Week Nine • Ellen's Trip to Watts

This week, I was particularly drawn to Ellen Bastrmadjian's post on her trip to Watts. She mentioned that she's never visited Watts before so this was a new experience for her. Ellen briefly explains her reason for choosing Watts as a part of her location topics was because of an article she read about the 20th Anniversary of the 1992 Los Angeles. While she was there, Ellen made many observations that showed that Watts is an economically, culturally, and academically poor district.

This is my comment to her post:

Hi there Ellen! First off, I wanted to say how awesome I think it is that we're both working towards the same major (though you're closer to finishing it since we're separated by a year haha). Secondly, I have to express how extremely impressed I am with this post. It is among one of the bests, in my personal opinion, that I have read over the past 8 weeks. You really go into depth and do so without superfluous information. You give the right about of analysis, reflection, an insight to each of your observations in such a professional and organized manner that everything was clear and easy to understand.

The first aspect of your post that I want to comment on is the video you provided. When I first clicked the play button, I wasn't sure what to expect (actually, I was expecting some sort of brief documentary sort of footage). What it turned out to be was something breathtaking and deep in message. While it was artistically stylized, it holds a lot of reality in a general since that in any poor community, violence is bred. Ultimately, I find that the inclusion of this video was a very great addition to your post, especially when you relate it back to the 1965 riots which, as you said, Watts was the center of because it expresses that real aspect that violence of some scale still, very well, exists.

While on that subject, it would have been nice for you to briefly explain the 1992 and 1965 riots in regards to what they were and why they occurred for those who may not be from Los Angeles or may not be old enough to know. Although I've always lived relatively close to the Los Angeles Metropolitan area, I was not aware of these riots until now mainly because the first happened far before I was born and the second when I was only a year old. I had to take a bit of time to research these riots to better understand their relation to the rest of your post. 

With your reference to these riots, it is clear that Watts seems to be founded on social difference, so much that these differences, that were on a racial level, unfortunately lead to these large scale uprisings. Because of this, without needing to visit Watts myself, I agree that Watts may face (if it isn't already) insurance redlining. And if this is the case, it would explain why Watts remains seemingly unchanged 20 years after the last riots and continues to be a poor community. They fall victim to discrimination, as so many other neighborhoods do, which causes a potentially endless cycle of poverty and violence. If a poor community is not provided insurance as it legally has the right to be, they continue to remain poor which leads to poor education systems in the area which then closes the circle of uneducated individuals unable to uplift their community from such a poor state. Unfortunately, poverty tends to lead to lack of proper education due to insufficient funds and as a result, lack of proper educations tends to lead to continued poverty.

Week Eight • Go Metro! Bus 720

What exactly do we classify as a place? It's rather a broad and almost ridiculous question to ask you may think, but if we were to actually sit down and reflect on this question we'd come to realize that a place isn't just a city, a store, a neighborhood or community; it can very well be a mode of transportation, specifically public transportation.

Within public transportation (bus, train, airplane, etc) lies a moving structure of what seems to be, in a way, the essence of changing social difference. By this I mean that there is a sort of fluctuation back and forth between these changes, primarily in racial demographics, which I will be describing throughout the rest of this post.

For example, if you were to follow one bus line for a long period of time (as I did today), and paid attention to both the outside city landscape and the people getting on and off the bus, you will see that there exists social difference. These social differences are the ones we're all already very familiar with: race and economic class.

The upcoming Metro Division 13 Bus Maintenance and Operations Facility
[photo courtesy of article written by Roger Vincent]

But before I get into talking about the bus itself, I remember coming across an article published by the L.A. Times earlier this month about the construction of a 442,265-square-foot maintenance facility for the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority. This facility is said to cost $73.5 million and is being built at the northeast corner of Vignes Street and Cesar E. Chavez Avenue. It will be housing 200 buses that run on compressed natural gas and will include a three-story concrete parking structure, a two-story bus maintenance and office building, and a cash counting facility. This facility is set to be completed in the summer of 2014 (Vincent).

What caught by interest about this article was the fact that these buses will be running on natural gas rather than oil (by oil, I'm referring to the gasoline we put into our cars and not crude oil). Studies have shown that natural gas is actually cleaner for the atmosphere than gasoline and diesel; vehicles running on natural gas "emit 33 percent less carbon dioxide (CO2), 80 to 93 percent less hydrocarbons, 70 percent less carbon monoxide, 90 percent fewer toxic emissions, and almost no soot" (Berg). This sounds pretty awesome in regards to air quality; unfortunately, in reality, even though natural gas is cleaner than gasoline and diesel when burned, it is still dangerous to the environment and to communities.

