>> The second Westside Permaculture Gathering will be an "Intro to Permaculture" primer, put together by community permaculturists, as well as a local potluck. All are invited to the free event: Monday, June 23, 6:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. in the Multipurpose Room of the Santa Monica Main Library, 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica. Contact Sean Jennings at swjennings@gmail.com with questions.
>> At the "ReGreen: Green Home Improvement" event, everyone from homeowners to design professionals can find out about the ReGreen program -- "best practice guidelines and targeted educational resources for sustainable residential improvement projects" developed by the American Society of Interior Designers' Foundation and the U.S. Green Building Council. The free event happens Tuesday, June 24., from 6 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. at the Multi-Purpose Room of the Santa Monica Public Library, 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica. RSVP to gbrc@globalgreen.org are appreciated but not required.
>> Join artist Jane Tsong and curator Donna Conwell for a conversation at the Farmlab Public Salon, " 'Everything is Alive' and Other Street Projects." "Everything is Still Alive" is an art project in which native California poppies were planted on patches of exposed earth in the L.A. area: "where the poppies survive, orange blossoms reveal the disparate patterns of land management." The free event takes place Friday, June 27 at noon at Farmlab, 1745 N. Spring Street #4, Los Angeles.
For a mani-pedi with an eco touch, drop by Recess, a new L.A. salon with an eco-chic feel. Here you can soak your feet in a scented bath, dry them on bamboo towels, then add a massage with organic essential oils followed by a moisturizing treatment with paraben-free lotions.
The swanky and spacious 2000+ sq. ft. salon has a green mission, though the environmentally free details aren't readily noticeable. Recess' owner Nidhi Lal outfitted the salon with FSC-certified wood, low-VOC paints, LED lights and repurposed materials and is working on getting LEED certification.
Especially considering the swanky look of the place, Recess' services are quite inexpensive. A 30-minute manicure -- complete with a scented soak, warm towel treatment, and moisturizing -- costs $25, a similar 40-minute pedicure's $35. For $6 a pop ($8 for feet), you can add on extras like a salt and sugar scrub or an organic essential oil massage.
At the end of the treatment, you even get to take home the buffer, orangewood stick, nail file, and foot file used during your treatment. Recess prides itself in never re-using these items, and so gives them to you free.
The least eco part of of the salon, unfortunately, is the nail polish itself, even though the nail polish lines Recess uses -- SpaRitual and Zoya -- avoid the worst three ingredients found in some nail polishes: toulene, formaldehyde and DBP. That said, everyone from L'Oreal to Wet 'n' Wild have removed these three baddies, so Zoya and SpaRitual aren't exactly much more eco than conventional nail polishes today. Recess does still have that strong chemical smell you get at conventional nail salons; so to call the polish non-toxic may be a bit of a stretch, though it could be called less toxic.
Still, for those who can't give up their nail polish habits, Recess offers a greener option. The gorgeous interior even works well as a party spot, making Recess the perfect salon for mani-pedi parties.
Recess. 8408-B Beverly Blvd. Los Angeles. 323.782.9919
>> Spring St. in downtown L.A. got a new pair of bike racks in front of 626 Gallery. Writes Eric Richardson of blogdowntown: "While certainly every rack is helpful for a cyclist looking to park, the excitement the sight of just one or two new racks can generate illustrates how far off the mark our city is as a whole."
>> Existing bike racks get busy. The usually half-full rack at Variety/E Channel Meridian Club building on Wilshire was packed, forcing Peggy Archer of LAist to tie her bike at a meter.
>> Free Bike Fridays on Governors Island in New York lets visitors try out NYC's sustained bike share program for free every Friday until Oct. 4. Streetsblog made a short video of people -- including a tourist from California -- taking advantage of the free bikes.
Avoid higher water utility prices and get a bit more self sufficient by taking the "Introduction to Landscape Rainwater Harvesting" with Joe Linton this weekend. The workshop'll give you an overview of L.A. water issues, take you on a tour of the eco-village's own storm water harvesting landscape features, and get you directly involved in building a terraced swale to detain and infiltrate storm water.
