Gelatobaby

When the sky isn’t dumping a year’s worth of rain onto Los Angeles in five days, one of my favorite places to go in the city is the bike path of the LA River. This concrete chute is probably the most misunderstood place in all of the city, as well as one of the fastest-changing. Here, in the soft-bottom corridor of the river near Frogtown, it’s easy to imagine what the river was like before it got reigned in a half-century ago, which is also how it could look again in the future.

The Los Angeles River Master Plan was completed in 2007 by the lovely Mia Lehrer, among others, and contains all sorts of amazing ideas for revitalizing the watershed. Until then, there are small victories to be seen. Tons of pocket parks have sprung up along the river, and there’s a string of major rec centers where people’s soccer games echo into the concrete walls. Crews had just broken ground on a new bike path here (the paved one currently ends at Fletcher) and it made for a bit of a bumpy ride but it was exciting to see this part of the river finally getting some solid services.

But as much as I want the river to ease back towards naturalization, part of its strange beauty are moments like these graffiti-splotched walls near Hyperion, which I’d hate to lose in a total return to wilderness. A great resource that illustrates the many personalities of the river (as well as the many personalities along the river) is KCET’s awesome interactive river project for Departures. And if you just want to get a closer look at our riparian treasure, Friends of the LA River leads cleanup walks, birdwatching adventures, and other tours along the river.

A few blocks away from all this is more evidence of the river’s changing role in our city:  The great Coco’s Variety. This is a bike store, that’s also a purified water store, which also features, among many other things, a giant parts carousel filled with all sorts of things you never knew you could live without, from Band-Aids to Mexican wrestler figurines (made in Japan). While we were there, three kids were charged with choosing one toy each from this tower of goodness, and the decision looked excruciating. Keith has some more amazing photos of Coco’s.