The extraction of natural gas is just as detrimental to the environment and human health as drilling for crude oil. Fracking (short for hydrofraulic fracturing) is a drilling technique which involves "injecting toxic chemicals, sand, and millions of gallons of water under high pressure directly into the ground to release natural gas in shale deposits." As a result this mixture of toxins, sediment, and any natural gas relased can "leak to the surface and enter rivers and groundwater in the process" ("What is Fracking?").

So, unfortunately, while this new facility will be promoting better public transportation for the residents of the Los Angeles Metropolitian area, we're still going to be relying on an energy source that is just as risky, just as damaging to the environment and our health, and unsustainable (more so if the demand for natural gas increases).

720 - Eastbound

Going back to the bus itself, I started my travels by taking the Culver City Bus line 6 from UCLA to Wilshire and Westwood Blvd for roughly fifteen to twenty minutes to catch the Metro line 720 going eastbound towards Los Angeles-Commerce.

All aboard!

See those blue pants, purple converse, bag and bike helmet in the photo on the right? Yeah, just a little proof that I actually rode the bus. I'd have take a picture of myself, but I felt a little awkward as a few people were already starting at me (maybe because I was dressed relatively colorful and wore a UCLA Celebrate t-shirt expressing our football victory against USC this past Saturday (Go Bruins!).

My bus adventure begins!
(apologies for the dirty window, you can blame the rain haha)

To start off, the 720 (or at least the particular bus I was on, as well as the one on the way back home) was quite noisy not in regards to the people on the bus (because there weren't many and they were actually really quiet). Not only that, but it was a really bumping and jerky ride. I remember riding several lines of buses nearly every day in San Francisco during the three months I lived there that were just as equally long as the 720, but a lot more smoother (spare the moments were everyone swayed every time the bus stopped and started moving again). I can either assume that maybe it depends on the driver as well as the roads, but overall I was a bit intrigued by how I, along with the other passengers, were swaying and jerking around as the bus was in motion.

Something that we all know (at least those who are familiar with riding buses) is that this is also a perfect location for advertisement, but what I noticed on this 720 was that it mostly advertised the Tap card and the Metro public transportation.

Also, booo Trojans, haha.

But what I found most interesting and rather odd was not the racial demographics on the bus, but how they seem to naturally seat themselves. I took a rough count of the people on the bus during the start of my trip and there were about twenty-five people. Majority, if not all, of the passengers in the front were white (for lack of a better description) whereas everyone in the back half of it were of African American, Hispanic or Latino origin. But this wasn't forced, this was how everyone seated themselves. There were still many empty seats throughout the bus, each stop, new passengers would come on and I would observe how it seemed about 70% of the time, people of African American, Hispanic, and Latino heritage would enter the bus at the front, pass all the empty seats and go straight to the first available seat in the back.

It also occurred that while spots in the back would open up, most of those who were white immediately sat in the available seats in the front. I watched this for about twenty minutes and noticed this happen over and over again. It got me wondering why this was even happening. Nobody told anyone to sit in the back, there were no rules saying this is where certain people should sit on the bus, yet this was what I saw. As I'll later come to find out, on my way back to UCLA, this phenomena did not occur. Going westbound on the 720 towards UCLA, the bus was far more crowded and the majority were of African American origin.

Why it was like this going eastbound, I don't think I'll ever know. I thought hard about why this may have occurred, but really nothing came to mind. It couldn't possibly be because those who are of African American, Hispanic or Latino descent instinctively felt that they were the minority and the back of the bus was where they were meant to be. That makes no sense to me. So as to why this happened, I don't think I'll ever come to understand, but thought it was definitely worth sharing. If anyone has thoughts, ideas, theories, and any insight on this matter, please feel free to share them below.

For the most part, both east and westbound, most people kept to themselves with only a few who knew each other sustained a conversation. Everyone else read a book, listened to their music, talked on their phone, or quietly stared out the window. This was definitely a fine example of gesellschaft and gemeinschaft coinciding; these people were sharing this public transportation, something that in itself was its own little community of most people sticking to routine, but remained strangers to each other, hardly (if at all) showing any acknowledgment.

The bus stopped at and eventually passed by Rodeo Dr. and Beverly Dr. where it got a bit more crowded but people still had seats to take (so no one had to stand). It's pretty clear to see that the 720 also serves as transportation for shoppers in this area.

