The Fake Angeleno

Wild Parrots Invade the Backyard

Having just encountered a very endearing baby parrot last month at my office, the novelty of having five wild parrots land in our backyard this morning wasn't quite as powerful as it could have been.  Still, it was a quite a site to see out the back window:

The whole gang was chattering amongst themselves and feasting on the blooms of our coral tree.  I think they'd have picked the whole tree clean if I hadn't have encouraged them to shove off after a healthy snack. 

Freakonomics Blog Tackles L.A. Transportation Issues

How am I always the last to know about these things?  The NYT's Freakonomics blog has been running a great series of L.A. transportation-themed posts by U.C.L.A. doctoral student and longtime Angeleno Eric Morris.

In his most recent "Los Angeles Transportation Fact and Fiction" entry, Morris writes:

In the last posts, we learned that Los Angeles is not a poster child for sprawl, that the air has gotten a lot cleaner, and that the freeway network is surprisingly small given the region’s enormous population. What about the charge that Los Angeles’s mass-transit system is underdeveloped and inadequate?

By U.S. standards, that’s false.

Of course, Morris goes onto admit: "I can’t look you in the eye and tell you the car is not king in Los Angeles. It is. Our transit share is quite small: a bit under 2 percent."  

Turns out that as far as mass transit share goes, L.A. puts Kansas City and Milwaukee to shame but lags behind San Francisco's surprisingly-low 5% and New York's country-best-but-still-kind-of-pathetic 10%. 

LINK: [Freakonomics on L.A. Transit Fact and Fiction]

Reading Material 12/29: Majesty of the Outdoors Edition

1. The modern hiker's been enjoying the San Gabriel snow -- with the photos and excellent hike suggestions to prove it. [Modern Hiker]


2. Plenty Magazine goes kayaking on the L.A. River and gives a history and urban planning lesson along the way. [Plenty]


3. While I'm at it, here's a link to the wonderfully informative website of the Santa Monica Mountains conservancy. [LA Mountains]

Reading Material 4/22: Earth Day; Taco Trucks Threatened

This morning, I'm afraid all I can muster for you is a bulleted list of links.  I hope you enjoy them; more blogging ahead this week...

• Happy Earth Day.  The Emerald City blog has compiled some E-Day happenings around L.A. if you're so inclined.  [Emerald City]
• A large swath of Wilshire will become a pedestrian Oasis today, but one blogger wonders whether the ensuing flash traffic jams will spew a metric ton of counter productive carbon into the atmosphere. [Opinion L.A.]
• L.A. taco trucks are being threatened by the city government!  The Great Taco Hunt has the lowdown, along with a link to yesterday's op/ed in the LAT in praise of the high quality and neighborhood-niche-filling convenience of the taco truck. [Great Taco Hunt]

There's also a new petition drive starting up to ensure no anti taco truck ordinance makes it through the city council...  You can learn more at www.saveourtacotrucks.org

Environmentalism in an Urban Context: 93.9 on your NYC FM Dial

For the past several years, my good friend Amanda Park Taylor (Diamond) has been writing a regular column in the L Magazine called The Conscientious Objector.  The column was high-quality when it started out, but for the last year or so, Amanda has really dropped it into another gear by focusing on environmental issues.  Her column gets better with every issue, and people are starting to take notice. 

Here in Los Angeles, the blogger Green L.A. Girl has parlayed her writings on environmentalism into a featured environmental blog on the L.A. Times website.   She's good, but The Conscientious Objector goes deeper -- with a more refined prose style.  And by "refined prose style" I mean something like "M.F.K. Fisher meets Jane Jacobs."  Here's a sample column from Amanda on an environmentally friendly gift guide.

Here's a memo to the New York dailies: You would be smart to snap up the Conscientious Objector soon as a blogger or columnist.   People are taking notice: Amanda was on ABC's local NYC affiliate recently, and tomorrow she'll be appearing on the Brian Lehrer show to talk about environmentalism in an urban context. She'll be on Lehrer sometime after 10:30 AM Eastern, April 22.  If you miss it, be sure to download the podcast at the Brian Lehrer website.  I'll post a link tomorrow when it becomes available. 

Since the L still doesn't have an optimal  online archives solution, (C'mon fellas...) here's a link to Google's cache of Amanda's Conscientious Objector columns.