How a city in LA is ruining an urban oasis
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- čas přidán 4. 06. 2024
- Culver City city council recently passed a vote to undo some of the recent changes in its downtown district, threatening to destroy the character of a neighborhood that has quickly become one of the most people-friendly parts of Los Angeles.
Chapters:
0:00 INTRO
1:12 CHANGES
2:45 PROBLEMS, AND PLANS FOR THE FUTURE
4:23 THE THREAT
Sources:
moveculvercity.com/
la.streetsblog.org/2022/08/08....
la.streetsblog.org/2022/10/25...
www.google.com/url?q=...
www.lamag.com/digestblog/culv...
www.hackmancapital.com/portfo...
www.dropbox.com/s/qfgbwpkud00...
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• The LA City Destroying...
• Culver City votes to e...
my links:
venmo.com/u/jonmizrahi
letterboxd.com/jonm/
/ @porkbeans
#bikelife #bike #biking #transit #trains #bus #urban #urbanism #politics #culvercity #la #losangeles #california #carfree #biker #bikemonth #city #cityplanning #urbandesign
California's soil was said to be super fertile and productive. People built suburbs on it. Heinous land use.
This is how it is around the world. Cities are built in fertile flood plains or near other economic resources.
California was basically supposed to be Hawaii East. That's why the geography even looks similar in places. But they turned into a massive gravel lot. That being said back in the 60s and 70s and even 80s it was functional and worked and without all the homeless people and traffic it was actually a functional state unlike today.
People built parking lots on it.
@@Distress.But it's usually not as sprawling
LA is the middle of a desert, Einstein. Oranges and palm trees. Nothing is being wasted, so you can put your high horse away, genius.
I work in downtown Culver City. I'm so sad that this happened. The traffic WILL NOT change. It was just as bad 10 years ago here when it was 4 lanes. It's all psychological and absurd.
Agreed. I live there as well, right in the middle of downtown, and have LOVED the walkability and the standalone bike lanes. Sure, I hate driving through town, but I don't wanna spend a lot of time driving there anyway. I park and walk where I want to go, and don't have to dodge 4 lanes of traffic.
@@MikeMallinson Yes. My workplace has a ton of bike racks that people have been using to get to work with as well. Some take the expo line and then bike the rest of the way to downtown. And here's the thing - the expo line connects Culver City to Santa Monica. So living and working in these 2 areas is super feasible using a bike (Santa Monica has an amazing network of bike lanes), but now we're taking a step back for no reason!
No, I did not get stuck in Culver City for like 30 minutes trying to pass a single block 10 years ago. That miserable stretch of road is somehow worse than even Chicago right now. Either make it a real road or just close it off entirely.
@@thirteen12 I mean, Venice literally parallels Culver for huge chunks of it, and when it diverges further, there's Washington. That's what gets me, the traffic on Culver isn't necessary unless you have to be somewhere right on that street. Turning off Venice over by Actors Gang when traffic is at its worst, I'm still at Duquesne in 5-8 minutes max. Annoying minutes, but if I'm going further down Culver there's no reason to have been on Culver that whole time. There are other routes that are better.
@@MikeMallinson Yeah I'm just angry I got stuck there once. They should have put up signs saying "Don't go here, fake ass annoying street" and it would have been fine. I legit prefer Soviet city blocks that don't even contain roads. There's no need to make it shitty for drivers by tricking them, maybe just close it off. Instead I'm stuck looking at dork ass graphic design interns from Ohio at pedestrian crossings every 30 feet, with no bus or cycle to be found.
I'll be so happy once Venice Blvd gets its bus and bike lanes. Right now Venice Blvd is a horrendously dangerous stroad for everyone including car drivers. It would be SO nice if Culver city creates a full-fledged bicycle network. The streets in LA are so wide that it's ridiculous there isn't protected bike lanes on all of them.
They found that in Culver City, Sales Tax Revenue significantly increased on the street after the protected bike lane was put in whereas it stayed the same in the rest of the city. Taking out these protected bike lanes will undermine the downtown.
The deciding vote on the city council was Dan O'Brien. He voted to remove the protected bike lanes and his campaign was funded by a parking garage owner downtown. This IS a conflict of interest and this IS corruption. Once again, the car industry screws over the people in LA by undermining other forms of transit by buying a weak and slimy politician. This needs to stop happening.
Who is they and what is their source on the sales tax revenue increasing after the addition of the protected bike lane? Also, is there reason to believe there is causation or is there simply correlation? The protected lanes were added just just as COVID era restrictions were being lifted across the US.
@@Ph4ttyD the source is the city. You know, the people who collect the taxes?
@@TheRyanHund I asked two straightforward questions. Your snarky tone was unexpected. I had a look into the data. The project was implemented in late 2021. During the implementation timeframe the DTCC corridor saw a drop in sales tax revenue. The next two quarters saw a rise. During this time multiple new businesses opened at the Culver Steps. This retail space was planned and built prior to the project and businesses delayed openings due to COVID. I’ve not seen any data that supports the protected lanes driving an increase in tax revenue. Thus my question about causation vs correlation.
Venice Blvd isn’t remotely as bad as other thoroughfares like Wilshire and Pico…
@@Ph4ttyD Seeing as your first question was already clear from the original post, and your second question came across as loaded with bad faith, I would have been snarky towards you too.
Asking people to prove causality in a retrospective study of a real-world occurrence provides no value to the discussion as that's literally impossible with any retrospective study.
I'm so glad more people are talking about urbanism and walkability! Great job exemplifying just how little time it can take for a place to become pedestrian friendly and how much of a positive impact it has :)
What was the positive impact? Pedestrians were confused/overwhelmed by all the new signals. Numerous stores went out of business. Overall business was down 25-30%. Traffic was gridlocked six hours a day. You couldn't park or rideshare to get there anymore which is where most of the pedestrian traffic comes from.