The workshop will take place at L.A. Eco-Village, 117 Bimini Place, Los Angeles this Saturday, June 14, from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Make a reservation by contacting (213) 738-1254 or crsp@igc.org, then show up with the $35 workshop fee and your own brown bag lunch.
For a less hands-on experience, attend Sustainable Business Council's panel discussion, titled "Water Wise: Get into the Flow." This event will connect water conservation to money -- not just saving money on your water bill, but on making money as an entrepreneur. The 5-person panel (plus moderator) is made up of business people working in the water conservation sector.
The panel takes place at Livingreen, 10000 Culver Blvd., Culver City, on Tuesday, June 17, 7 p.m.-10 p.m. [Update: This event's been postponed. Check the SBC website for new details.] Cover's $20 -- a tax-deductible donation that includes food and drinks. RSVP online.
Enviro-fans of Dwell magazine: You'll be glad to know that the focus for the 3rd Annual Dwell on Design will be sustainability in the L.A. area. The conference and exhibition will showcase and discuss modern design, architecture while examining ways to encourage sustainable living in an increasingly dense city.
And you can check out the exhibition -- with more than 200 exhibitors -- for free! Just use the codes below.
When: Conference on June 5 and 6; Exhibition on June 7 and 8 (exhibition preview for conference attendees on June 6). Where: Los Angeles Convention Center, 1201 S. Figueroa St., Los Angeles. Cost: Exhibition tickets cost $25 online (free with code BDODEC) or $50 at the door; conference registration costs $349 ($50 off with code GRP22SP). Register here.
The exhibition include lots of green panels that examine everything from what L.A.'s new green building codes will mean to new resource and energy efficiency innovations to sustainable interiors. Lots of panel members are also LEED-accredited professionals!
If the conference and tour aren't enough, you can sign up to take a tour of green homes in L.A. And on June 6, you can watch 16 L.A. designers produce 2D sustainable and modular dwellings, rooms and furniture in a tournament-party at MOCA. $50 gets you into the evening event, featuring an open bar and a live DJ.
Valley bicyclists: Want better walk-bike-rail connections in your 'hood? Then join the L.A. County Bicycle Coalition and Metro for a bike or walk tour and weigh in on a plan to improve bike and walk access to the Van Nuys Metro Orange Line Station.
When: Saturday, May 31, 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Where: Marvin Braude Constituent Services Center, Conference Room 1A., 6262 Van Nuys Blvd., Van Nuys Cost: Free, with a free lunch if you RSVP to Dorothy Le at Dorothy@la-bike.org or (213) 629-2142.
According to Metro, this bike-walk deal is "part of a comprehensive study of existing conditions and recommendations for improvements at transit hubs across the Los Angeles County." The Saturday tour is just the first of five. The next four will all focus on Blue Line stations:
Metro Blue Line Compton Station, Saturday, June 14, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Metro Blue Line Florence Station, Saturday, June 21, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Metro Blue Line Rosa Parks Station, Saturday, July 12, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Metro Blue Line Vernon Station, Saturday, July 19, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Put them in your calendars. Wondering what happens after you put in your two cents? The findings from the tours -- which are part of a study funded by a Caltrans Environmental Justice Planning Grant -- will be put together into a final report of recommendations, scheduled to be completed this fall. That report, in turn, "can be used by cities to apply for grant funds to improve access to the stations," according to Metro.
Yes, that means that Metro's using a grant to do a study to apply for more grants; actually bringing about the recommended changes that come out of these bike-walk tours will be contingent on whether or not we get these future grants...
>> L.A.'s greener than San Francisco and New York City, according to a study by think tank Brookings Institution. But Margot Roosevelt delves through the fuzzy math: "The calculations did not account for the fact that half the city's electricity comes from coal-fired power plants. Instead, Brookings used a state-wide average that included the hydroelectric and nuclear plants in Northern California. Omitted from the data are emissions from industries and commercial buildings, and from local roads apart from federal highways." Also omitted were CO2 emissions from long-distance commuters.
