Newsletter, February 1994

THE Los Angeles FORUM FOR 835 NORTH KINGS ROAD WEST HOLLYWOOD CA 90069

ARCHITECTURE AND NEWSLETTER February 1994 IN THIS ISSUE: URBAN DESIGN LOS ANGELES URBANISM

Public space and ll,banlsm are dIscussed In art Ic les by Fred Dewey, Chava

DanIelson and on an ,n troduct lon 10 the Forum lecture senes by John Dutton.

These are also the tOpICS for upcomIng sympoSIa sponsored by MOCA, the Forum

and the Gaur Center.

FROM BREAD TO CIRCUSES AND BEYOND: ON GOOD AND BAD PUBLIC SPACE IN LA FRED DEWEY

Public space is thought to mean any open space that attracts people. Yet most would agree Los Angeles, even with its crowds and parks, is not a very favorable environment. Indeed, and frankly as a shock, it is becoming almost hostile to the good life. Some blame the automobile, others planning. still others the destruction of independent politics, the police, the rise of enclaves or crime. Some, like Mike Davis and Ed Soja, have greatly advanced debate by discussing the militarization of space here. But this does not go far enough, however much it may lay the groundwork: for a serious rethinking of Los Angeles. Can we be 'urban, ' at aU? The deeper problem is, we no longer understand, or can

continued on pege 6

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RETURNING TO L.A. CHAVA DANIELSON

Ignored for so long as aberrant, idiosyncratic, or bIzarrely exceptional, Los Angeles, in anothef paradoxical tWIst,

has more than any other place, become the paradig­matic Window through which to see the last half of the twentl8 th cenrury (Edward Soja, Poslmodern Geogra­phIes, pg. 221}.

For a century and a half eXiles escaping the burdens of Climate or of politiCS. or Simply hoping for some Impossible 51rolo::8 of good luck, have been drawn to los Angeles. Overlooking the immediate beauty of what lay before them, they planted elm llees ,

Urbanists, who traveled here to study the place. 100 saw only the metaphorIC desen. They turned thelf attentions elsewhere, promISing to return once a city finally emerged.

A great many prOjects were proposed that attempted to give the sprawl of Los Angeles the clarity or legibility it was said to lack, but they have been continually thwarted by the reality that to live here meam to live WltnoUt self..conSClOusness, without the burden of an urban identity. Angelenos, as a whole, continually refused either nostalgia or a higher sense of civic duty In choosing where to live, to work, how to travel between Ihem, or which pans of Ihe city would be central to their lives. Other forces have formed th is place. with an honesty and a cruelty Ihat has left most students breathless.

In thiS light it IS both highly ironic and absolutely predictable that Los Angeles would become the focal point for intense inquiry by a new generation of theorists and critics. It is a reflection of the matura­tion of both the metropolis and of urban theory. social criticism and their practitioners,

What has changed in the discussion of urbanity is the acceptance of simUltaneity. That a mull!tude of forces cOincide at any given moment In

history to produce colliding and contradictory trends IS now accepted as pan of the post-modern expenence

Multiple centers In the same met/opolitan area, IncreaSing fragmentation of social and economic life, and a simultaneous consolidation of wealth and power are all patterns that have been reproduced across the globe.

In Los Angeles, the middle and upper classes of lhls ci ty conllnue to retreat behind electronic gates and lines of security patrols, demonstrating the kind of radical SOCial polarizallon that was preViously attributed to third world countries. Meanwhile waves of immigrants. with an uncanny astuteness for the way the space of th is ci ty has successively been occupied. have created elusive and nearly Imperceptible local POints for thelf communities In the m idst of prevIOUSly undifferen­tiated suburban sprawl. And while few people are brave enough to predict the outcome of the massive building prOjects taking place downtown, the new and lingering reSidents of the neighborhoods immediately adjacent have lust been presented with the cleanest and most expensive public transportation, the best library services ar"ld the slickest architectural monuments In the short history of this enormous basin. Suddenly Los Angeles, OllCe thought underdeveloped and ill -def ined, IS understood as a highly..charged urban landscape.

ThiS focus of intellectual attention on the nature of urban life in los Angeles has coincided with a moment that l inds Angelenos uncommonly interested in ciVIC self-reflect ion. The smoke screen of decades of boostelism is beginning to clear-to reveal a criSls-ridden but strangely compelling place. It seems that. as this citv developed, the intense individualization in the daily life of its people found spatial expression in a continuous suburbanization and expansion across the Southern California landscape. The incessant expansion found an economic analog in an almost constam rise in the value of real estate Ihal somehow, It was assumed, would conunue unabated. Our optimism had been given malerlal form. Meanwhile. thirty years of sporadiC de­industrialization have finally taken thelf toll. now thaI the

2

Los Angeles lookmg east 1960.