It has been proven that patrons will go somewhere else if they are forced to walk long distances to get to an establishment. Most of the people you see walking in this video are doing so because they have to. Not because they want to.
It’s great to see more LA urbanist content! LA does have potential as it is actually fairly dense (as an urbanized area it’s actually the densest in the US). The density unfortunately lacks a reasonable structure and there is a serious lack of mixed use zone, but that seems fixable over time.
I think one of the biggest things I have noticed is that almost all pedestrian friendly places in LA have a bit of a Disneyland effect where everything is pretty expensive and it kind of feels like a place pretending to be something that it’s not.
Not just places like 3rd st in Santa Monica, but also culver, abbot Kinney, sunset through silver lake, etc. I kind of wonder if it’s possible to keep a place pedestrian friendly without making it sterile and boring. New York doesn’t have this problem because there’s just such an abundance of pedestrian friendly places.
LA is not the densest, NYC is much denser.
I am referring to this measure en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_urban_areas. Which utilizes census blocks. LA is #1 followed by the Bay Area.
The point is New York has the densest core, but the periphery is less dense. LA lacks a dense core but is pretty uniformly dense across the urbanized area. Having a dense core like manhattan makes transit planning pretty straightforward. All trains except the g and upcoming ibx go into the city. LA really has no equivalent.
@@ficus3929 Walkability in Los Angeles? Do we just pretend LA doesn't have massive problems with crime and street homeless? In many places you have to walk in the street. Did you know 50 percent of the stores on the 3rd st promenade in Santa Monica are vacant? Or that 25 people have died of drug overdoses this year on LA metro trains and busses ? These issues need to be dealt with. Do any of these urban planners ride the LA metro ?
Wow. Shows how out of touch you are.
I find it funny how no one ever points out how WAY more people walk and use public transit in ethic neighborhoods as East L.A. (yes East L.A., not that made up Eastside crap ya'll call Silverlake/Echo Park), Van Nuys, Panorama City, MacArthur Park, Koreatown, Huntington Park, Maywood, and Florence among others.
And guess what, they never implemented bike or bus only lanes but yet we see heavy foot traffic and none of these places have your Disneyland effect.
@@peterwelby
No housing = increased homelessness.
Less walking + more driving means less financially viable local businesses = lower unemployment for poorer individuals.
Less people walking around = less visibility = greater potential for crime
Higher unemployment among poor people + lots of homelessness + no communal visibility = increased crime, increased drug usage and overdose, decreased safety, lower property values etc.
There are two solutions, build everything around the car, build new suburbs that are difficult to get to without a car, commercial properties that are designed for usage with a car, and minimal public transit to allow the worst off just to get to work and nowhere else. So long as a steady stream of housing is available that kinda works so long as you’re ok with increased traffic noise, pollution, long commute times spent in traffic, and a high fatality rate from car crashes and pedestrians being run over, children not playing outside because it’s safer indoors and unpleasant and boring outdoors with nowhere to go, etc. LA is bounded on mountains. Same with San Francisco, and most Western cities. You can’t just expand indefinitely because you’ve already turned your basin into a sea of asphalt and concrete and generic single-story homes. And the valleys directly connecting to the basin. Here in the US we tend to take exception commutes over 1 hour long, given that the cost of driving tends to be high enough to not make it worthwhile. If someone works a part-time job for six hours a day, needs to drive 60 miles to find a place they can afford to rent at that price, drives an old car that only gets 20 mpg, then they’ll need 6 gallons of gas a day. At $4.50 a gallon (being generous), that’s $27 every day. If they work six hours, at minimum wage, they make before taxes, $93 a day. Take away taxes that’s going to be about $87.50 a day. Take away gas, that’s $60.50 a day. At 5 days a week, 4 weeks to a month, that’s on average, $1210 a month. Take away car insurance which is typically a few hundred a month, let’s say ideally it’s only $100, then groceries which maybe if they’re frugal they are able to feed themselves at only $10 per day or $300 a month, and this person is down to only making $800 a month. If someone can not find rent at $800 a month within an hour radius of LA, they can not afford to work in LA. If they can’t afford to work in LA they probably don’t have a job if they stay in California. If they stay then they become homeless. Once homeless, it’s extremely difficult to get a job. People’s hygiene often goes to crap when homeless. Business owners don’t want to hire people who haven’t been able to take a shower in weeks. Being homeless is stigmatized, so people leave. That is effectively an inescapable spire so people often turn to drugs as an escapism, and use the public transit to get out of the weather. The result is an increasingly high number of homeless people as they are priced out of living, but are unable to leave, middle class people fleeing the high prices and increased social problems, and businesses wondering why they can’t find skilled and unskilled workers willing to work for a reasonable price. In short, California today.
The other solution is instead of building housing on the peripheries is to densify in key areas. There needs to be a lot of housing made available though, developers if they’re only allowed to build a few buildings will focus on the most profitable, serving the people who can afford to pay almost any price so long as it’s seen as worthwhile. So lots of housing needs to be built to satisfy the needs of upper and middle class housing so lower class housing gets built. With all those people though, traffic will get worse, so alternatives need to be developed, such as mixed-use development so people don’t need to commute by car to get places, increased walkability and cyclability so more people use less space on the roads, and mass transit to move large numbers of people from one place to another across distances typically requiring vehicular transportation. If homelessness is already a problem, social housing programs need to be put into place so people can get out of the downward spirals they find themselves in. However social housing without bringing down rents everywhere else means they will forever be reliant on charity to have a roof as even with a job, they can’t afford the market price. It will be rough at first. Many people won’t feel comfortable utilizing the new transit, bike paths, and sidewalks. That’s ok. As long as they get built and are being utilized by people they will get safer over time. People are less likely to commit violent crimes in the presence of groups of people. Less people are going to become homeless and be ‘uncomfortable’ to be around, if housing rents go down. As local businesses start to thrive more, money will circulate more in the region allowing more people to have a job reducing unemployment, particularly among less skilled workers. If you don’t like those changes and want to live in an isolated community, personally I recommend rural or smaller suburban areas. Housing is usually cheaper, views are often nicer, and the number of homeless people typically far fewer than in a city. Less traffic, too. I’m from a rural area, and it surprises me how many people living in fairly urban places, seem to think that they live in the middle of nowhere and act like it.