It's not hard to miss Rodeo Dr. and Beverly Dr. as the buildings in this area are very architecturally rich
and highlighted with gold trimming such at the one shown in this picture.

But as soon as the famous shopping district ended, the bus drove through a more business and office oriented zone. This area was spotted with palms and other trees for about two miles before the 720 pass La Jolla Ave and everything almost suddenly became rather dull. There was hardly, if any, trees at this point and whereas there were houses before La Jolla Ave, there were now nearly only apartment complexes.

There were also small shopping and service plazas scattered along this part of Wilshire Blvd.

The 720 eventually made a left on Valencia St and then a right on W 6th St. At first 6th St. looked pretty run down with buildings and apartments that didn't look very attractive.

The housing on this part of 6th St.

Hellooo many tall buildings

However, just after passing over the Harbor Freeway, the bus entered the epitome of a concrete jungle. But almost immediately hitting 6th and Main (where I got off) these tall building casting large shadows over the street disappeared and everything brighten up.

There were three things I quickly took note of:

1. There were stores and other services on the ground level of building, the levels stacked above being housing for residents.
2. That this area was predominantly made up of those of African American, Hispanic, and Latino origin and very few white and Asian.
and lastly,
3. The homeless was extremely prominent in this area.

I also came to find that it can very well be easy to get lost in the part of Los Angeles, especially if you've never been here. Unfortunately, it didn't feel like that great of a place to get lost in. During the two blocks I walked to catch the 720 going westbound, I got cat-called twice and then flirted with (while I proceeded to ignore the man who was much older than me) while waiting for the bus while there were countless people standing around me. He had no problem puckering his lips at me in passing with people watching who, turned out, didn't care.

I found this both awkward (despite this not being the first time since I got it in San Francisco as well), but also interesting seeing how I walked about the same amount of distance to board the 720 going eastbound and wasn't even acknowledged by anyone once.

Overall, this trip really showed me how just one line of public transportation can pass through many different communities and other areas can be vastly different than the ones neighboring it in terms of racial, economic, and social difference.

Miscellaneous Field Notes:

Route

Time: roughly 2 hours total (1 hour east, 1 hour west back to UCLA)
Distance: roughly 12.5 miles

Other References:

1. Berg, Linda R., Mary Catherine Hager, and David M. Hassenzahl. Visualizing: Environmental Science. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2011.
2. Vincent, Roger. "$73.5-million Mero bus facility being built in downtown L.A." Los Angeles Times Business. Los Angeles Times, 4 Nov. 2012. Web. 23 Nov. 2012.
3. "What is Fracking?" Don't Frack with NY! Riverkeeper: NY's Clean Water Advocate, 2012. Web. 23 Nov. 2012.

Week Seven • Stephany's Visit to South Pasadena

While reading through quite a bit of recent posts from my classmates' blogs, I found that most discussed how regions were rather dominated by the use of automobiles (e.g. Downtown L.A.). For those that mainly focused on neighborhoods, usually the car was needed to reach a certain destination due to a considerably length of distance of which most people seem to be too lazy to walk (or bike if they own one).

However, Stephany Bailon's post on the city of South Pasadena stuck out to me due to her observation that neighborhood she visited appeared to be very community based. She briefly explained how a friend invited her to their church and proceeds to take note of how the church blended in with the neighborhood "since it could easily pass as a house."

This is what I wrote in response:

Hi there Stephany! I enjoyed reading your post about South Pasadena. What especially caught my interest was how you explored an area that didn't seem to be dominated by the use of cars. You discussed how this area seemed to be a very tight community in regards to location of stores, services and a church.

This brings me way back to one of our lectures when we learned about how cities evolved to be more centralized. These center points are usually political, economic, legal, civic/cultural, or religious. In this case, it seems the community is centralized around the church you visited with your friend. I find this interesting because your post conveyed how this neighborhood, this area, seemed community based. You, yourself, stated that "a lot of members appeared to be from this community and as a result did not need to drive, they simply walked to church."

This as well as your observation that Trader Joe's, parks, and other services were well within a comfortable and easy walking distance. So it seems for more of the basic needs, cars aren't required (only when the residents want or needs to travel outside their neighborhood). Which makes me think about how the neighborhood's residents interact. If most attend the same church and do so regularly, than that would mean that they know each other relatively well. In a way, this seems like a community that holds onto the concept of Gemeinschaft, however I'm not sure how much. For all we know, while they may interact and may know details of their neighbors'  life, they very well may not put the well-being of the community before their own. Unfortunately, you were not able to provide any information that could prove or disprove this. So we can assume that this neighborhood/community experiences the idea of Gemeinschaft within Gesellschaft.