UCLA Deparrment of Geography aeflal phoro archIVes, Spence Collection

dismantling of the military industrial complex can no longer be lobbied away. The city seems, somehow, to have grown to the extent of its tolerable limits. Areas With even fewer identif iable urban markers, such as the Inland Empire or Orange County have become metropo­lises in their own right. not simply a parI of Greater Los Angeles. The collapse of the real estate market dealt a blow, both finanCial and symbolic. to the eternal optlmisls of Southern California. while the flOtS articulated the frustration caused by decades of economic and racial ineQuity with an urgency that made it difficult for even the most intransigent and entrenched power players 10 Ignore Our focus has contracled along With our hopes and our economy at a time when urban theory is finally speaklOg to us: as it is in fact lived, nOI In relation to an Impofled model 10 which we could only aspire. It is impoSSible for anyone who lived here during the '60s and '70s to Imagine that a book such as Mike Davis' City of Ouaflz would become a regional best seller, but it describes events and phenomena that slJddenly the citizens 01 Los Angeles are struggling to ur"lderstand.

The urgency of Ihe diSCUSSion of urbanism and urban Issues has not left architects unaffected. As fOI anyone else, It has become important to understand in a new sense, beyond the time-woln metaphors of liberation and sunshine, what it means to be a part of this place . Could there be an architecture that admits, or that IS in fact genuinely susceptible to, the urban pressures of los Angeles without either reducing this urgency to simplistic contextualism or indulging in images of IOstabilitv that become little more than iconography? The answer is unclear, or perhaps untested, but is certainly part of a larger Question: what impact can, and Should. architecture ever have on people's lives.

Chava Damelson practIces archItecture m Los Angeles and IS the edItor of the Forum Newslerrer.

LOS ANGELES URBANISM: NEW PUBLIC REALMS

JOHN DU TTON

It is Increasingly common to hear Los Angeles invoked as the model city of the emerging post-industrial world. Although such a claim may have wide accep­tance, there IS httle agreement as 10 whether It is an honor, dishonor, or merely an observation of the obvious and inevitable.

Undoubtedly. fundamenta l structural changes in the world economy have resul ted in concurrent changes in the very structure of our ci ties. The transformation from an industrial society to one based on service and informat ion IS having urban ramifications as significant as Ihose of the industrial revolution itself. A growing literature on the subject inyariabty cites L.A. as the ultimate example of th is new type of city: the " ex-urb," " techno­burb," "10D-mile city, H " geography of nowhere," or conglomeration of peripheral" edge cities."

The Forum lecture series this winter w ill address in part icular the changing conceptions of the public realm of Los Angeles. In a city increas­ingly torn by the physica l. econOMic, and racial fragmentat ion of space. whose downtown "public plazas " are owned, developed. and controlled by private corporations, and where successful urbanism IS often taken to mean safe. entertaining places to shop. traditional not ions of "pubhc " and "private" may no longer apply. Each of the speakers Will be addressing new conceptions of and prescript ions for the publ ic realm. What is al stake is the very defini tion of city itself, as a place of civiras and common culture.

Transporta tion and Its infrastructure have always dramatically affecled and shaped l.A .. both at the larger regional scale of vast networks affording a new mobili ty. and at the local scale of. for example, specif ic road and Sidewalk Widths. freeway onramps. and Metro ra il and its stat ions. While the fascmatlon with freeways has always existed In L.A. and their role m shaping the city is undeniable. Doug SUlsman. amongst others. has helped {urn attention back to the original transportation and organizat ional arteries. the boulevards. Suisman's monograph "Los Angeles Boulevard" was published as Forum Publication NO.5 m 1989. HIS research helped architects and planners rethmk the importance of the boulevards. Presently. as the founder and pllnclpal of Public Works DeSign, he has gained recognition for hiS researCh and

"Defender' car. Los Angeles Auto Show, 1994. photo: Chava Danielson

design of publ ic spaces in American cities. His work in Los Angeles has primarily centered on design in relation to public transportat ion and its infra­structure, both future-the Electric tro lley project. for example-as well as past-the abandoned railroad yards at Taylor yard.

Both Steven Flusty and Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris will speak on topics rela ted to the increasing desire to control public space. Loukaitou­Sideris studies the transformation of traditional public spaces, urban plazas and parks. and methodologically examines their development and maintenance as surrogate public spaces owned and controlled by private interests. Flusty. on the other hand. describes new "paranoid typolog i es~ which have recently emerged through" strategies of spatial control. H He analyzes new types of building and planning, from the alarmed and secured private house to the LAPD surveillance grid painted on rooftops of the city. all aimed at assuaging the spectre of general urban fear .

The privat izat ion of publ ic space IS best displayed through the evolution of the marketplace. Joanne Berelowitz w ill lecture on City Walk. the swan song of the private production of shopping centers as publ ic space. It IS deSigned to attract middle class consumers to a safe and entertalnmg environ­ment on the brink of an era heralding the safest. most fantastic place of shopping: the home computer shopping and multimedia network.

If City Walk represents an elitist incarnation of city culture. George Lipsitz is interested in its mirror image. in " the way the city looks from the ground up." His research and writings examine the relationship between urban form, street culture, and race in American cities. He sees culture as a battlef ield for civic hegemony. and views much of the street culture that has emerged in Los Angeles. from popular music to graffiti art. in terms of its resistance to the urban inst itutionalization of capi ta l.