I lived in Culver for 10 years with family of 2 toddlers. We loved it and still do!
You overlooked the new, dense, metro-centric housing east of downtown. It has its own commercial area and is walkable/bikeable to downtown.
The bike lane ending inside a trash
container was very funny
and appropriate...time to take out the trash.
Funny how an urban oasis in the US looks like most western European city centres
They are much more common in our older, East Coast cities that largely predate automotive madness. Our West Coast cities, on the other hand, experienced their major growth periods concurrently with the widespread adoption of the automobile. Los Angeles once had the most extensive electric rail transit system in the world. However, the Pacific Electric was a private venture so, naturally, politicians who'd never built anything of value in their lives decided to pave over the tracks to make room for automobiles. As the United States was helping European nations rebuild their rail infrastructure after World War Two, we allowed our own to decay and cities throughout the country paved over rails to meet the postwar demand for cars -- and the roads upon which to drive them.
Funny how Europe and Japan have top automobile industries and yet still have walkable, livable cities. Why does USA struggle with nuance? Its always one extreme or another over there.
@@stevens1041 The US is actually an extreme country. There are extremely good things about it but it also means it goes overboard and has extremely bad things about it too.
@@stevens1041
The things you find attractive about them, are based on their physical constraints:
a. Both Japan and Europe lack their own energy resources.
b. Both countries had much of their urban centers destroyed during WW2.
c. Both societies being centuries-old, their societies were used to not having cars.
Urban planners there, recognized these 3 physical realities and in many cases, rebuilt from scratch.
The US as a nation, has ample energy resources, lot of "elbow room", and in the case of western cities, grew up WITH the car. The US' urbanization model played to its strengths.
I'm also an LA native; and I've spent much of my adult life living in walkable cities in Europe. Unfortunately, I do not envision a scenario in which LA could ever become truly walkable or accessible by transit. The sprawl of the city precludes this, as even the recently built metro lines kind of drop you off in the middle of suburban-style neighborhoods with no good solution for the last 5-10 miles of travel. Then there's the issue of homeless people, who frequently camp out in the public transit and openly use drugs. No one will ride Metro so long as that's going on. I've never seen such a shoddy public transit system anywhere in the world. I hope LA can somehow change its ways, but I've got major doubts. Thanks for the video!
The other key point is that the Culver City DOT's own study showed that the protected bike lane had 0 impact on congestion. Yet, the city council caved to a vocal minority that believes restoring a vehicle lane will improve the duration of the commute through downtown. I use the protected bike lane on a regular basis and it is the safest I feel on my bike in all of LA. I even made a video showing the difference between the protected bike lane and riding with cars passing mere inches away.
I'm also an Angeleno now living in NYC. Duel resident between Brighton Beach Brooklyn and LA county near SoFi stadium. In my opinion LA will outpopulate NYC in 40 plus year's. LA has plenty on land and areas to work with. While NYC has exhausted it's available land space. I just believe that in LA the Metro has to keep expanding and more condos/apartments with businesses on the street level more are needed. And I feel like the homeless crisis which is happening now will gradually end / numbers will get smaller. LA can be unique as both a vehicle and public transportation success.
I’ve been to LA two times on holiday (from Europe), but I don’t feel the need to visit the city again at all actually. My two trips there where awesome, but it’s so much more fun to explore a city by walking or cycling. You have to rent a car as a tourist.. Cities in Asia are much more fun to explore because of their great walkability and public transport. I really hope that the younger generation will travel outside of the US and see how living in city could be so much better. Or that they simply watch videos like this one and support public transport options and walkability projects!
You don't know what you're talking about.
@@vision-gc4hy Im not trying to hate on you but your comment accomplishes nothing because it just leaves people to guess why you’re angry instead of you explaining the issue you have with their comment.
@@gatleystone2480 I’m not sure either. Feel free to comment you opinion about my comment but this is useless
@@gatleystone2480 Greater Los Angeles has over 18 million people. More people than many countries. Portugal for example has just 10 million. For some to "holiday" in Los Angeles twice and then definitively express what it's about as actual fact is nonsensical. It's also insulting. Just because he opened his mouth and uttered words doesn't make it true or important. I merely said that he didn't know what he was talking about and it's true. You should have interpreted it that way.
There's lots of great cities in the world to visit of course but if you get the chance then LA really does have a lot to offer. Year round nearly perfect weather, excellent restaurants, thriving pockets of the arts, world class museums and and very walkable communities. I'm currently living carless in Hollywood and can make it to everywhere I want to go on the bus or subway as fast as a car can get me there. I love a walkable city and large parts of LA are decidedly not that but I just stick to the parts that are and live here very happily. I love LA!
Great video! It does a really nice job of highlighting the issue.
From only a bike friendly perspective! Narrow and biased report on whats going on in CC. Too much circus “progress” has cost us our traditional relaxed mayberry feel and tooooo much building is creating an overly dense town, saturating traffic! Rather than attack auto drivers, how about setting reasonable limits on how much new building and density increase our area can safely absorb!! Cars are NOT an enemy though you paint them out to be. While some like to bike, and are welcomed to do so, others must use cars to bridge larger geographic areas between school, work, home, and family and some of us arent physically able to bike! Punishing car drivers by painting restrictive circus like distracting street patterns, with signals weve never seen before has made CC downtown dangerous for all!! Perfect example of overworking things in the name of “progress!”