On a final note, I would have liked to see you elaborate more on your ideas. A lot of it seemed very general and you only provide a sort of basic insight. I would have also liked to have seen you relate what you found, observed, and noticed to a concept, idea, or something we learned or read for class in order to further analyze the social difference within South Pasadena.

Week Six • The Original Home of The Lakers

For those of you who don't know, the city of Inglewood was once the home of the basketball team, The Lakers for 31 years. It was also the home of the Los Angeles Kings hockey team and the women's basketball Los Angeles Sparks. The Forum, the indoor arena in Inglewood, was one of Inglewood's biggest highlights and attractions while these teams played there up until they eventually moved to the Staples Center between 2000 and 2001.

But now that these teams moved on for bigger and better days, The Forum seems to have lost quite a lot of its prestige. While it's still used for concerts and other small sporting games, The Forum feels to be more of a historical monument than the bustling and excitement filled arena.

It may be hard to see in the image, but The Forum has definitely seen better paint jobs and this area
seems almost dull even if it's not currently in use for anything.

My dad was my driver again, having been down for some business, but finding time to drive me to Inglewood where I would walk around and observe. We first drove through the district known as Crenshaw-Imperial. This are is mostly a business and shopping district that's no where near like what you'd find on Rodeo Dr., but still far better than the Garment District. Just think of your average strip of basic services, stores, fast food chains and restaurants, and any other businesses that you'd find somewhere in your own city.

We mainly drove down Crenshaw St. which, as I mention already, was obviously an everyday business and shopping oriented area bordered by residential zones (mainly apartment complexes with a few homes).

As we drove, we reached the invisible line that separates the Crenshaw-Imperial district and the neighborhood known as Morningside Park. Morningside Park is mostly an area made up of residential patches and is also where The Forum and Hollywood Race Track is located. In addition, it's only about 6 miles from the Los Angeles International Airport.

One of the many patches of residential neighborhoods. Note how it looks rather dull and average in
comparison to the homes found on Rodeo Dr.

The first thing that stuck out to me about the apartments and houses in Morningside Park was how nearly every single one had gated doors and windows (some even had gates bordering the buildings).

  

A closer looks at the barred windows and gated doors.

This apartment complex was not only surrounded by a metal fence, but if you look closely, was
also topped off with thin barbed wire!

The only reasonable explanation for this is that this area experienced high burglary because I highly doubt those bars were put there for aesthetic appeal. To see if my speculations about this was correct, I checked it out by generating geographical maps on SimplyMap that expressed the burglary index in Inglewood (and specifically in Morningside Park).

As you can see above, there does seem to be a bit of a high rate of burglary in and around Morningside Park which would explain all the bars and gates (and even barbed wire). Continuing on this correlation, I decided to see what the crime index looked like in this area, which I have provided another geographical map regarding it below.

According to SimplyMap, clearly Inglewood, especially Morningside Park, has some pretty high crime rates which, again, explain the gated entryways.

Branching away from burglary and crime, one other thing I made sure to take note of was how Inglewood is predominantly inhabited by people of African American heritage (with some of Hispanic or Latino origin and very few white). It was at that moment, that the majority race living in Inglewood (again, specifically Morningside Park) and it's proximity to the Los Angeles International Airport reminded me of one of our early readings in class, The Environment of Justice by David Harvey.

In his writing, David Harvey brings up issues linking social class with the environmental justice movement in the US. He begins with discussing the "primary issue that has given rise to the movement, namely, the dumping of toxic wastes in poor communities or countries". In other words, we can look at this as an environmental as well as social injustice.

One particular section that stood out to me in Harvey's writing was this:

"And if we care to think about it at all, there is a symbolic dimension, a kind of ‘cultural imperialism’ embedded in the whole proposal: are we not presuming that only trashy people can stomach trash? The question of stigmatization of ‘the other’ through, in this instance, association of racially marked others with pollution, defilement, impurity, and degradation becomes a part of the political equation."

This takes me back to how Inglewood is so close to the airport, something that produces not only noise pollution, but air pollution as this city experiencing the result of many departures and arrivals. It also takes me back to how African Americans, those always known (unfortunately) to be among the minority, are the predominant people living here.