The morphology of Los Angeles streets-the parking lots, mini­malls. undefined street edges. the lack of public spaces-that has emerged more or less incidentally from private, unplanned development is often cited by architects and urbanists as evidence of the need for more coherent planning and zoning . Yet for Marco de Michelis, there is a beauty and logic to L.A.'s city form and its evolution. Suspicious of calls for more European sensibilities for LA. de M ichelis will explore L.A.'s own particular brand of urbanism and the state of the contemporary ci ty through a discussion of the morphology of the street corner.

At a time of limited public resources. the question of who owns and controls public space is urgently relevant. The nature of such spaces-the uses aSCribed 10 them as well as the people intended to use them-are essentially pol it ical Issues, with ramificat ions for bOlh urban form as w ell as social policy. As the critic Rosalyn Deutsche reminds us. it is no coincidence that homelessness and new public spaces are both resul ts of urban renewal programs . Architects and planners need to reassess their roles in the production of urban spaces as the city evolves in the post- industr ial era. It is the goal of the Forum lecture series to raise some of these questions.

John Dutton practices architecture in Los Angeles.

January 31

February 7

February 21

February 28

March 7

3

STEVE N FLUSTY IS the author of the forthcoming Forum Publication No. 11 '"Building Paranoia." His pamphlet and current research analyze '"strategies of spatial control H in the creation of what he terms "interdlctory space." ANASTASIA LOUKAITOU-SIDERIS is Assistant Pro fessor at UCLA's Graduate School of Architecture and Urban Planning. GEORGE LIPSITZ is Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California. San Diego DOUG SUISMAN IS the founder and principal of Public Works Design and has gained wide recognition for his research and design of public spaces In American Cities. JOANNE BERELOWITZ IS ASSistant Professor of Art History at San Diego State University. MARCO DE MICHELIS' tr ip to Los Angeles was. unfortuna tely. cancelled due to earthquake-related complications.

calendar

February 7

15

16

through FEBRUARY 18

l.A Forum/8:00 pm/ Schind ler House: Anastasia Loukaitou -$ideris

Woodbury University/7: 30 pm/Gym Betty Tsou Fang, sculptor

SCI -Arc/8:00 pm/Main Space Margaret Crawford

USC/6:30 pm/ Harris Hal l 101 Norman pfeiffer

UCLA/exhibit/PerioH Hall Gallery Karl Gernot Kuehn

FEBRUARY 22-MARCH 18 UCLA/exhib it/Perloff Hal l Galle ry Vienna Housing,Trends and Prototypes

March

21 l.A. Forum/8:00 pm/Schind ler House George Lipsitz

22

23

24

28

2

3

7

8

9

14-25

14

16

18-20

23

UCLA!7:30 pm/Ha ines 39 Daniel Libeskind

SCI ·Arc/8:00 pm! Ma in Space Enrique Norten

UCLA!7:30 pm/Per loH 11 02 Elsa Prochazka

l.A. Forum/8:00 pm/Schindler House Doug Suisman

Woodbury University/7 :30 pm/Gym Kate Diamond

SCI-Arc/8:00 pm/Main Space Mehmet Sanders, dancer

UCLA/7:30 pm/Moore 100 Alberto Perez-Gomez

L.A. Forum/8:00 pm/Sch indler House Joanne Berelowitz

Wood bury Un ive rsity(7 :30 pm/Gym Gerard Smulevich

SCI-Arc/8:00 pm/ Main Space Mehrdad Yazdani

USC/6:30 pm/Haines Hall 10 1 John Clagett

USC/exh ibitlHelen lindhurst Gallery Parkinson Field Associates

USC/6:30 pm/Bovard Auditorium Wm. Scott Field, Robert Tracy

SCI -Arc/8:00 pm/M ai n Space Eric Owen Moss

Califo rnia Women in Envi ronmental Desi gn Confe rence, A NA Hotel , San Francisco

USC/6:30 pm/Ha ines Hal l 101 Scott Johnson

SCI-Arc/8: 00 pm/Main Space Margaret Morton, photographer

MARCH 25-APRll 7 Getty Center/ l os Angeles:

27-30

30

Film Series

Getty Center/ l os Angeles Symposium

SCI-ArC/B:OO pm/Main Space Karl Chu

Cine City: Film and Perceptions of Urban Space 1895-1995 The Getty Center lor the History 01 Art and the Humanl· ties IS pleased to present a sympoSium and concurrent 111m series that will examine the Intersections of cinema and architecture/urbanism over the course of the last century.

Symposium Sunday, March 27 to Thursday, March 31, 1994 Santa Monica, CA Redefinitions of spatial and temporal relationships that began in the late nineteenth century have found

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Co nsuming Experi ence: The Situatio nist International and the Shoppi ng M all

A n A rchitectu re of M any Languages

Metropolis: Views of l os An ge les

Th e Trace o f the Unborn: The Berlin M useum and the Alexand erplatz

The St rife in the Dream of Poliphilo : The Erotic Dimension of Architectu re

Synt hesis of the Ant ipodal

Publ ic Acts: Projects Initiated by Pr ivate Clients for Public Use

Cine City (see below)

Cine City: Film and Perce ptions of Urban Space, 1895-1995 (see below )

expression in cinema, architecture, and urban design. The symposium will investigate the theoretical founda­tions and cultural implications of this shift through presentations and panel discussions among architects, filmmakers, urban theorists, cul tural cri tics, and scholars.

