets; generate increased driving, pollution and greenhouse gas emissions; and undercut the complete street goals of the Mobility Element update.

I. Feedback on the Proposed Pedestrian Enhanced-Districts

Los Angeles Walks supports the inclusion of Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts in the mobility element as a way to enhance walking in areas of the city that are heavily used by pedestrians and/or areas with potential as spaces for walking. While we believe that every street and public space in Los Angeles should be a safe and pleasant place to walk, Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts can help create highly walkable areas that can be expanding centers and hubs for pedestrian streets, neighborhoods and lifestyles. We have several suggestions for developing, locating and maximizing the benefits of these districts and related pedestrian enhancements:

• Examine other indicators of pedestrian activity. The factors and data that the City analyzed to create an initial map of potential areas for Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts are all useful indicators of places that should be enhanced for walking. We encourage the City to also identify areas with low rates of car ownership (in order to enhance equitable access) and high frequency transit corridors.
• Add enhancements beyond the sidewalk. As we noted in our January comments, improved sidewalks and safe crossing are essential for safe walking but the nature of the surrounding street and built environment are equally critical to make places where people actually want to walk. Moderate enhancements should include zoning as Pedestrian-Oriented Districts and measures you’ve already included in Vehicle-Enhanced Network concept to “consolidate driveways; for new developments, restrict driveways where side street or alley access is available.” Comprehensive enhancements should include traffic calming, lower speed limits, bans on auto-oriented land uses such as drive-thru restaurants, and prioritization for parklets and street plazas.
• Create pedestrian-friendly corridors between Districts. Certain streets that may not qualify for pedestrian enhancement because of lower population density and fewer surrounding amenities may still need pedestrian enhancement due to their use by local residents and at-times dangerous conditions for walking. For example, residential streets (especially those in hilly areas that lack sidewalks or those used as cut-throughs between busier streets) deserve enhancements to make neighborhoods more walkable and to become safe links between residential areas and the denser Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts.
• Link Districts in a Pedestrian-Enhanced Network. One solution might be to follow the model of the Los Angeles Bicycle Plan and consider Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts as the equivalent of the Backbone Bike Network. Residential streets in need of pedestrian improvements could become the equivalent of the neighborhood network, receiving traffic calming or shared street treatments.

 II. Opposition to the Vehicle-Enhanced Network

Because two of the biggest obstacles to walking in Los Angeles are a legacy of car-oriented traffic engineering and the resulting real and perceived danger that vehicles pose to pedestrians, Los Angeles Walks also examined the draft of a Vehicle-Enhanced Network (VEN). We consider it to be unacceptable as currently presented due to the inclusion of measures that would make streets less walkable and more dangerous. Some of the proposed interventions in the concept, such as expanded express parking meters and restrictions on driveways, make sense. Others, including more roundabouts and more left-turn arrows, can be beneficial if designed to protect pedestrians rather than purely to move through traffic more quickly. However, we have several objections to the Vehicle-Enhanced Network as presented.

1) The VEN runs counter to five of the six goals of the Mobility Element:

• Streets prioritized for cars do not put Safety First. The VEN violates the purpose of Complete Streets by endangering some road users (pedestrians and cyclists) to grant quicker movement to vehicles. Increasing vehicle traffic and increasing vehicle lanes will likely lead to more crashes, injuries and fatalities. As Jeff Speck points out in his book Walkable City, large cities in the United States with wide, fast streets prioritized for vehicles have up to five times the traffic fatality rates as big cities with streets designed for, shared by (and slowed down by) pedestrians, cyclists, vehicles and transit.
• Streets enhanced for vehicles are not World Class Infrastructure. Adding vehicle lanes runs precisely opposite to the international movement for world class streets, which embraces a Complete Streets philosophy and focuses on road diets, bus rapid transit, protected bike facilities, green infrastructure, and placemaking rather than lane and traffic expansions. If anything, the Vehicle-Enhanced Network would move Los Angeles back decades by embracing the traffic-engineering mistakes of the past. Removing street parking for vehicle lanes is a goal that goes all the way back the 1924 Los Angeles Major Traffic Streets Plan and its condemnation of the “promiscuous mixing of different types of traffic” (through trips vs. local trips). It is not a serious or forward-looking priority for 2013 and beyond.
• Streets enhanced for vehicles do not provide Access for All Angelenos. First, almost 20 percent of households in Los Angeles do not own cars, and private vehicle ownership is the most expensive of the common forms of urban mobility. In addition to being inequitable, redesigning streets to advantage the movement of more vehicles would reduce access to Angelinos utilizing active transportation. Heavier traffic flows create streets where most people do not feel safe riding bikes. More obese streets also widen the perceived and actual distance that walkers will need to travel to cross traffic, endangering pedestrians and discouraging people from walking.
• Streets enhanced for vehicles certainly do not promote a Clean Environment and Healthy Communities. Increased vehicle miles traveled combined with less walkable and bikeable streets will lead to more crashes, injuries and fatal injuries, air pollution, asthma, cancer, physical inactivity, cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, and greenhouse gas emissions.
• Streets enhanced for vehicles are not Smart Investments. Streets bring economic value to communities and to the City when they become good places with diverse land uses that support local businesses and other places for people to shop, stroll and connect. Streets designed to allow as many vehicles as possible signal that these places are areas to avoid. These mini-highways drain value from the local and city economy. There are many areas on streets chosen as part of the potential  Vehicle-Enhanced Network that have potential as walkable places and/or that are heavily walked and used by local residents despite poor design. These streets and neighborhoods should not be further harmed by increasing vehicular traffic.