>> Your own private L.A. traffic island. Guerrilla gardeners are taking over unkempt public spaces, bringing greenery to urban blights. "One of a slew of DIY gardening currents, such as permaculture (design of highly sustainable ecosystems), urban homesteading, composting and free fruit movement, guerrilla gardening is a response to dwindling green space, limited land and suspicions about food sources, say experts."
>> Go species scoping in the Santa Monica Mountains. BioBlitz 2008 starts at noon to end 24 hours later! Join scientists, naturalists, and fellow Angelenos to observe and record as many species as possible in a 4-hour-shift. Register on-site at one of the stations (PDF).
(Alex Thompson looks goofy with his tan arms and white hands . . . when will cycling manufacturers make "tan through" gloves?)
I've written about the most basic bike activism -- riding your bike in LA. I wrote about extending that to talking to friends and family, and taking that a step further to volunteer for a bike organization. What's left? A lot. There are many aspects of L.A.'s car culture that cyclists need to adjust in order for LA to be a bike friendly city. Right now there simply aren't enough people doing enough things.
So what can you do? The third way to bike activism is to get creative. You can create an organization, or become a lone wolf agitator. You could organize a group ride, pull off a media stunt, or become a regular at public meetings. You could document biking through writing, blogging, the ibikeu Wiki, film or photograph. You can take a leadership role in an existing bike organization. There are many needs, and even more approaches.
(Bike activists argue at the L.A. Bicycle Master Plan update meeting in West L.A. Photo by Franz Ellers, with Alex's camera!)
What you will do, if you get creative with activism, is fail. I know this because I personally have failed more often than I have succeeded at bike activism. I failed publicly on a joint project called Roll With It. I failed on my first project, Critical Commute, which I embarked on with almost no knowledge of existing bike activism and culture. I failed in trying to organize UCLA cyclists to lobby for a stronger UCLA Bicycle Master Plan. Ask me in private and I'll share my more recent failures. The point is to keep trying, and learn from your mistakes. It's OK to fail because, typically, when you succeed, your success will snowball and catalyze more change than you could have anticipated.
I think that documenting bike culture and bike activism is an area where more creative effort is needed. It's also an area in which one can have tremendous impact. Recently, Emerald City reader Nolen Clark recommended I watch "Return of the Scorcher," an influential movie from the '90s about a resurgence in cycling. As I watched it I felt as if the ideas it presented were useful, but unoriginal and commonplace. Then it hit me -- this movie has been watched by almost every bike activist in the United States who has operated in the last decade. It was so influential that everyone learned the ideas within it, making the ideas ubiquitous, and therefore the movie eventually made itself obsolete. It seems basic to me because it is part of today's base of knowledge; it has become an element of the foundation of knowledge from which bike activists operate. That is powerful.
(Two cyclists ride on the 405 during a traffic jam, a controversial instance of bike activism. Photo by Alex Thompson)
More recently a group called Crimanimal Mass mixed a creative ride idea with careful documentation to make a powerful statement about Los Angeles car culture. 25 cyclists (including me!), along with 3 rollerbladers, took to the 10 freeway, heading east onto the interchange to the 405 North, and eventually exiting onto Santa Monica Blvd. In the midst of the rush hour parking lots we call "freeways," I felt safe riding, since vehicle speeds were below eight mph. Organizers documented the ride using multiple video cameras and carefully crafted the footage for viewing on YouTube and Vimeo. The footage was picked up by numerous bloggers, and hundreds of thousands of people viewed the videos and read the articles.
Now, you might exclaim "what positive impact can breaking the law and riding where you don't belong possibly have?" "People are going to be put off by your wanton disregard for the law," you could argue. Many were, but the footage of cyclists passing cars stopped in bumper to bumper traffic on the gargantuan 405 raised interesting questions. Why is it that our transportation infrastructure is so broken that it doesn't function when it is most needed, at rush hour? Why is it that cyclists are better able to make use of a system designed for cars? Cyclists participating in the (second) Freeway Traffic Jam Ride succeeded in raising those questions in an intriguing way, a way not easily dismissed. They catalyzed conversations between citizens about highway infrastructure and cycling. By starting those conversations, they don't just help cyclists, but they help everyone who is stuck in traffic. It was a unique and creative instance of effective activism.