Nice to have a great video from a super small youtuber reccomended for once :)
It's so refreshing to watch a video that keeps it concise instead of adding filler to reach the 10 minute mark
Awesome to see you entering the urbanist CZcams space, advocating for LA! Subscribed.
Also when removing the dedicated bus lane doesn't fix traffic do you suppose they'll complain again?
culver city is a gem
Was! Such a shame
I grew up in OC, went to Berkeley and then NYC for college, and I’m back in OC. Hoping to find a walkable city to live in a few years. Good luck Culver City. Great job and I’m keeping my eye on you.
I can't think of something more stupid than creating a lane specific for bus and bike sharing. Yeah, lets slap together the largest possible vehicle that swerves and breaks a lot with unprotected meat on wheels, nothing wrong can come out of it.
I bike everyday and busses, vans and big trucks are the scariest shit
In 10, 20, 30 years do you really suppose you will be biking around? People get old, bodies become frail. People come to understand the physical risk they are putting themselves in by being on a bike in a sea of cars/trucks/buses.
Eventually, you will join us "old foagies" in a car (or on the bus).
If I commuted to work on a skateboard, I would not expect a special lane for skateboarders.
@@charlesbrown9213 I don't get your point and why it's related to what I've said
I grew up in the West Adams district which is a neighborhood east next to Culver City. Adams Blvd was also redesigned with a dedicated bike lane but with a single car lane on both directions. I like the idea and I’m big on promoting for public transit for LA cause I grew up taking it, but the issue was that the bike lanes affected the working class that lives in LA and work in the westside and having to go through Adams Blvd and Washington Blvd was a nightmare during rush hour. Especially for those that have no choice of traveling by car because there are people like gardens or handyman people who use their cars for work. The bike lane was a great benefit for residents of the area but are a great hindrance for people who need to pass by the area. I think this idea was great but it was poorly executed…
Totally understand. There are always growing pains when it comes to infrastructure changes, but I do think neighborhoods need to prioritize planning around their own residents over people who pass through on their commute (something that Culver City didn't do). In the long term, switching away from car-dependency only helps lower income citizens, who no longer have to pay a huge upfront cost and continual maintenance costs on a depreciating asset. People like gardeners and handymen should still have access to roads, but a general reduced demand for cars would only serve to free up roads to the people who truly need them.
@@j.mizrahi- Don’t shoot the messenger, The homeowners of Culver City (the 50+ years and older) spoke and wanted their lane back.
They were impacted, they are not ready to ride their bikes, take buses, take the unkempt train. It’s ashamed since LA spent billions building it. Sadly they don’t keep them clean and verify whose riding. (the homeless have ruined a great mode of transit)
Culver City residents feel safer in their own vehicle. If everyone lived and worked in the immediate area it would work. Greater LA is vast. People still need to drive.
@@j.mizrahi "Switching away from car dependency only helps lower-income citizens"
EZ there Robin Hood. Maybe we should let the "gardeners and handymen" decide how they want to get around. I know that you know better than the poor people because you took some planning classes at a fancy college somewhere but this comes off as reeking of hubris and privilege. I will say that you did an excellent job on editing and presentation but a far more interesting video would be one on why this project failed, and fail it did. You seem to focus on the usual urbanist boogymen - NIMBYs, Karens, car-culture, neighborhood groups - but there's a lot more here. You present information from the MOVE reports but did you read them all? Have you visited Culver City or biked along the path? As someone with a planning background a number of problems should be immediately apparent as soon as you look around.
@@TonyRogers-gp1fl I do think people should be able to get around on cars! I think the problem is that it's the only option for most people, and it's the most expensive, most dangerous, and least efficient one. Yes, I read the reports, and yes I bike along the path every day. I don't think the implementation of MOVE's changes were perfect by any means (for one, I would have liked concrete barriers or real bollards instead of plastic ones to actually protect cyclists), nor do I think its changes were enough, but it no doubt turned around the vibe of the neighborhood. Sorry you disagree with the premise of my video, but I'm glad you engaged with it nonetheless.
I also didn't take any planning classes in college :)
the 10 is literally 300 feet north of adams
0:29 as a life long new yorker, this blew my mind the first time I went to LA. It's basically just a bunch of suburbs larping as a city.
Please read through to the end you might like the idea. Vision is needed for things to progress!
4:48 Some of the major reasons for opposition to improvements in Culver City are likely due to safety concerns and the lack of good alternative travel options to cars. It is a regional issue beyond just the immediate area. As urban areas become more walkable they also become safer due to more eyes on the street. It is a difficult transition period that metro areas need to go through to progress.
Perhaps Los Angeles would benefit from something like the excellent Modelleisenbahn Wunderland in Hamburg, Germany.
Create an interactive tourist attraction of a model Los Angeles with alterations showing how they can be positively impacted by walkable public spaces, bicycle friendly infrastructure, good transit, beautiful parks, architecture, etc. It would create a social environment where people would inadvertently be talking about such issues, and would pay for itself with ticket sales. People would come to be dazzled by the models and not know that they are getting a lesson in good urban design!
Jonathan, as a former New Yorker and a now Las Angeles resident, you will surely appreciate the the movie Synecdoche, New York. Synecdoche, Los Angeles could be a more positive version.
If you look at the following video you will see all sorts of details of people interacting with their environment, with interesting easter eggs!
Miniatur Wunderland OFFICIAL VIDEO - world's largest model railway | railroad
czcams.com/video/R669l5CA1YA/video.html&feature=share
Good work, keep it up!
It doesn't matter how often we talk about urbanization, LA will never change. It is doomed to forever be carcentric. Culver City proved that point on their most recent vote. Californians apparently prefer grid lock over urbanization.
