Century City/ Westwood
August 9 – 22, 2019
NEWS
CenturyCity-WestwoodNews.com
Overnight Vehicle Dwelling Ban Renewed LA City Council reinstates Section 85.02 of municipal code. By Sam Catanzaro It is again illegal to sleep in a car on the streets of Los Angeles. On Tuesday, July 30, LA City Council reinstated Section 85.02 of LA Municipal Code which prohibits individuals from using a vehicle for dwelling between the hours of 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. on residential streets and any time within 500 feet of a park or a licensed school, pre-school or daycare facility. On July 1, City Council let the ban expire before they went to recess, unintentionally giving people living in their cars a grace period. At City Council meeting Tuesday a heated public hearing took place on the issue, with an overwhelming number of people speaking out against renewing the ban. “We can sleep in ditches but we cannot sleep in our cars. There has to be a way that we can
all work together. That there could be designated for the less fortunate to sleep in their cars while they get on their feet,” said Jose Garcia a veteran who was previously homeless for five years. “Not every homeless person is bad. And everybody deserves a second chance.” Peggy Lee Kennedy, a member of the Venice Justice Committee, worried that renewing the ban would harm individuals who have the least in society, “The City likes to think of itself as somehow doing this balancing act to protect the people that are housed by criminalizing and harming those who are not. That’s not a balance. You’re harming people that have the least amount among us,” Kennedy said. “Don’t just work with private developers doing long term efforts and over-the-top bridge housing efforts, that are going to house ten percent or less of the people.” Mary Anne Curtis of the End Homelessness LA Campaign took issue with the difference in the way the fact that the City lets e-scooters park on the street but not unhoused individuals. “Thousands of electric scooters are given priority parking on streets that people un-
housed are being swept off,” Curtis said. “980 plus have died this past year and your response is to ban them from street parking?” Despite the overriding public support against renewing the ban, City Council voted unanimously to reinstate Section 85.02 of the code, making the overnight dwelling in vehicles illegal immediately. After Council voted, members of the public began chanting “shame on you” repeatedly,
forcing City Council President Pro Tem Nury Martinez to instruct the Los Angeles Police Department to remove the protestors. Councilmember Mike Bonin, who represents Council District 11 which includes Pacific Palisades, was not present for the vote. In an email to Century City-Westwood News, however, Bonin said that he was unable to at-
OVERNIGHT, see page 6
Rail Line from the Valley to Westwood? LA Metro’s Sepulveda Transit Corridor project
Photo: LA Metro
A rendering of a potential light rail stop near the Sunset Boulevard exit of the 405 freeway
By Keldine Hull The Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority is a series of public meetings in selected locations to address the Sepulveda Transit Corridor Project, which aims at constructing a rail transit line that connects the Valley to LAX with a potential station in Culver City. According to Metro, “The natural barrier created by the Santa Monica Mountains means that most people traveling between these areas are funneled primarily onto the I-405 Freeway, already ranked as one of the most traveled urban highways in the nation.” Metro added, “More than 400,000 people travel through this area every day to commute to work, school, and other destinations along the freeway and beyond.” Metro is currently in the process of conducting its Feasibility Study to identify and evaluate a range of rail transit alternatives between the San Fernando Valley and LAX. The study,
which began the end of 2017 and is expected to conclude this fall, is divided into two areas: a Valley- Westside segment and a WestsideLAX segment. Metro continued, “Its findings will be the basis for future environmental analysis and project refinement.” Potential locations for a stop in and near Westwood include the UCLA campus, the future West-
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Contact Judy Swartz judy@smmirror.com 310.204.4255
wood Purple Line Extension stop and the Expo Line Sepulveda and Bundy stations. The location of the stations will be determined by the type of train LA Metro chooses. These include Heavy Rail Transit (HRT), currently used by the Red and Purple Lines, Light Rail Transit (LRT), currently used by the Expo Line and monorails. HRTs, offer the highest speed, fastest
loading but requires a fully separated right-ofway. LRTs offer high speed, flexibility, can operate in-street or on a separated right-of-way. Monorails, while having a lower speed can operate on steeper grades than HRTs and LRTs, something LA Metro is taking into account given the terrain of the Sepulveda Pass. All of these options can make it from the Valley to the Expo Line in 26 minutes or less, with the fastest being HRTs at 15 minutes. For comparison, without traffic, the same distance takes 22 minutes in a car and 110 minutes in traffic, according to LA Metro. Through the public meetings, Metro looks to not only present transit concepts and cost projections but to receive public input as well. To learn more about the Sepulveda Transit Corridor Project, visit: https://media.metro.net/ projects_studies/images/factsheet_sepulveda_ transit_corridor_2018.pdf
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