(Bikes and trees go together, a creative post-Freeway Ride use of trees. Photo by Alex Thompson)
Crimanimal Mass would have been far less effective had they received less media attention. That's the risk with more creative activism: there's no guaranteed payoff. However, the upside is that you can have impacts that conventional activism can only dream about. No mass e-mail by an established advocacy organization could have a similar impact as the Freeway Ride videos or Return of the Scorcher. This is true of other forms -- if you start a new organization there is a chance it will fail, but if it grows, then you have massive success. If you blog, there is a chance you will have trouble reaching new readers, but if you succeed you have created a powerful new voice for cyclists. These are higher-risk forms of activism, but they carry with them a chance of an avalanche of benefits for cyclists.
Next week I'll write about . . . I don't know what I'll write about. Perhaps I will write more about other forms of activism. What would you like to know about cycling in L.A.?
>> Up to 24,000 Californians die from fine particulate pollution each year, according to state researchers. The revised figures are based on a review of new research across the nation about the hazards posed by microscopic particles, which sink deep into the lungs. "More measures will be needed, air board officials said, including eventually lowering the maximum permissible levels of soot statewide."
>> A Senate panel overturned the U.S. EPA's decision against California's bid to limit greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles. "In December, EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson turned down California's request for a Clean Air Act waiver that would have allowed the state to require that automakers cut global warming emissions by 30% in new cars and light trucks by 2016. Boxer's bill would deem the waiver approved."
>> Polluting paints are getting phased out from SoCal. "Starting July 1, all flat paints made, sold and used within Orange and major portions of San Bernardino, Riverside and Los Angeles counties must have 50 grams or less of volatile organic compounds per liter."
The good news: Our beaches are cleaner and healthier! The bad news: They're cleaner and healthier because we're in a drought! That means less rain -- which means less urban runoff and less ocean pollution.
That's the latest news from enviro-nonprofit Heal the Bay's 18th Annual Beach Report Card released earlier today. The Report Card monitors the water quality from more than 375 California locations year-round (517 locations in dry weather from April to October) -- then grades them on an A to F scale based on the risk of adverse health effects to beachgoers.
Los Angeles County still has the lowest beach water quality in the state -- for the third year in a row. However, our water quality still improved considerably from last year. Plus, our stats are a little skewed by the fact that we collect our samples directly in front of flowing storm drains and creeks, where water tends to be dirtier. Most other counties haven't made the switch to this more accurate sampling method -- something Heal the Bay is pushing to change in the future.
In any case, only five L.A. County beaches are named and shamed on Heal the Bay's "Top 10 Beach Bummers" this year, down from seven last year. Yippee! Here's the list:
1. Avalon Harbor Beach on Catalina Island (Los Angeles County) 2. Santa Monica Municipal Pier (Los Angeles County) 3. Poche Beach (Orange County) 4. North Beach Doheny (Orange County) 5. Marie Canyon Storm Drain at Puerco Beach (Los Angeles County) 6. Cabrillo Beach harborside (Los Angeles County) 7. City of Long Beach -- multiple locations (Los Angeles County) 8. Campbell Cove State Park Beach (Sonoma County) 9. Clam Beach County Park near Strawberry Creek (Humboldt County) 10. Pismo Beach Pier (San Luis Obispo County)
As a teenager, Siel sped past Paramount Studios on the 10 Metro bus to get to Fairfax High School. Now she cuts through the concrete jungle of Los Angeles on her pink Townie bike to shop at local farmers' markets and socialize in pre-loved Prada heels. A contributing editor to BlogHer, Siel also keeps a personal blog, green LA girl. Send your burning green questions to greenlagirl@gmail.com.
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