PreseOlaljons and Panels Day 1 Cinema and Ihe Cons/ruction of Ihe Future Day 2 - The CIty Signified: Readmg Ihe Urban Texl Day 3 - ElectrOniC lmagmg. The Space Beyond rhe Screen Day 4 - On Los Angeles.

· Urban Design, Urban Theory, and Urban Culture­Saturday, May 14, 1994 9:30 am - 4:30 pm Hotel Inter-Cont inental, Bunker Hill Ballroom 2251 S. Olive Street Co-Sponsored by MOCA's Architecture and Design Council and the los Angeles Forum for Architec ture and Urban Design

Symposium Statement:

To profess to be an urban designer in the United States is to lay claim to an understanding 01 the underlying social. economic, cul tural, and pOlitical organization 01 contemporary American urban and suburban hIe. As an activity, urban design necessarily predicates a set 01 values about what is deSirable about city and suburban hfe . DeSign is an activity of making chOices, chOices about what conslltutes a decent hfe on the pubhc scale, as well as on the scale of personal roullne day-to-day hfe. Urban deSigners must make assumptions about which groups ought to benefit from proposed Interventions In the urban fabric. what kind of benefits they ought to have, and what phYSical fOlm these amenilieS Will assume. In short what urban designers do is necessarily grounded in urban culture and theories of urbanism. Any Significant discussion and Questioning of contemporary urban design has to arise out of a diSCUSSion of w hat cit ies are like now and what urban culture IS hke.

Given the ponderousness of the highly bureaucrat ized and pohticized process of implementing urban design policy, it is easy for urban designers to become distanced from the realit ies of urban existence. The exigencies of professional practice and organizational culture often erode deSigners' gut-level intUitive sense of what actually does determine the soul, spirit, and character of hie In big cit ies. Furthermore. the professional conven­tions, training and day-to-day practice of urban design can &etu.ally act 10 prevent the urban designer from being open to new information. and from input that comes straight from daily hfe and the streets of the city Itself .

The essays and dialogue presented throughout the sympoSium Will explore the nature of contemporary urban life and culture as an entry point Into current urban design strategies. It will produce d ialogue among urban theOris ts. pract itioners of urban design. and analysts of contemporary urban culture. And. most importantly. it will provide an opportunity for participants to have their visions of city deSign checked. challenged, and perhaps transformed by people who have thought about the nature of life in cities. and who come from the allied disciplines that Inform the practice of urban deSign.

April 6 USC/6:30 pm/Harris Hall Boyd Coddington

13 USC/6:30 pm/Harris Hall Julius Shulman, photographer

19 Wood bury Universi l y{7:30 pm/Gym James Brown

26 Woodbury Universi ty{7:30 pm/Gym Mehrdad Yazdani

May 3 Wood bury UniverSi ty{7:30 pm/Gym Kent Twitchell, painter/ muralist

10 Woodbury Universityl7:30 pm/Gym Peter Pre"

14 MOCA/l.A. Forum

Symposium Schedule:

Introduction : El izabeth Smit h

Session I: Urban Culture Confronts Urban Design Moderator: John Chase

- The Architecture of Everyday Life," Margaret Crawford -Urban Economics, - Paula Sirola -Public Representation, - Allan Sekula -Anthropology of Urban Cultures, - Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett "Urbanism of New Majorities, - Ruben Martinez

Session II: Urban Theory Challenges Urban Design Moderator: John Kahski

-Labor History and Urban Activism. - Mike DaVIS "ImmigrallOn," MariaPatricla Fernandez-Kelly "Li terary Theory and Urban Space, - Kristen Ross "Social Theory and Homelessness. - M IChael Dear "Re-thinklng the Public Realm," Nancy Fraser

Session III: Urban Design Responds Moderator: Diane Ghirardo

Participants will be drawn from the following teams represen ted in the MOCA's eXhibition : "Urban Revisions: Current Projects in the Public Realm"

Agrest and Gandelsonas Marc Angehl and Sarah Graham Diana Balfl"lOfilBatmori & Associates MOjdeh Baratloo and Chfton Balch Peter Cal thorpe Wilham Fain/Johnson Fain and Pereira AsSOCiates Hawkinson + Smith-Miller, Kruger and OuenneH Ale,,; Krieger/Chan Krieger Levi Architects Gustavo Leclerc/A~OBE lA Robert Mangunan and Mary-Ann Ray/Studlo Works Moule Polyzoides Mlchaele Prlde-Welfs Hani Rashid and Lise Anne Couture!Studlo Asymptote Michael Sorkin Achva Benzlnberg Stein

Design and Influence of the American Hal Rod

Symposium, Hotel Intercontinenta l, l.A. Abo ve and Belo w : Urban Desi gn, Urban Theory and Urban Culture. (see above)