2) The VEN is unlikely to achieve its implied purpose of reducing vehicle congestion. Studies agree: Increasing vehicle travel speeds increases congestion because induced demand from more car lanes will cause more driving. The wider streets of the VEN will again fill with cars, leading to more demand for more road widening, and a downwards cycle of frustrated drivers, dangerous streets, and a more polluted, less healthy city. Fortunately, there are alternatives to road expansion. Provision of alternative forms of transportation is important. Land use rules and forms that enable people to live closer to where they work, shop and recreate are also critical since proximity is ten times more effective than speed in allowing people to reach more destinations. (There are many studies to support this: go here and here [PDF] to read more.) Fortunately, the City of Los Angeles is updating community plans, studying transit corridors and preparing to update its zoning code, so there is an opportunity to align land use and mobility to promote walkable communities rather than design wider, more dangerous vehicle-enhanced streets.

3) Los Angeles Walks is doubtful that the City of Los Angeles needs another Vehicle-Enhanced Network. Los Angeles already contains a quite large Vehicle-Only Network: 181 miles of highway. Most of the 6500 miles of L.A.’s streets have been widened and sped up in past decades so that nearly every mile of the street grid is prioritized for vehicles. After a century of favoring cars on the streets of Los Angeles, it is time to prioritize people.

In conclusion, Los Angeles Walks strongly supports the Pedestrian-Enhanced Districts and opposes the Vehicle-Enhanced Network as proposed in the EIR Scoping Materials.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on this critical element of the City’s General Plan that will move Los Angeles into the 21^st century with strong support for active transportation that complements our dynamic communities.

Please feel free to contact us if you would like to discuss these or any other ideas in more depth or if you have any questions or concerns regarding our comments.

All the best,
Deborah Murphy, Executive Director
Los Angeles Walks

CC: Los Angeles Walks Steering Committee

Top image: Sunset Triangle Plaza is a great example of what could become the center of a Pedestrian-Enhanced Network.

As the Executive Director of Los Angeles Walks, I should have been thrilled when KCET’s SoCal Connected aired a segment on pedestrian safety a few weeks ago. The potential for the segment was huge: It could address a critical issue facing pedestrians in Los Angeles on a mainstream television program where it could be explored in depth for all of us to discuss and debate. (You can watch the full episode here.)

In fact, back in December of 2012, I had received a call from the producer of the program asking me for advice on the segment.

I was excited by the variety of issues the show could address. We could talk about the way pedestrians are not prioritized in the city’s infrastructure, looking at intersections, mid-block crosswalks, driveways, parking lots, and hillside streets lacking sidewalks. We could talk about pedestrian safety technology devices, including design and engineering ideas being introduced in LA that function as traffic calming. Or we could talk about how more teenagers and young adults are choosing to walk, bike and take transit instead of running out at age 16 to get their drivers’ license and buy a car.

But instead, KCET chose to focus on a very small part of the pedestrian safety world and puzzlingly devoted almost the entire segment to their criticism of the installation of high-visibility crosswalks in the City of Los Angeles.

High-visibility crosswalks—which many of us have called “zebra-striped” crosswalks forever, now known as “continental” crosswalks—are the new City of Los Angeles standard crosswalk design and their installation is being prioritized by LADOT (the City’s transportation department) by locations with the highest number of pedestrian-vehicle collisions. (We covered the installation of the city’s first high-visibility crosswalks on our blog in December.) For those of us who have encouraged LADOT to install the continental crosswalks for over 15 years, we are thrilled that this is the new standard and that the prioritization was based on need, not politics.

