Waterfront

COOL CITIES WATERFRONT

High quality recreational areas close to home are an important component of reducing driving distances and fighting climate change. The Greater Cabrillo Beach area should be preseved for personal, outdoor recreation, and be free of industrial operations like cruise terminals.

Attend: Waterfront Hearing Monday, Oct 27, 6 p.m.

Action: Write a letter of support

Next Update: Sunday, Oct 28, 6 p.m. PDT

Climate change may be the worst crisis humanity has ever faced. The slow-moving nature of the climate crisis means that by the time we clearly "feel the pain" it will be too late to act. By then, we will have painted ourselves into a dangerous corner with no safe way out. This won't be some far-off environmental disaster that extincts polar bears and penguins but otherwise leaves mankind alone. At best, it will destroy the quality of life we are used to and lead to economic collapse. At worst, it will lead to mass starvation and the greatest suffering people have ever experienced.

So, the challenge with climate change, is developing policy that deals with it as Public Problem #1, while we face many other problems for which we already "feel the pain." As just two examples of other crises, we have the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Our nation is suffering from failing schools in many urban areas. In Detroit, only one in four children graduate high school. In Los Angeles, only about one in two.

Nationally, we face many more urgent challenges, besides the economy and schools. They are all important and we need to tend to them. If we are to successfully deal with these and with climate change, we need to look for solutions that help us solve more than one problem at the same time. Otherwise, we may work for solutions that solve one problem at the expense of aggravating another.

The purpose of the Cool Cities Waterfront Plan is to provide leadership into a new urban lifestyle that confronts climate change head on and in doing so helps revitalize the economy of a struggling urban core. This effort begins with the realization that urban blight and poverty leads to urban flight—which itself contributes to climate change. We can't fix climate change just by swapping out light bulbs and driving hybrids. We need to deal with core urban problems that force far too many people into long commutes for work, shopping, school or recreation. These same long drives diminish the quality of our life, eat up our time with driving rather than living, take away from a sense of community, and rob much of Southern California of a sense of place and destination.

 

Attend: Waterfront Hearing Monday, Oct 27, 6p.m

The Port of Los Angeles and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will hold their only public hearing on a draft environmental report for the Los Angeles/San Pedro Waterfront Project at 6:00 pm on Monday, October 27, 2008. This meeting will be held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, 601 S. Palos Verdes Street, San Pedro, CA 90731 (map).

This meeting will begin with a presentation by the port on the waterfront plan. This presentation will be followed by presentations by a variety of groups, including a Waterfront Work Group which will present a sustainable waterfront plan (which the Sierra Club supports). Among the presentations will be a presentation on the Cool Cities Waterfront Concept by the Sierra Club. The presentations will be followed by general public comments from the audience.

Whether or not you make a public comment, your attendance is important — both as a show of support and to hear what the port and members of the public have to say.

 

Action: Write a Letter of Support

We need your letters to help support a "Cool Cities" waterfront for Los Angeles and to reduce the global warming impact caused by cars and driving and to protect Los Angeles' tidelands area.

Please download, printout and sign this letter (PDF, RTF) and then print your name and complete street address below your signature. (You may add your e-mail address if you like.) Mail it to us at:

Sierra Club Angeles Chapter,
3435 Wilshire Blvd., #320,
Los Angeles 90010.
"Attention Waterfront"

And we'll forward copies to Mayor Villaraigosa and other decision makers. Or, you can paste the text of the letter in an e-mail and send it to us electronically to waterfront@politeo.net. If you do, please be sure to include your complete street address as well. The address will help make your letter count.

If you would rather, use our letter as a guide and feel free to write your own.

For more information or to help further, you can also call Maddalena Serra at the Sierra Club office at 213 387-4287 ext. 210, or Tom Politeo at 562-618-1127.

We will have more information posted on the Waterfront here on August 18, 2008.

Correction: Due to a press error, the August 2008 edition of the Angeles Chapter newspaper, the Southern Sierran, omits a short sample letter to Mayor Villaraigosa.

Waterfront

The waterfront areas in San Pedro, Wilmington and East Long Beach that are near residences, recreation locations or retail centers should be deindustrialized. Hazardous materials, such as chemicals and fuels, should be removed from these areas. Leases for existing facilities should not be renewed.

The waterfront should serve as a buffer between heavy industry in the ports and nearby residences.

Cruise ship operations should be kept away from Cabrillo Bay (Outer Harbor) which should be preserved for a recreational area for water sports.

Cruise ships and their terminals should be good neighbors, limiting noise so it doesn't disturb nearby residences.

Parking should be removed from most of the waterfront area and offsite parking should be provided in downtown areas (away from residences) or in areas between San Pedro and Wilmington. Shuttle buses, the red car and walkways should connect these offsite parking locations to the waterfront.

The California Coastal Trail should be completed around San Pedro Bay providing three tracks: one for urban walkers, one for joggers and one for bicyclists. The trail should be continuous and have good connections into downtown and residential neighborhoods in San Pedro, Wilmington and Long Beach. It should be connected to the Los Angeles River.

The California Coastal Trail, red car and bus routes should be used to help improve linkages between south San Pedro, north San Pedro, Wilmington and Long Beach.

The waterfront area should be the primary location for restoring 300 to 350 acres of wetlands which may be combined with additional recreational opportunities.

Waterfront commercial and cultural development should be site appropriate. Development should be pedestrian and transit oriented and minimize or eliminate the presence of automobiles on the waterfront. New urbanism design approaches should be considered.