"Gridlock over urbanization" -- this seems to me to be a false choice. -- The majority of voters/tax payers/citizens will surrender their cars. So converting car lanes to bike lanes only adds to the congestion -- it pushes the same number of cars into few lanes. And who pays for those bike lanes? -- Mostly the gas taxes levied on the cars. If cyclists want bike lanes, how will the cyclists fund those lanes, other than taking money funded by cars to subsidize the cyclists?
If I have a car, I am expected to pay for the 'privilege' of using that car, including the roads. What responsibilities to cyclists have to pay for those bike lanes? Are cyclists fiscally freeloading, then griping about the car commuters who pay for their choice?
I don't think that captures the entirety of what's going on. Have you ever taken Metro? Have you been in the red line? There's more to the story than just, "LA people are dumb".
The traffic is absolutely miserable! Can't have parking and saftety at same time.
Make friends with 50+ home owners and invite them to walk / bike with you. That's how you get the votes.
You get like 5 min in before they start regurgitating right wing talking points as if they are their own original ideas. These type of people only talk and do not listen because they believe their opinion is superior due to their position.
If you really want to implement change, you will want to use a "citizens' assembly" which pulls a sample of the greater population to listen to experts and deliberate before recommending a path forward. This process requires people to understand.
The easier solution is to just ignore them and keep doing surveys and votes, but minimize their results. This is effectively what happens already, but to the benefit of boomers. This is primarily the issue, we are playing by their rules.
Yup. Most cities only care about home owners' opinions.
@@BicycleFunk The boomer generation can't pass away fast enough. We'll be fixing their failures for generations
I think you might have found your audience with this California urbanist content!
Great video. What was the sample size on the survey? And good methodology? Love all the changes cc has been making over the past few years and had a great time with my kids at the steps just the other day.
But part of me also wonders if cc residents love this so much, why didn't they come out big time in the survey to keep it? Typically with initially unpopular but beneficial infrastructure like congestion pricing, we see a ton of hate but then everyone realizes how much better it is and it never goes away..
Great video! Subscribed!
Great video!
As a born and raised Angeleno in East Los Angeles. I realize LA is special and not a city like NYC and Chicago. It's more of a region than a city
the way LA is a perfect American city for developing walkable/transit oriented infrastructure but has the least amount of it will forever grind my gears. I hope in the future LA is more like NYC or european cities
There’s a lot of hype around Culver City as a great urbanist neighborhood. I live here and I think it’s a great spot to live, however, I don’t think it is necessarily the best urban oasis in LA, and I think it is being overhyped a bit. I personally think places like DTLA and Ktown have so much more potential than Culver City, given how much density and mixed use development there is over there, especially in DTLA. The problem is that people don’t want to live in places like DTLA due to the crime and homelessness, but I hope we can make these places more safe and desirable so that people can experience good urbanism.
Also Santa Monica has much more mixed use development and better bike infrastructure than Culver City, and I think Santa Monica is a much better walkable and bikable urban oasis than Culver City.
All that is to say, I think Culver City is great, but I think LA has much more to offer than that. If Culver City wants to take a step backwards, then hopefully other areas can step in a make changes for the better. It will be a loss for Culver City.
Agreed. The real issue preventing us from capitalizing on LA's dense, mixed-use areas is homelessness. If the homeless people aren't taken off the street, then no one will live in these neighborhoods no matter how many bike lanes and cafes they add. How do you think we could reduce the homeless population?
Great video! Shame the city is revoking the progress it made, especially with such specious logic. Hopefully they're not able to actually make good on these reversals.
Are you suggesting that you hope that the will of the people as reflected by the actions of the elected officials is not made good upon? That's a grim view of democracy. Both the implementation and removal of the protected bike lanes in CC have been democracy in action.
@Pat Dwyer My friend, you must not be familiar with politics at the local level. There are plenty of times when good urbanist policy gets approved, like bike lanes, better transit, or dense housing, that then get bogged down in lawsuits, complaints, or other mediums. To suggest that just because a narrow vote of councilors approved something I disagree with means that I should just accept it is naive at best.
@@jamalgibson8139 I didn’t suggest you should accept it. I inferred from the tone of your comment that you hoped the recent actions of the council would get bogged down in the type of resistance that you suggests blocks otherwise good policy. Perhaps I misunderstood. Also how familiar are you with the community’s opinion on this particular project? The council members who were recently elected campaigned while this issue was front and center. The constituency had a great opportunity to pass judgment on the project as implemented and made a choice. This is democracy at work, just as it was when the previous council approved the project in the first place.
The dedicated bus lane was a disaster.
Nicely done
Out of curiosity what role do you think the anti camping law has in any of this? Did you support/oppose or neutral?
yep, there's a need for more protected bike lanes and transit priority. Of course it's hard for people to change their habits when good projects are done piecemeal. We have this same problem in Chicago. I'm optimistic with our new mayor and some additional progressive city council members we can make progress. Rooting for the Los Angeles area to get it together as well.
Yeah I agree with you about the piecemeal thing. It's hard to be successful at this transformation when it doesn't affect enough people at the same time. And the slower it goes, the easier it is to get in the way. These highways we have now were done from the top down and have resulted in them being very sticky and hard to get rid of but progress will someday come.
Just stumbled upon your channel. Adding it to city nerd and free range Asian. Now it’s a triumvirate! ;).
This is why I believe density really needs to come first before the transportation to support them. Density creates demand for more walkable streets and public transit. If you make pedestrian friendly streets, dedicated bus lanes, and bike lanes, if they are empty most of the time, the car dependent suburbanites will want to take it away for their cars.
sometimes its literally the opposite. Many argue you can't build density unless their is viable mass transit options. This is kind of like a chicken or the egg scenario. I think its best to advocate for both as they feed off each other.
