CicLAvia Recap

On Sunday October 6th, students from Professor Deike Peters's Sustainable Cities Class made an appearance at 
CicLAvia.

Although this particular event has come and gone, 

keep your eyes peeled for more CicLAvia events this spring! 

Until then, keep reading for a "Virtual Tour" of our walking tour through LA 

+ fun highlights of the event + informational links provided by Deike + perspectives on what it felt like to walk the streets of LA. 

* The Journey through LA *

This was our route: click me!

1. Caught the metro to LA at Laguna Nigel 

2. Met up at LA's Union Station
The station (and the surrounding area) is currently being redeveloped to better accommodate not only rail users but also bus riders, pedestrians, and cyclists. Find information about this project and the history of Union Station, look here.

3. Walked past LA's busy HistoricPlaza/El Pueblo and Olvera Street
For more information about the history of this part of town, check here.

4. From there we made our way to Chinatown.
Remember that this is LA’s new, (forcibly) relocated Chinatown, as the Old Chinatown was displaced and razed when Union Station was built in the 1930s. We saw the big new ForestCity’s Blossom Plaza mixed use project close to the Gold Line transit station as well as the China Gateway project JiaApartments just nearing completion at Broadway and Cesar Chavez.

5. We crossed the 101 Freeway
and thought about how amazing it would be to cap this great concrete divide and put a park on top, reconnecting the two halves of the city again. Up to date on this ambitious project can be found here.

6. Stopped at the newly opened Grand Park
It opened exactly a year ago and has been named one of the top 10 new open spaces in the country. There was a November 2013 article about it in the NY Times. There were food trucks and activity booths here.

Giant checkers at the games booth

Teaching kids about street safety

A bracelet made at the crafts booth from old bike tubing

7. Photo Op at City Hall 

8. We continued down the route to Spring Street

A remaining strip of the green paint

and saw that the green paint for the Spring Street bike lane had already been mostly scraped off, as the film industry complained about it and won. 

9. On Gallery Row
where there are weekly art walks on Thursday evenings, we marveled at how quiet the streets were without the noise of car traffic. Even the shouting of some of the rowdier cyclists wasn't as intrusive. We didn't feel like we were even in LA!

10. We also found a pocket park
designed by Lehrer Architects, which was created via a public private partnership, with the main initiative coming from the non-profit group Friend of the Old Bank District Gardens, with dedicatedfunding from American Apparel and planning help from the city. The park remains a public facility.

11. Last stop was Pershing Square
where we caught the metro back to Union Station and then caught our train back home.

For more pictures of the Soka excursion to CicLAvia, check out our album on Facebook.

While Soka students were inspired by the change of mood and accessibility on the streets of LA, others were inspired to different ends... Read about a Ciclavia marriage proposal here!

If you want to know more about the event, talk to Deike or the students in her class!