good trains and bad trains

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Monday September 20, 2010 · 1:39 PM PDT

2010/09/20 · 13:39

Trains. The word summons up an image powered by some of America’s favorite mystiques: our childhood infatuation with the little engine that could and Thomas the tank engine; nostalgia for the age of steam and manifest destiny; and the promise of a sleek, techno future with trains levitating to destinations at rocket speed. (As a character from the Dick Tracy comic strip once said, "He who controls magnetism, controls the world!") In an era of climate change and sprawl, trains deserve much of this good will. But railroads also have a history that is problematic in part, and, in some of their operations, a cloudy present. I wanted to write a bit about rail good and bad. I hope to follow it up with a post on how to improve good rail: a kind of trains plus agenda.

lostangeles

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Wednesday September 15, 2010 · 12:42 PM PDT

2010/09/15 · 12:42

Rebecca Solnit’s purposely and gorgeously meandering wanderlust: a history of walking identifies ‘basic freedoms’ that allow us to walk in the world. Solnit describes three freedoms; I’ll break one into its two component parts, so four freedoms, paralleling FDR’s.

"One must have free time, a place to go, and a body unhindered by illness or social restraint." (wanderlust, 168)

Walking therefore has a social history. Your right to walk freely has been fought for. This framework of requisite freedoms – free time, good places, good health, equal access - illuminates a new set of challenges to walking in the modern city.

lostangeles

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Tuesday February 03, 2009 · 1:08 PM PST

2009/02/03 · 13:08

The Federal stimulus bill currently being considered by the senate contains approximately $21 billion for nutrition assistance programs. $20 billion for food stamps (now called supplemental nutrition assistance programs) SNAP, with the remaining billion for the after school feeding program, seniors nutrition programs, emergency food assistance, and WIC management information systems. These are badly needed investments that will help low income Americans avoid hunger and food insecurity; and, because poorer people are more likely to spend dollars they receive (or avoid having to spend out of pocket on food), it can have a positive economic boost as well.

Which raises the question. Can we identify other stimulus you can eat?

lostangeles

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Friday January 09, 2009 · 12:41 PM PST

2009/01/09 · 12:41

Like many, I’ve been struck by the juxtaposition of the financial collapse of the past several months and the waning days of the Bush administration - both symbolizing a kind of massive systems failure. It seems to boil down to a failure of elites. More specifically, a lack of accountability for failed elites. So rather than just stay annoyed at the destruction wrought, I’d thought I’d look at that broader precondition for elite status and malfeasance: inequality. I’ll consider economic inequality in the Los Angeles region. This first entry will summarize distribution of wealth. Time willing, I’ll write a second on why inequality of ownership of wealth matters- when it’s harmful as opposed to when it’s merely a spectacle. A third, drawing on work by my colleague Peter Dreier, will discuss whether local/ regional policies are available to address inequality (or if state and federal action is the primary antidote). I also plan to include a ‘bonus’ post in the series, kind of a side bar on the sources of wealth of L.A.’s ultra rich and what implications that may have.

lostangeles

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Friday December 05, 2008 · 11:18 AM PST

2008/12/05 · 11:18

This is the final post in a series on food in Los Angeles that started with Land of Sunshine and continued with Two Cities.

In this post I speculate how the demographic shifts changing the region- largely the result of immigration from Latin America and Asia- and global economic integration will impact L.A.’s food landscape. The answer will likely emerge from a creative tension between the globalization from above of corporations, trade, and finance and possibilities for a globalization from below of migration and social change across borders.

lostangeles

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Monday December 01, 2008 · 2:58 PM PST

2008/12/01 · 14:58

This post is the second in a thanksgiving season series on food in Los Angeles and by application, urban areas. The first was Land of Sunshine, focusing on urban agriculture. The last will be City without Borders, about the future of food in an L.A. transformed by globalization and migration.

Former L.A. Mayor Tom Bradley, in his 5th inaugural address in 1989, stated that:

"Los Angeles cannot permanently exist as two cities – one amazingly prosperous, one increasingly poorer in substance and in hope."

