A Vision of the Once and Future L.A. River--For Those Who Have a Vision


The Los Angeles River gets more publicity from the Los Angeles Times, with another follow-up on the EPA's decision to label the River a traditional navigable waterway. Yes, another kayak trip down the river of shopping carts, carp, and turtles.

Photo credit: Mark Boster, LA Times

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Paris has the Seine

"Paris has the Seine. London has the Thames. Vienna's got the Blue Danube. L.A.'s got a concrete drainage ditch. It's all we got. It'll have to do."

(Many, I miss Boomtown.)

Most great cities were founded by a river, be it the Hudson, the Mississippi, or the Monongahela. In most cities, the river at least looks decent. In some cases, it's the focus of the city. No reason why Los Angeles can't be one of them, given enough time and a commitment to cleaning up the river.

Wild

That's cool.

I hope that there's some money for "green jobs" with the conservation corps. That's like a big gang intervention program. It breaks people down and rebuilds them.

The fisherman also had the right idea, except if the river's cleaned up, he could eat the carp.

That reminds me of the carp problem in the Great Lakes. They should give people jobs to fish the carp out of the water. Pay people to go fishing.

Then, take the carp and fry it up and give it away. You could put a lot of people to work, and then take the food and give it to people who are out of work.

Carp isn't popular with Americans, but some Asians and Eastern Europeans it it. It's a traditional Christmas meal in some European countries. It costs around $2 a pound at markets.

Why don't we just prepare it and give it away until the problem is done with?

Rearranging the Deck Chairs

When I first saw this story on the LA Times Website, my first reaction was that maybe it was a protest about moving too slowly to clean up the LA River. Turns out it was art.