17 Woodbury Un iversity{7:30 pm/Gym Pierre Koen ig

19-20 USC/exhibit/lindhurst Gallery Thesis Projects

Film Series Thursday, March 24 to Thursday. Apr il 7. 1994 Santa Monica & l os Angeles. CA The film senes will present documentary, experimental. ethnographiC, and commerCial films produced by local. national. and internallonal f ilmmakers. Films to be screened Include: Playflme !JacQues Tall . 1967J. Man WIth a MOVIe Camera (Ozl9a Vertov. 1928J. Notebooks on Cmes and Clothes (Wim Wenders, 1990). Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese. 1976). The Crowd {King Vidor, 19281. Aiphavllie (Jean-luc Godard. 19651, Los O/vldados (LUIS Bufluel. 19511. Paris qUI Don (Rene CIM, 19241. Th e TerrOrlzers (Edward Yang, 19861. and Videogramme of a Revoluflon (Harun Farockl. 1992).

Scheduled participants: Peter Bosselmann, Gian Piero Brunetta. Giuhana Bruno. Elizabeth Diller. Harun Farocki, Anne Fnedberg. Douglas Gomery. Tom Gunning, Andrew Herron, Chris tian Hubert, Franklin 0 _ Israel, DaVid James. Gertrud Koch. Peter lunenfeld. Syd Mead. PatriCk O'Neill. Han! RaShid. AllucQuere Rosanne Stone. Douglas Trumbull. Yun

5

OrganiZing Comml\tee:

Tsivlan. Anthony Vidler, Helmut Welhsmann. Slegffled Zielinski

Scott Bukatman. DaVid Jensen. Anton Kaes, SylVia lavln. Annene Michelson, Fntz Neumever, Thomas Reese. lain Boyd Whyte

Schedule and programs Will be sent m February 1994 If you would like addit ional mformatlon. contac t DaVid Jensen at 310/ 45B-9811. ext 7084.

dewey comif'ued from page 1

even talk about. what pubhc space truly IS. Pubhc space IS In lact a pohtlcal problem as mUCh as It is about architecture, layout. boulevards and technology. It IS a problem extending Into the very fabr ic of dally hfe, 10 the nature of our th inking processes, and the quality of our debate as citizens. Most of all, whether or not something IS public space has to do with something intangible: whether or not It extends and expands pol it ical freedom.

In the last half-century, the antl-totalitallan phi losopher and historian Hannah Arendt framed the Issue of public space in a way which gets around arid debates on square footage, body count, and phySical structures. It is not a funct ion of urban layout per se, and not a matter of technology, spectacle, massed bodies, or, as Doug Suisman has tried to frame it, material structures of exits and entrances. Public space is the fragile, invisible tissue which makes us human beings in a function ing and vibrant democracy. It IS the place we 'appear, ' not as bodies, but in deeds and speech, preserving our differences as individuals . Only by deeds and an ongoing conversation which grasps the affairs of our world, do we become free.

Public space is not simply a place to come together. It is where we develop the ability to compare, contrast. debate, challenge, and most of at! think. Without it, we are deprived not just of amenities. say, parks or entertain­ment. Without publ ic space, we disappear, having nothing to protect us from the ravenous despotism of mass society, something, Angelenos no longer realize. not at all inconsistent w ith Intensive and extensive privatization. Arendt formulated th is after a careful study of Nazism and Stalinism. Knowing what America was becoming, she saw the decline and destruction of true publ ic space as the very hallmark of mass society, by which she meant not some sociological description. but something profoundly political: the active elimina­tion and destruction of individual difference, debate. and discussion. She saw public space. and specifically the township prinCiple. as the only way to halt, and reverse our own far more subtle slide Into a totali tarianism of consumption.

These might seem like lofty principles, but they show how low our classic American notions of public space have fa llen. How else to account for the transformation wrought by one tiny change in LA's urban labllc, the rise of coffee houses, whele people can meet regularl y to ta lk' In fact, deliberate diSintegration and reduction lurk behind LA's grand experiment in pllvate intimacy. W ithout neighbors, fllends, and perhaps especially strangers meeting consistently In a pubhc place to discuss and decide affairs, places, no matter how 'public: become precariOUS, intimacy is effectively rendered, paradoxically, useless, and we enter a state of permanent disappearance. The 'urban' world which has evolved here, as an outgrowth of suburbia, is in many ways the very antithesis of urbanity. It const itutes often, and not so SUbtly. a unique and unprecedented form 01 political despotism, through architecture, layout. and the natu re of eXistence itself. What more eVidence does one need, In fact, than that divergent, d iSSident. and troubling Views, in fact. debate In roro, threaten Angelenos. and are kept instead to the quiet of dining rooms and whispellngs In the office? The less fortunate have the street. but that IS preCisely because their debate no longer matters ,

The problem. in short, IS broader than car, urban layout, or crime . It is about culture, both physical and of mind-set. that is, about our very deepest politics. That is why, even as discussions are spllnglng up about the need for public space from Warren Olney to workshops In South Central, how we lhink about public space is more cri tical than ever. What follows IS an attempt to analyze some sacred cows and highlight over-looked spaces, In an effort to reframe how we th ink about the 'public' spaces we do or do not have.