But KCET had an issue with the LADOT prioritization methodology. They decided that LADOT should have prioritized the locations which saw the most serious injuries as results of collisions—not just the total number of any collisions or injuries.

They also minimized the diversity of the victims of pedestrian-vehicle crashes in the city. When I was contacted by the show’s producer, they asked for a connection to a person they could interview who had been a victim of a pedestrian-vehicle collision. I am lucky that I didn’t know anyone directly, but I did know an African-American friend and colleague of my mother’s who had been in a horrible collision on Florence Avenue in Inglewood near her church in August of 2011. I reluctantly called my mother to ask if she would contact her friend, a long time principal of various schools in the Inglewood Unified School District. My mother’s friend agreed to be interviewed and gave many, many hours of her time to the segment, dredging up the horrible memories of the crash—like being thrown like a rag doll across the street—and reliving all the various surgeries required by her injuries. After giving her time and images of her scars to the KCET cameras, the show’s editors cut her completely out of the segment other than a two-second image of her in the introduction. Instead, the segment mainly focused on one young white woman victim from the Westside—ignoring the fact that the majority of victims of pedestrian-vehicle collisions are Latino and other minorities, and that these collisions are more likely to occur in lower-income neighborhoods.

Another error was an important one when it comes to educating the public about pedestrian safety: KCET used the term “accident” instead of “collision” or “crash,” even after I advised them on why the term is incorrect. The word “accident” implies there was no fault or no possible way to avoid the crash, which most of the time is not the case.

We all waited for months for this segment to be aired on KCET, only to be greatly disappointed by the results. If we truly care about saving lives and preventing injuries, we must present a comprehensive and thoughtful review of the pedestrian safety challenges on our streets. We can’t nit-pick on one issue, like how LADOT prioritized the installation of continental crosswalks, a victory that we have fought long and hard to achieve, at the expense of dealing with the complexity of the pedestrian safety situation. We must hold drivers responsible for the safety of all road users, especially those that are the most vulnerable, like pedestrians and cyclists, and in particular children and seniors.

We must remember that we are all pedestrians in Los Angeles. When we get out of our cars, we are pedestrians. When we get off our bike, we are pedestrians. When we get off the bus, we are pedestrians. We are all pedestrians. Let’s take care of each other out there.

KCET should get out of their news van and get out on the streets.

Los Angeles Walks hopes to take on the challenge of alerting drivers to the safety needs of pedestrians with our “Hey, I’m Walking Here” campaign for LA 2050 and other grant opportunities. We look forward to having all of you join us in our campaign.

—Deborah Murphy

photo: Stephen Villavaso

We had fun walking in the LA River last Sunday with artist/LA-River-Explorer Bettina Hubby. Our walk started out at the new restaurant/residency space on Glendale, Thank You for Coming. We all ordered lunch and headed down Glendale to the river, noting the lively pedestrian-friendly stretch of Glendale Blvd that we passed along the way (the Atwater Farmer’s market, the line of people at Tacos Villa Corona). There were lots of people hanging out on the street in Atwater on a warm spring day in LA. While we walked, Bettina texted us photos of objects, graffiti, artwork, and other things that she had photographed on her walks around the river and surrounding neighborhood, and we became engaged in a scavenger hunt of sorts to find the objects and places in her photos.

We entered the river bikepath and crossed over the Sunnynook pedestrian bridge, where we could look down on the water and wildlife in the Glendale Narrows without the sound of cars passing nearby. As we crossed, we also had a great view of the historic City Beautiful style Glendale-Hyperion Viaduct (built in 1927).

photo: Stephen Villavaso

From there, we walked along the river, stopping at Red Car River Park to see the historic red car pylons, where the Pacific Electric Railway once crossed the river, connecting Downtown LA and Glendale.

Then we sat on the river bank to enjoy this delightful music performance by Bettina’s friend Hélène Renaut.

And finally we headed to Rattle Snake Park to sit in the shade for a bit and talk to George Villanueva about NELA Riverfront Collaborative and their current campaigns. We gave him feedback about our own ideas for the LA River and what it could be.

Our walk wrapped up back at Thank You for Coming, where the TYFC staff had made an awesome + delicious picnic lunch for us. We hope we can collaborate with both TYFC and Bettina again soon!

Update: Our walk was also covered by George Villanueva over at KCET Departures!