Los Angeles River
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The Los Angeles River flows through Los Angeles County, California from Canoga Park in the west end of the San Fernando Valley, 51 miles south to its mouth in Long Beach. Its official starting point on the map is placed at the union of Bell Creek and Calabasas Wash in the southwestern San Fernando Valley (). But the majority of its source waters flow from high in the San Gabriel Mountains to the east of the San Fernando Valley, and the Santa Susanna Mountains to the north. Major tributaries, in order of their appearance on the River, are Brown's Canyon Wash, Aliso Canyon Wash, the Tujunga Wash, the Western Burbank Channel, the Verdugo Wash, the Arroyo Seco, the Rio Hondo, and Compton Creek. The River flows eastward through the San Fernando Valley until turning south and southeast in the city of Burbank. It then flows between the Santa Monica Mountains and the Verdugo Mountains through a passage known as the Glendale Narrows. When it leaves the Glendale Narrows, the River flows directly south through Downtown Los Angeles and continues flowing in a straight southerly direction until it reaches Long Beach. The River flows in a concrete flood control channel capable of delivering massive amounts of rainwater to the sea during the rainy season. These flood waters come from the Santa Monica Mountains, the Verdugo Mountains, the Santa Susanna Mountains, and the San Gabriel Mountains, collecting more urban runoff from Los Angeles and Pasadena along its path to the Pacific Ocean. In the dry season, about 80% of the water in the River consists of tertiary recycled sewage water. While this water is cleaner than the water in most urban rivers around the world, it is polluted from runoff from the city streets, which drain into the river all along its fifty mile course. Rainy season floodwaters from the streets of Los Angeles are particularly toxic and have created pollution problems along the beaches following heavy storms.
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[edit] History
The river provided water and sustenance for the Gabriellino Indians for hundreds of years prior to the arrival of the Spanish. The Gabriellinos were hunters and gatherers who lived primarily off the fish, small mammals and acorns from the abundant oak trees along the river's path. There were at least 45 Gabrielino villages located near the Los Angeles River, concetrated in The San Fernando Valley, and Elysian Valley in what is present day Glendale. In 1769, Gaspar de Portolà during his 1769 expedition of Alta California named it El Rio de Nuestra Señora La Reina de Los Angeles de Porciúncula, so translated: The River of Our Lady Queen of the Angels of Porciuncula. It was referred to as the Porciuncula River.
The River was originally an alluvial river that ran freely across a flood plain that is now occupied by Los Angeles, Long Beach, and other townships in Southern California. Its path was unstable and unpredictable, and the mouth of the River moved frequently from one place to another between Long Beach and Ballona Creek. In the early 19th Century, the River turned southwest after leaving the Glendale Narrows, where it joined Ballona Creek and discharged into Santa Monica Bay in present Marina del Rey. However, during a catastrophic flash flood in 1835, its course was diverted again to its present one, flowing due south just east of present-day downtown Los Angeles and discharging into San Pedro Bay. (Prior to another major flood in 1862, it was joined by the San Gabriel River in present-day Long Beach, but in that year the San Gabriel carved out a new course six miles to the east, and has discharged into Alamitos Bay ever since.)
Until the opening of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the Los Angeles River was the primary water source for the Los Angeles Basin, and much of its channel was dry except during the winter rains. Unpredictable and devastating floods continued to plague it well into the 1930s (most notably the catastrophic 1938 flood that precipitated the recall of corrupt Los Angeles mayor Frank L. Shaw), leading to calls for flood control measures. The Army Corps of Engineers duly began an ambitious project of completely encasing the river's bed and banks in concrete, with only a trickle of water usually flowing down its middle. Ever since, it has primarily served as a flood control channel, fed by storm drains. The only portions of the river in which it is not completely paved over are in the flood control basin behind the Sepulveda Dam near Van Nuys; a three mile stretch east of Griffith Park known as the Glendale Narrows; and along its last few miles in Long Beach.
[edit] Points of Interest
Sepulveda Basin is a flood-control basin to control floodwater runoff. Except for infrequent but dramatic flood episodes, this otherwise dry-land flood control basin, most of which is leased from the Corps by the City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks, plays host to diverse uses today including athletic fields, agriculture, golf courses, a fishing lake, parklands, a sewage treatment facility, and a wildlife reserve.
The river's southern stretch forms the heart of an industrial corridor stretching nearly unbroken from Lincoln Heights to Long Beach. In this area, the busy Long Beach Freeway (I-710) and several high-voltage power lines run within a few hundred feet of the riverbed. Several rail yards are located along the river's banks in this stretch, as well. Just outside of the industrial corridor lie some of the most densely populated cities in the state of California, such the cities of Cudahy and South Gate; most of these cities are in the river's flood plain and experienced significant flooding prior to channelization.