The peril in our discussion of publ ic space is part icularly c lear in the case of Venice Boa rdwalk, world·wide symbol of LA. Here, strangers become more strange. and neighbors-from all over the city-become tOUIiStS, In contrast to the renovated Venice Athletic Center, separated from the boardwalk by low walls and fences, where everyone regardless of race and

Grand Cen/ral Markel.

phow: Peler Samarin

6

class can hang OUI playing SPOrtS and converSing, the Boardwalk IS a relentless four-lane freeway traffic jam broken only by accldent,vlewing stat ions. Here, like McDonald's. benches and tables have recently been deSigned to be uncomfortable. The only 'regulars' engaged in ongoing, day-to-day public conversat ion are the peddlers, hustlers, and. at dusk, drunks and homeless. These have as much right to be here as anyone. But that they are really the only regulars says it all . If one wants to see public space as it really is, both what it says about the city and about the level and spread of debate, look through fast-motion film over days and weeks, Who stays? Who returns? Who has the ongoing conversation, and what is it about? From Jody Moroni'S on the southern end, to the Fig Tree's Cafe and Waterfront Cafe on the north bordering Santa Monica, T-shirt shops, jeans, and incense stands, it's hardly possible to stop to d iscuss Iraq or Somalia or the spreading corruption in Washington or Sacramento, but instead move on or get crushed. The Sidewalk cafe and excellent Small World bookstore are buried in a chaotic din of people who do not talk to each other, only watch, consuming. Crawling GI dolls and blaring radios collide in a void of emptiness where discussion is. frankly, a mark of insanity.

Second on the list of most people's favorites, Olvera Street, as the 'old pueblo' of Los Angeles, had, by 1870, ceased to exist as community center, reborn-and characteristically named for a US government judge-in the '30s as a 'Mexican-style' marketplace. But this marketplace was unique. It contained neither vegetables nor necessities. The very design was antithetical to the community. e~cept in the most limited way. Now. masses of Mexicanos and Chicano families do take children to baptisms at a nearby church, but they leave behind barely a straggler, With 'authentic' restaurants as payoff for the colonization of ethnic and public imagination, mixing not community and outsiders, but instead 'color' and tourists. the quarter-block-long 'historic' park's public events-Cinco de Mayo and Dia Los Muertos, as well as the bandstand turned beautiful creche at Christmastime-serve to tragically highlight the bloody, government/corporate gulf separating the 'color' from LA's founding here in 1781 by eleven Indian-Mexicano and black families .

Like Olvera Street, and near it, Japanese Village Plaza continues the destruction of publ ic life through pseudo-mult icul tural internment and burial. Designed as the center of Litt le Tokyo. local elders chose tourists and businessmen as their clients, deciding specifically against Integrating daily community activ ities with outsiders, replacing such a vital linkage With the simulation of public li fe, the ongoing ethnic 'fest ival.' Unlike the public li fe. from which it once derived, the festiva l is now little more than a Chamber of Commerce promotional activity, designed not to incite and develop public conversations or discussion of polit ics and how a specific community is being run, but to sell ritua l, tradition, and goods. Lin le Tokyo, already a simulated street. moves through angled buildings and blue-t iled roofs, its restaurants, record stores, and fast -food joints like another LA river reduced to a trickle between militallzed dikes. At one end, the Koyosan Buddhist temple, a logica l, regal anchor to public life, is hidden behind prison-like four-story walls, the only access a narrow, pilson alley, At the other end, passing the Japanese American Theater. the ·village.' a travesty of community life, terminates in a cold. br ick plaza and a 'contemplation' garden Imprisoned in a corner behind metal bars.

PhySically near Olvera Street and Little Tokyo, but humanly and temporally a continent away, downtown's Grand Central Market crunched between Spring and Broadway and 2nd and 3rd streets, as old as modern LA, remains invisible to western LA, showing just how threatening the city's true multicultural history has become. Regarded almost like garbage tossed down from the imperium's towers and museum on the hill, ItS noise. activi ty, aromas, antique neon. food counters, and constant food chopping ma~e It the equal of great markets the world over. Sawdust floors Wind through a profusion of fresh vegetables, gourmet items, and necessities, Homeboy Tortillas, a youth-run

business bolO of Father Greg Boyle's Inner-clty jobs program, stands near the 60 yr-old family-run dried frUit and nuts store. BardOVI and Kazan Porl butts, chicken fee t. live ~lnds of chorlzo, crushed pepper, dried shrimp, and beans stand cheek-by-jowi wi th twO locally-favored central-American food counters and the superb Marla' s, a seafood 10int with soups, cevlche, and charbrOIl. One af\emoon, twO Mexlcano elders In cowboy hats crushed IIpe avocados Into broth, dispenSing adVice,