@@Noah-jx8qw the people who say that are usually NIMBYs who don’t want density in the first place. You then build the transport infrastructure, then they go - see what a waste of money nobody is using it. You try to amend zoning and parking requirements and then they say no.
Density has to come first unless it’s a brand new area then you can have transit oriented development.
It’s easier to defend something when the people are there using it. But if nobody is using it, it’s difficult for hypothetical future residents to protect something.
@@Noah-jx8qw Ideally the development of one quickly drives the development of the other. Rather than arguing which should come first, we should pave the way for both as quickly as possible.
How many people per square mile should there be, for the demand for walk-able cities to exist.
Give me a number, or you will look stupid.
@@ImBalance This is more of a political argument rather than a technical one. When NYC instituted their bikelanes and pedestrian lanes, there was immediate response - people use them, enjoying them, and the benefits were clear from day one. Those people will defend these changes because they are there to enjoy them.
Contrast with LA, not a lot of people using them, car drivers will be politically mobilized to undo these changes and there aren't enough people to defend them. Then they say, see we don't have good pedestrian infrastructure therefore we cannot have density. Which is just a tactic since they don't want density in the first place.
Well done, Jonathan; so proud of you
Unfortunately for Los Angeles, by the time they woke up (really were forced into by a consent decree due to lousy overcrowded bus transport) about 30 years ago, the local suburbs population which already had skewed to established single family homes was well on its way to further ageing of said population. I don’t think you’re going to get them out of their cars and onto bikes. Simultaneously there is the hopeful younger generation that might have an eventual political impact. But they are pit against the staid property tax payers who are known voters for the establishment. So it’s a push-pull dynamic.
I mean...there's also the issue of the transit system itself. Have you ever actually taken the red line? It's a zombie apocalypse down there. No sane person rides Metro.
Seeing one level single use commercial on a downtown corner lot is SUPER depressing- especially in an area that supposed to be experiencing thoughtful urban design
So the Main Street, Montana, and Promenade areas of Santa Monica are super depressing? They seem really popular and iconic. So does Melrose, Fairfax, La Brea, Larchmont, Abbott Kinney, Venice, etc. I've also heard that people like Beverly Hills. Lots of one-level, single-use there. Maybe we should just bulldoze that all and build the ubiquitous mixed-use 1+5s that are springing up everywhere that look like the offspring of a Best Buy and a housing project?
@@TonyRogers-gp1fl if that’s an argument for more walkable mixed use housing that reduces car dependency and its traffic, reduces carbon footprint, makes streets safer for biking and pedestrians, reduces rent w more supply, brings more middle class back to the city then I’m here for it and the drinks are on me!
@@theblondebomber No, it was just an argument that these one-story commercial areas may not be super depressing to everyone. But since you mentioned the world-saving virtues of mixed use - is all that density why NYC is so happy, affordable and safe for pedestrians and bicyclists?
@@TonyRogers-gp1fl NYC still got a ways till they follow Amsterdam and Paris’s lead of recognizing cars ruin cities. Population is also less than it was in 1950 due to down zoning and letting cars choke out the city. NYC could easily house millions more- give it 10 years and it’ll be hurtling towards being a safer, more dense city.
Love the footage. Narration was solid and highly understandable but kind of swift. Suggestions for improvement: Not enough charts, graphs, maps, or labeled video. I had trouble following the opinions and what was being implied with moderately elevated vocabulary.
Really appreciate the feedback! Def gonna start talking slower and with more accessible word choice. And I guess I gotta dust off after effects and step up my motion graphics game :)
Terrific video about a subject that I knew little about even though I live in the L.A. area. But please speak slower so that I can fully grasp your ideas (when playing it at .75 speed on the video settings, I was able to follow it.) Thanks for this video!
Biking off Venice blvd in Culver City back in 2015 was still awesome! Fingers crossed Culver City doesn’t go backwards with these sick bike lanes.
here in wilmington the city of la (wow they did something) made anaheim one lane in each direction instead of two for bike lanes and a consistent turning lane + lots of safety features coming in... 2028... because they can't do it any faster. before they did this in november/december the line backing up from figueroa in the morning was sometimes two blocks long. now it's gone
Thought it was strange that Downtown Culver City is located on the edge of town where a block away north you're in LA when you cross Venice Blvd. Most cities downtown is typically in the middle of town rather than on the edge of it. Enjoy what they've done around the Expo line though.
Those weren't high-rises. They were low-rises or, at most, mid-rises.
I live here, use these roads daily, walking, biking, motorcycling and driving. This report is pure horse****.
Mass transit should be elevated or underground. Transit projects can cost several times more to build than other countries.
Many of the infill developments are hideous compared to ones built before the 1930s like the one at 0:53
great video! speculating here, but as to why more men than women might support changes, we are making these changes essentially because we want people to take public transportation, but it may be that women prefer personal vehicles at higher rates than men due to risks associated with public transportation. Would be interesting to study how perception of danger affects ridership by gender on different modes of transportation-but in any case I feel like women tend to be more averse to risk, and young men are I believe the least averse to risk, so that might play a role.
Also, I think the over 50 crowd's opposite trend might be related to car ownership rates, again speculating, but I would guess that men over 50 own more cars per person than women over 50, so improving public transportation could be seen as a means to increased mobility
Anyway great video, keep up the great work!
Yeah, these "urbanists" seem to avoid the hard truths. - A fundamental need of any society is personal/physical safety. Without it, nothing works the way it should. If urbanists want to move their agenda forward, a pre-requisite is to stop making excuses for the street people. -- Get them off the streets, and out of neighborhoods where they expect citizens to "walk". Stop tolerating vagrancy and drug use.
Repeat after me "No safety, no walking around"
great writeup fam
It’s hard to accept such major change when the Los Angeles City doesn’t echo the same changes. If you work outside Culver City you need a car sadly. I’m sure most people in Culver City don’t work there. The metro lines are too few and far between to support such a huge transition.