Just a few years later, in 1992, the city erupted, drawing stark attention to this division as it manifested in race and class- and also, as it turns out, in access to food.

lostangeles

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Tuesday November 25, 2008 · 2:58 PM PST

2008/11/25 · 14:58

With Thanksgiving approaching, I’m going to post some thoughts about about food politics and policies in Los Angeles. I’ll break it into three angles. First, for today, the Land of Sunshine, a short history of how we used to grown food in the L.A. region and how we can grow more food here now. Next, Two Cities, focusing on the opportunities for food justice in a staggeringly unequal metropolis. And third, City without Borders, looking at how migration and globalization are changing the future of food in Los Angeles. While focusing on L.A. examples, most of the suggestions in the post should be relevant in other cities.

These diaries will be based on a presentation I gave on Halloween at Farmlab sponsored by the magazine the Next American City. Thanks to both organizations for their interest in urban food topics.

lostangeles

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Monday November 24, 2008 · 1:12 PM PST

2008/11/24 · 13:12

I watched the new Disney film Bolt over the weekend. It was pretty good. I thought Madagascar 2, which I also saw recently and which in ways was less ambitious, was a better kid’s movie.

Both films contrast the city with the natural (African wilderness in Madagascar, rural America in Bolt).

Bolt’s anti-urban bias ticked me off slightly.

lostangeles

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Monday November 17, 2008 · 11:52 AM PST

2008/11/17 · 11:52

I. how the wheel turns...

We have long associated L.A. with the entertainment industry in mental space; and with cars and sprawl as a physical place. Reels and roads, one could say. The rotation of a film reel in a projection booth and the spinning of auto tires on freeways as symbols of Los Angeles in motion.

With the domestic automobile industry facing bankruptcy, I thought it would be worth considering the ghosts of wrecked transport industries in southern California for hints as how a retooled auto sector could help meet urban transportation needs and how G.M. can potentially be steered towards a new, green line.

more >

lostangeles

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Wednesday October 08, 2008 · 10:33 AM PDT

2008/10/08 · 10:33

I. slash of his pen

Last week CA Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would have placed a $20 per container fee on shipping containers at California ports, raising $300 million annually to mitigate the health effects of pollution from goods movement.

The Coalition for Clean Air called this the most important environmental bill this year in California. Even the normally cautious Los Angeles Times editorialized that:

"With a slash of his pen, the governor simultaneously damaged the region’s economy, choked its roadways and ensured that thousands more people will die annually because of the pollution associated with moving goods to and from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach."

(more inside)

lostangeles

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Thursday October 02, 2008 · 11:40 AM PDT

2008/10/02 · 11:40

So governor Schwarzenegger of California, amid his vetoing of state legislation (including a badly needed fee on shipping containers that I hope to have the chance to write about) allowed a chain restaurant nutrition labeling bill by state reps. Padilla and Mignon to become law. By 2011, chains with 20 or more locations in CA will have to provide nutritional labeling on menus.

lostangeles

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Tuesday September 02, 2008 · 2:03 PM PDT

2008/09/02 · 14:03

As the Sarah Palin saga unfolds, it occurred to me that one angle on the Republican ticket is as a last gasp of the right wing vision of the west, that weird frontier of mythic individualism propped up by a concealed federal socialism.

McCain represents the sprawling, sunbelt, water-thieving wing of the party. His (well, his wife’s) 7000 sf Phoenix condo and his recent faux pas on the need to reconsider western water compacts reflect the illusion that infinite cities can be constructed in the American desert. The McCain’s numerous residences and Cindy’s priviligese on how a "small private plane" is the only way to get around Arizona show how money and air conditioning can still shield the wealthy from the energy and climate consequences of their lifestyles.

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good trains and bad trains

freedoms to walk

NutriStim - subsidizing fruit and vegetable consumption

show me the money- inequality in LA County

the future of food in a city without borders

two cities- food justice in urban america

land of sunshine: strategies for urban agriculture

Bolt's anti-urban bias (semi serious)

a streetcar named REVENGE

Poisoned by Schwarzenneger's business buddies, walnuts, shoes, and hawaii

terMENUtor - nutrition info in CA chain restaurants

McCain Palin - last gasp of the old west