The exhaustion and Imprisonment of public life by short-sighted polmcal and corpora te Inlerests, symbolized In Lillie Tokyo and Olvera Street, IS posed most cleCirly by the Beverly Center A shopping gulag IISlng like Garagantua between La Clenega and San Vicente and 3rd and Beverly, It destroys everything InSide and outside for a mile around, not only aggreSSively killing off the dehcate tissue of common li fe, but resolutely cutting It oil, containing and plivatiZlng It inside prison walts. From the ease with which one can get lost, to the' marble skallng links w ith 'liVing' plants and the reduction of humans to the sounds and smells of 11 zoo, thiS el 'tomlzes the human as animal. reduced to labor for consumption . ThiS IS nOt shop until you drop ThiS IS don't you dare drop until you're finished shopping. Toddlers and teens love thiS galleria model because human adulthood IS effectively neutralized Zoos, after all, are fun, anrmals are amuSing and entertaining. precisely because they are behind bars. Nel(t to the clneplel( with liS pay-per-vlew mortuaries, Sam Goodies' offers the one Cyclopean window. surveilling all who come and go. wamng to devour anyone who dares to el( lst. and suggesting. finally and succinctly, those who shop are superior, above, and can see what you Will never see.

As cilles w itt, a coumer-move sprang up across the stree t. not only completely overturning these agendas, but subverSively linking either side of the deadly DMZ of La Clenega. The deSigners of the Beverly Connection deliberately kept the build ing low. integrating older structures and surroundings Into a visually noisy dynamiC 01 nestled space. vegetation. movie theater, food store. and book shopping . lingering IS a pleasure, as IS. even. sometimes. diSCUSSion. At a third the size. With a miniscule fraction of the stores, It has as many VISitors, by my car-per·mlnute count. as the prison across Irom It Parking IS Integrated as display. palms and greenery are even VISible to cars and ramps. helping create a circulating, yet stationary, space that chec~s and reverses the mass and VOid. Impoflantly, the neighborhood IS served by the old Rexati's drug/hardware store and a new Ralph's market. connected brilliantly to parking by a mOVing ramp.

At the intersection of W ilShire and Rodeo Olive In Beverly Hills, the rethinking of our relation to the car, Vis ible With the Beverly Connection, expands radically. It IS hardly perfect. but It points to an entirely new way of th inking about denSity in an automobile world. Two Rodeo, unlike either malls or theme parks. makes real use of SoCars one histOrlc-and almost termi· nated-lnnovClt lon In publIC li le: the drive-in. like Beverly Hills as a w hole, the bUilding, a str iking edifice which. from the back. looks like a colossal movie studiO. violates every ru le of neighborhood linkage, yet unlike Beverly Hills. works hard to create a place lor pedestrians safe from the death derby outside. Entellng an underground 'hotel' lobby with attendants. one ascends by elevator to the 'street,' joining, or not joining, tourists, wandering or sitting w ith locals at the cosmopoli tan Piazza Rodeo Ino cover). Absolutely central. one can leave, and is perhaps unintentionally encouraged to, without spending a cent. It is not because it is obscenely expenSive and too cramped that Via Rodeo is wrongly compared to Disneyland's Main Street. In terms 01 creating a non-commercial zone that IS public as well as safe from the automobile, It IS actually more populist than the supposed populist Disneyland or CnyWalk. It IS not by chance that Disneyland and Cl tyWalk produce simulation nausea : they keep cars segregated and Me cut oil, totally controlled inSide fortress walls, out In the middle 01 nowhere. This is absolutely cri tical to the corporate agenda, a fact those who cite the broad class spread of malls and theme parks fall to address. Via Rodeo. by contrast, even with its failures, takes on the city and works to reintegrate it, ritualizing car and fractur ing space into new and str iking perspec­t ives. ThiS is a perfect defini tion of the phYSical component of public space. Ghmmellng fountain and glow at night. foreign vOices echOing back from hard stone-all offer a glimpse of another li fe . Where the new corporate simulations of public space seek to re·engineer us as automata navigallng a virtual realm in order to e)tpend, this saves, giving back to the city the tissue of li fe . That IS to say, In ItS own stili rudimentary way, 1I becomes a generator rather than a vacuum, a producer of life rather than a consumer of it . It offers, however brrefly and shyly. a glimpse of something beyond pure society. It tries to break the implosive mass of one of the moSt undemocratic intersections in the world.

Montana Ave, between 7th and 17th street in northern Santa Monica has gone precisely in the opposite direction, replac ing an exist ing sleepy actual village serving retirees and locals w ith a drive-through Rodeo simulation. In 1967. rent was S.BO. ln 1987. at the beginning 01 the recession! depression, rent was hiked to $3.00 Irom $2.20. First gas stations closed, then two and three story buildings went up, and l inally long-held neighborhood businesses like Santa Monica Stationers and Evans' Hardware were forced out. At least one couple was ru ined, unable to make the adjustment. Now, those businesses which stayed at the higher rent have closed. while yuppie chain stores linger like sharkS, Starbuck'S characteristically offers cutllowers. gorgeous men and women, and counters too high to lean on. Here the good life becomes a club to beat over the less fortunate. less beauti ful. and less young. the krnd of playground where only Schwarzenegger would flaunt hiS military vehicle . People radiate ease of wealth and beauty. knowing full well how hard It IS for the res t of us. Don Henley may smile fra illy walt rng for a light, but most think t hey'll stay permanently at the tOp.