The Los Angeles River has become a source of embarrassment for many Angelenos, with graffiti lining its walls, garbage strewn along its bed, homeless persons and heroin addicts camped out underneath its bridges, and drag races (immortalized in the film Grease) taking place in its channel. The river's condition is especially bad south of Boyle Heights.
[edit] Revitalization
One of the most exciting initiatives shepherded over the last three years by the Ad Hoc River Committee is the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan. As a result of the Ad Hoc River Committee’s efforts, and with funding from the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, the City of Los Angeles’ Department of Public Works-Bureau of Engineering issued a Request for Proposals in 2005 for the preparation of a Revitalization Master Plan which would identify proposals that would make the Los Angeles River a “front door” to the City, and support a multitude of civic activities.
The 18-month Revitalization planning process will look at improvements along the project area all aimed towards celebrating neighborhoods, protecting wildlife, promoting the health of the river, and leveraging economic development. By the end of the planning process, a 20-year blueprint for development and management of the Los Angeles River will be developed for implementation by the City of Los Angeles.
A critical element of the Revitalization Master Plan will be ongoing opportunities for public involvement in the process. The plan calls for an extensive, proactive community engagement effort, and will employ multiple outreach tools, including public workshops/meetings held at key project milestones in convenient locations along the Los Angeles River, participation in appropriate neighborhood and community events, and an interactive web site (www.lariver.org). The Revitalization Master Planning effort formally commenced in September 2005, with the first public workshops scheduled for mid October 2005.
Friends of the Los Angeles River (FoLAR) and Unpave LA, a coalition of environmental groups, have been advocating restoration of the river, creation of a wildlife corridor from the mountains to the sea and a radical change in the way we deal with rainwater on individual properties.
The Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, a new player in the river drama, has a powerful State mandate to connect Elysian and Griffith Parks to the mountains. With an initial budget of $1,000,000, MRCA is evaluating the acquisition of properties to create parks and trails along the river between the two large parks. (See the article by Ester Feldman in the April '94 TPR).
The California Coastal Conservancy, a state agency, published its Los Angeles River Park and Recreation Study in 1993, identifying potential projects along the river. In November 2005, Unpave LA sponsored a well attended conference, Rethinking the River, to promote discussion of LA River management options.
[edit] Entertainment
Numerous films, video games, and television programs have featured various sites along the Los Angeles River, including Them!, Blue Thunder, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Grease, Volcano, Point Blank, Boomtown, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Midnight Club II, Rize, The Core, Repo Man, and many others, including a skit on the show Jackass in which Johnny Knoxville tries to jump a section on roller blades, but breaks his ankle.
[edit] Riverside communities
Communities along the banks of the Los Angeles River include:
- Canoga Park
- Reseda
- Van Nuys
- Sherman Oaks
- Studio City
- Universal City
- Toluca Lake
- Burbank
- Los Feliz
- Atwater Village
- Elysian Valley
- Glassell Park
- Cypress Park
- Chinatown
- Lincoln Heights
- Boyle Heights
- Vernon
- Maywood
- Commerce
- Bell
- Bell Gardens
- Cudahy
- South Gate
- Lynwood
- Paramount
- Compton
- Long Beach
[edit] Crossings
Crossings are listed from south to north.[1]
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[edit] See also
[edit] References
[edit] Further reading
- The Los Angeles River: Its Life, Death, and Possible Rebirth. Blake Gumprecht. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8018-6047-4.
- Eden by design: the 1930 Olmsted-Bartholomew plan for the Los Angeles region. Greg Hise & William Francis Deverell. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. ISBN 0-5202-2414-0. ISBN 0520224159.
- Río L.A.: Tales from the Los Angeles River. Patt Morrison. Los Angeles: Angel City Press, 2001. ISBN 1-883318-24-6.
- Down By The Los Angeles River: Friends of the Los Angeles River's Official Guide Joe Linton. Berkeley: Wilderness Press, 2005. ISBN 0-89997-391-4.
[edit] External links
- Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan and City Ad Hoc Committee.
- The Los Angeles River Tour
- The River Project
- F.O.L.A.R Friends of the Los Angeles River
- Friends Of Vast Industrial Concrete Kafkaesque Structures, a photo journal of photographs of the Los Angeles River flood control channel.
- The Los Angeles River Master Plan
- Los Angeles River Flickr Photo Group