Though I hope someday we can recover the streets back from the stroads , with LA owning SFV and/or sitting between so many manufacturers who want those roads for their employees who live and work far…. Doing a transition like this would mean getting LA City to play along. Which if Harbor City and Panorama City (neighborhoods owned by LACITY) have taught me anything, little change is likely to happen over the course of 15-25 years.
That’s why I believe it’s best to break up LA to smaller cities like Culver City so when transitions like happen, it can collaborate with neighboring cities to make/prove this lifestyle as viable.
Gauging the viewcount, I'd say you ought to make more of these urbanism videos. :)
I just came back after being gone for nearly a decade. While I was happy I have to say the conditions and congestion is absolutely out of control and I rarely go out and about now unless it's for groceries or work. Sad to say but my hometown is a debacle.
Nice video dude, hopefully urbanism takes over with our generation
Focus more on the rage-inducing reduction of the cycling and pedestrian zones. It's madness!
I think they need to build the transit oriented housing first then the people living there will demand more walkable neighborhoods. To get this done they need to ease up on Zoning especially for housing so it was a big step forward for Culver City to get rid of minimum parking requirements.
Stumbleuponability is a great word!
This video is funny to me because somebody else's video concluded with Culver as a little ray of hope, but a day later here's this video like, nope, the monsters will win once again, like they always do.
Had seen another video back in march I think wrning of that vote. and as a Canadian, sent email to mayor of LA to mention how bad an image such a move would make worldwide. But in your video, you mention Culver City is its own city, so I take it the mayor of Los Angeles has no say in this?
Is there some sort of greater LA authority that can have master plans that influence each city within greater LA?
LA County has around 80 cities. Los Angeles of course is the largest with 4 million residents. You need to email the mayor of Culver city.
OR, since you are not a resident, maybe worry less about the virtue-signalling of some distant municipality in a foreign land, and let the locals sort it out. -- Or if its really important, consider donating to fund a bike lane in Culver City... (yeah, didn't think so). Talk is cheap.
@@charlesbrown9213 I felt it important to signal to the mayor that this decision was seen all around the world and LA becoming less pedestrian/cycling friendly. Whan a mayor's actions are heard around the world, it has more of an impacr on the mayor. I justr sent this to the wrong mayor.
I wonder what it would be like if more of the local people politely attended local city counsel meetings and requested more of what they want in their communities?
So so so sad. Bikes and buses are such wonderful solutions but unfortunately they mix very poorly. Bikes are slow moving vehicles that make very few stops, a bus is a fast moving vehicle that makes many stop. This fundamental difference makes the two modes of transportation incompatible. Such a shameful oversight by the city council.
I drive to & from Culver city every day & HATE the changes they've made to the streets. It's not easier or safer for either bicyclists or drivers!! And making bikers share a lane with buses is flat -out ridiculous!
The only people walking/biking in Culver City are those who work at Sony studios and then they get in their cars and drive home to the suburbs. Until people live where they work, the multi modal transit model won't work.
sick video
The Phoenix sprawl in Arizona feels like LA lunacy.
0:54 Flynn's arcade from Tron!😀
I blame the biggest car-addicted suburbanite NIMBY propagandist of all, John Phillips of 790 KABC.
I lived on Hughes Avenue in Culver City in 1979. It was nothing special other than it was not far from Venice Beach.
When I moved to L.A. in Jan 1989, I chose Culver City because it was equidistant from Venice, WeHo, and LAX. After five years (and 2 weeks after the Northridge quake), I moved to Venice.
Sony pictures single handedly revived CC.
There was no design for L.A., that's the problem! Culver City used to be such a dump, so definitely a success story.
can u get a quality mic or turn plugin off? audio’s like from a trench in bakhmut
The history of Southern California was a bunch of spaced out cities that grew in population until they bumped against each other. It's different than most cities with a central place the expands outward.
That mess of cities is also why it's hard to do anything because the small areas have just enough power to do what they want.
Eliminate parking. Make it expensive and inconvenient to park. Free up all that land for development. Make not using a car the better option.
Or, outlaw bikes. - No need for underused bike lanes which are paid for by the gasoline taxes of the car commuters.
@@charlesbrown9213 Outlaw bikes are so loud and annoying.
The problem with all these tiny independent cities like Culver, Beverly Hills etc. is that most of the people who are actually in the city on any given day dont actually live there. Those cities try to amass as many jobs and amenities as possible while keeping housing growth flat (CC has only grown by 2000 people since 1980!) so the people who live there and are allowed to vote in city politics are not representative of the people who are actually there using these spaces every day. many such cases!
Worse city planning. The traffic gets so bad through culver city and most visitors of the downtown area use cars to get there or uber.
Culver City has the best Italian Deli this side of Brooklyn!
Next best is in San Pedro and Long Beach….
Cool! -- Now that I know that, makes me want to hop in my car and drive 20 miles to get a sandwich!
Sorrento deli
Worth the drive!
@@josephpadula2283 The guy who owns that deli is on the City Council and voted against protected bike lanes. Also - Bay Cities is better.
I agree that getting rid of bike lanes is a bad thing, but these bike lanes weren’t done well at all. It made the traffic there horrible. I think if it was done better it would have been more successful. Also culver city is not the only area doing this urbanization in the city. West Adams’s and Hayden track is close and doing bike lanes a little better imo.
I have never been to culver city and barely visit DTLA being a long beachian I think long beach is also being ruined by being part of L.A county and the south bay area is hurt by being under L.A bureaucracy too.
Just say “fuck it” like the rest of us, and move out to OC. 😂
I sneazed before you made the sneaze joke!