Symbollzrng everythrng Montana IS losrng, Larchmont Boulevard, or 'the Village' to locals. a place of outdoor cafes, trees, and peace, IS very un·PC. All the more surpnsrng, It IS now used by urban plannrng workshops rn neighborhoods struggling to bUild themselves up. Community hfe IS Integrated because merchants and neighbors work to preserve the tissue of life worth liVIng It's not just that Pfopnetors smile and learn your name Yes, It feels like It 'S for the nch. Yes It'S boring But a shoe repair place re-stltched a shoe of mine no one else would. for $10 Stores make home deliveries and speCial order as a regular service. When corporate chain Payless threatened to move In and undercut locals, cHcled by the same yuppie chains as Montana. 'Shop DaVid, Fight Goliath' signs sprang up as a community moblllzalion . ThiS IS not Nimbyism, but rellects the real damage big store employment bonanzas and malls can do to a neighborhood rn the wrnk of an eye. This lesson holds for everyone, IIch and poor. Simply settrng up a boundary-which some accuse Larchmont of dorng-Is InsuffiCient, as shown by the less successful. stlll­struggling, renovated Whlltier Boulevard to the east. with the Vibrant Boyle Heights section cut off and dorng qUite well on Its own.

Small. less self-conSCIous, and someumes filled only With a few elders at a table, Leimen Park. at the InterSection of stately Lelmert and South-Centrars aorta, Crenshaw, gives the he to common-sense assumptions about public space. pllmarrly the IlI'Ik to quantity of bodies or vast open VOids A uny patch of green, Sidewalk and shade, the square and its old foun tall'l stitch together neighborhood and liS sinew. history Hit hard by the riots. last year the VISion Complex theater abutt ing the park. under the old Watchtower beacon, hosted a good part of the LA Festival. The square sports the Kaos network. an ongoing neighborhood-based video production. film, and distribU­tion workshop. Nelertiti watches from the lintel of the st ill-bustl ing House of Beauty, while 5th St . Dicks serves coffee at tables buil t speci fica lly lor wastrng away the afternoon .

Finally, the most under-rated public space in the ci ty remains Lincoln Park. In east LA, just north 01 the tolnt USC Medical Center and City Coroner, It is marked al its western end by a statue of Lincoln. one of the few in the area-mostly of Spanish conquerors-not to have been defaced. A weU­preserved oasis of green and quiet, it is the only park in LA equal acre for acre to Olmstead's Central Park in New York . Unhke Griffith Park. which IS mostly inhospitable scrub and mountain, this integrates both nature and urbanity. With two baseball diamonds and playgrounds, one containing an LA icon. an Aztec pyramid for kids to climb on. each w ith clean sand. kids, and elders. a row of constantly-occupied chess tables. and a huge well landscaped hili covered w ith old trees and spots for lovers and the solitary. all is centered by a soothing pond with ducks, fountain and boat house undecorated by trash. All told, It is a far more beckoning than the tiny thread rimming Echo Park or the garbage pit the city has turned MacArthur Park and its untouchables into.

Plaza de la Raza, at the center of Uncoln Park. has a commu­nity swimming pool serving both ASIan and Mel(/cano kids. a large community center that sponsors over 90 different classes as well as public performances, a basketball court and a rec room for community meetings, comes closest to being a true and financ ially accessible town center lor all. Naturally. the city. In a typical concession to the automobile, has left the park cordoned off by thoroughfares, industrial ized loning. and railroad tracks. But. while th is severs the park from the community, it has also served the unanllcipated effect of making the park seem even more of an Isolated oasis In a barren desert of smog and fast-moving war mobiles.

Emerson once spoke of the town meeting as 'the unIt of the republic and the school of the people: ThiS is the true model of public space. and should again be our reference point . Few spaces in LA, or anywhere in the United States for that matter now. can measure up to this profoundly polit ical, democratic standard. Without such a model though. our discussions of public space will remain as impoverished as the barren life their absence has left us trapped w ithin. LA is plunging us ever further into a mass of electrons, subject to a mittion spins, where we labor barely to feed, collide, and disappear. This world of the collectively privatized is a dead world, and it can only be over­turned by beginning, at last. to th ink carefully about the real contribution of arChitecture, space. and community planning to the secure and ongoing life , and f reedom, of the people.

Fred Deway has w r;rten for London 's New Statesman, LACPS' Framework. the L.A. Weekl y, and the Wild Palms Reader (Sr. Martm's}. In 1993. he orian ized ~ Town Meermi~ panel diSCUSSions on "L egacy o f rhe Pan/hers, ~Counci/ Democracy, and ~Cyburbia : New Fron /ier or Grave?~ ar Beyond Baroque. He reSides m Los Angeles. Portions of rhls article were excerpted m the October, 1993 "The Best of L.A." edlrion of the L. A. Weekly. It has been reprmted here m rhe mteres t of presenting hiS argument Inract

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