Air and noise pollution and a minority group? Looks to me that no wealthy white person would want to live near an airport (which is why you always find them in places like Beverly Hills and Malibu). And while it isn't as bad a toxic waste dumping in a poor community, this still sounds like an environmental (and social) injustice to me.

UPDATE:
Recently I was using the last bit of my free 4 week subscription to the LA Times and browsing the site for any articles pertaining to social difference. While I didn't seem to find much, I did find something that stood out to me like a sore thumb. It was a video about a thirteen year old student at Inglewood's Century Academy of Excellence who was "kicked out after her mother complained about an alleged racial slur by a teacher". According to the student, her teacher insulted her during class in front of her entire class where all the other students laughed in response. Upon hearing this, the girl's parents confronted the teacher who immediately apologized for her actions. However, when the parents took it up with the principal, she was not apologetic and stated that she was glad her teacher insulted the child.

While it is known that the student had been involved in a fight and was marked tardy on several occasions, the parents, of course, don't find this to be enough basis of stating that their child is a "mean little girl" as the principal told them up front. The principal also told the parents that "bad things had to happen to mean kids" and as a result, expelled the thirteen year old from the school on the grounds that (from a letter from the school to the student's mother) they kicked her out "due to the fact that you scolded the principal...and your daughter used inappropriate language referring to Dr. Edman [the principal]".

It should also be known that this family is of African American origin and it makes me wonder if the child would have been kicked out if she were white. While I don't know the full story and only know what information was given in the news report, it seems to me that regardless of if the parents "scolded" the principal, to racially insult a child is something unacceptable and should be addressed (bad kid or not, you don't discriminate against another person, especially a young child).

Week Five • Tommy's Adventure in the Westfield Mall

This week, I wanted to read other classmates’ blogs and read what their experience was out in the Los Angeles Metropolitan region. Almost immediately, I was drawn in by Tommy's exploration of the Westfield Mall. His introduction was catchy and his humorous description hooked me in, making me want to continue reading it to see what else he had to say. However, as I read on, I found that while that very humor was attention grabbing (here and there), it was also a drawback in which several of his jokes don't make much sense. He later, at the very end of his post, relates his observations of the Westfield Mall to David Harvey's article about "built environment" as well as references David Sibley's Mapping the Pure and the Defiled.

Here's my comment to his post:

Hi there Tommy! To start off, one of the reasons why I wanted to make a comment on your post was that I found myself strangely drawn to your descriptive introduction (the other was that I actually just visited the Westfield Mall with a friend this afternoon for fun, haha). At first, I wasn’t sure where you were going with your writing and this eerie ghost story like tale until you stated that your location of topic was the Westfield mall.

One major thing I would like to address is the humor in your post. In the beginning, I was laughing at the jokes you made, finding them clever and catchy and ultimately adding a unique and personal style to your writing. However, as I continued reading several of your jokes stopped making sense and the amount of it became distracting as some aspects of your post felt superfluous and/or irrelevant. It was also very unclear what your point was in different aspects and the first large portion of your post sounded something more like a comedy blog than of one expressing observations in an analytical way. In other words, I mean that it was, in my opinion, far too heavy in the hilarity and extremely lacking in analysis and other observational elements such as demographics (just to name one).

 It isn’t until the end of your post that you lay down relations and references to a couple of our readings (which I will be giving my own input about later). My suggestion is to lessen the amount of jokes you present and make more short analytical comments. For example, when you brought of the security guard and gave some brief insight on how no large malls, in seems, are without them as well as maybe why they are present. I would have liked to see more of this (maybe even in a bit more elaboration) and less with the comedy so that you don’t lose your readers’ attention (and it would also make the several jokes you do make, sparingly, funnier). In the briefest of words: blend your humor with professional and insightful analysis.

On another note, I loved what you said about malls being “consumer spaces designed to make you feel at home, as if the actions you perform there are natural and abide by codified laws of this new built environment”. I never really thought of it this was and now that I look back, every mall I’ve been to certainly does feel as if everything we do (shopping, loitering where permitted, wandering around with friends) is natural and expected. Those of us who have the money to spend are able to move about and spend money freely in contrast, as you mentioned, to the poor who are discouraged from the start from even entering the consumerist area. I’m glad to see that you took note of this and referred briefly back to Sibley’s Mapping the Pure and the Defiled because we see this harsh segregation between the mid to high income and low income individuals and groups practically all around us. The mall and any other location where capitalism is at is finest and maximizing profit is the goal, is a perfect example of this separation in which the idea of it in itself (a place to spend money) is the force that drives these two economic groups apart.