Allowing housing/retail development without parking is going to be problematic. Just like it was before the laws went into place. It’s CA, people are still going to need cars. They won’t disappear just because developers don’t have to build parking spaces. This argument is being pushed by developers looking to save money and charge the same amount for units. Requiring 2 stalls per apt is probably too many though.
Shared bike-bus lanes aren’t even that good. Buses can be even more nerve-racking to deal with than SUVs, even if the drivers are trained better, as you never know when they’ll stop or leave a stop. I can say that from personal experience. The only advantage is that buses are rarer than cars. I live out in the Phoenix valley, which is one huge city (Phoenix), a dozen mid-sized cities (and one town with over 270,000 residents), and a few small towns/cities, and aside from downtown/midtown Phoenix, downtown Tempe, and the Apache Boulevard/Main Street corridor from Rural Road in Tempe to Dobson Road in Mesa, density is pretty sporadic. The only dedicated transit lanes are the light rail line and some bus lanes by the state capitol (as a bunch of commuter express buses go there), and the only street that has been completely pedestrianized is Central Avenue for 1 block. Main Street in downtown Mesa has sharrows, but it’s a more pleasant street to be on, with slower traffic and only 1 lane in each direction, though there are worse sharrows (Central Avenue from Roosevelt Street in downtown Phoenix to Camelback Road in midtown, which is in a 35mph zone).
It infuriates me that the older generation is so insistent on sticking to car-oriented development at the expense of bankrupting the younger generation by forcing them to stick to cars.
"Infuriates" ? Chill.
The "older generation" pays most of the tax revenues. Tax revenues are what pays for every ditch being dug, traffic (car, bus or bike) lane being built. -- So you are infuriated that the people paying for the civic development get a say? What does that say about you?
If you are lucky, one day, you too will be "the older generation". There is a reason not too many 60 y/os are on bikes -- Old people stay off of bikes for their safety (as bodies age, they become more frail, unable to heal from accidents). People with kids want the safety & convenience cars provide for hauling their precious cargo. And certainly, anyone with a long commute is not going to be riding bikes to work. Or, anyone concerned about being accosted by the rampant druggies/street people (calling them 'homeless' is a euphemism).
Cyclists will always be a small contingent of the population. -- Encroaching on car lanes, while expecting the car commuters to subsidize the bike lanes (courtesy of CA's absurdly high gasoline taxes). Maybe a hefty annual "bike registration fee" of $3K/year would help pay for the bike lanes? No registration displayed on your bike? - Have the cops confiscate the bike.
Man, this is sad to hear. Increasing quality of life, walkability, and safety only to reverse course because some old people want the world to burn so they can profit for a few years before they die. As they say, no good deed goes unpunished.
"some old people" -- J H, if you are lucky, you too will join us one day (getting old, I mean).
Most old people don't "want the world to burn". I've no idea where you get that notion. Old people have frail bodies. they are not going to use bicycles. And in a Socal full of druggies/vagrants , they are not going to risk an encounter which could have tragic consequences.
Commuters pay gasoline taxes to pay for roads. How do cyclists pay for bike lanes (other than taking tax revenues from non-cyclists?) You want bike lanes? Fair enough. - How will cyclists pay for that (without taking money out of the pocket of the great majority of people who don't use the bike lanes?
Wanting something without having to pay for it. That's the definition of Santa Claus.
Our voices only matter if we exercise political will, if you live in Culver city, please replace Mayor Albert Vera and Councilmembers Göran Eriksson and Dan O'Brien. They voted to end the bike lane.
I'm in Nashville and somehow we got outvoted to put in a Lightrail a few years ago even though we had the majority vote. The truth us the politicians do not walk things in the country to run smoother they live in mansions far off where traffic isn't a concern.
A majority of the public and an overwhelming majority of businesses opposed this project. Culver City is extremely pro-transit and progressive and always has been (lots of bike lanes, buses for a long time). Many downtown businesses went out of business. Sales tax plummeted. Maybe the mayor and council members had a valid reason for voting against this?
who is this Vera? I remember long time ago Vera ..the original owner the Sorrento Market on Sepulveda was Major of Culver City..This Vera is relative of this family?
That's the thing...most people and businesses there do not support this project as it currently stands. Like I keep saying, the increased density needs to come first. The people that were using this weren't really spending in Culver City either.
@@d.c.1132 Yes he is his failson.
Changing one lane to a bus lane in an already compact pocket is not the solution. Traffic was already bad and now it’s worse than ever.
Need a more wholistic plan that will connect more parts of the city for any solution to make an impact .
Like the content!
LMAO, that's your idea and people who would rather drive than exercise. I wish every city is like Culver City where they made it safe for bicyclists and pedestrians.
I thought Culver City is one of the more pedestrian friendly cities in LA?
Los Angeles and San Diego are such a waste of a wonderful climate.
The statistic where only young men (and not young women) support the walkability changes is interesting. I wonder what the reason for that is.
Bike lane "craze" by politicians is bizarre. I work in a big office in mid-wilshire . We have maybe 2 people that bike part time.
Thats 2 out of like 300 people..lol
I love the walkability and pedestrian friendly shopping, dining and communal space in DTCC you feature in this video. None of the redevelopment, much of which pre-dates Hackman by more than a decade, has ever been dependent on or related to the Move project.
It's actually a shame that the Move project was implemented as hastily as it was. The change was rushed and the backlash was obvious and foreseeable. Proponents of the project miscalculated when they assumed that just because they had won an election that they could make lasting changes without first reaching consensus with the constituency. Changes that last need to be thought through because once a movement creates the kind of negative community reaction that the Move project did it becomes difficult to earn a second chance.
Culver City is incorporated.
Culver City better be careful the homelessness might take over.
They need to restore the car lane along culver blvd, it will much better for traffic, now it's a disaster.
LA loves its cars
I like the idea behind Culvers downtown but the way they have the lights set up on Culver Blvd makes for insane congestion.