Overheard at yesterday's Griffith Park Resources "Board" (sic) meeting:

After reading through this laundry list of Griffith Park action items, you just have to wonder about the priority of agencies who are ostensibly tasked with the environmental health, care and protection of this urban wilderness park.

ACTION ITEMS: 

• Work on the new foot/bike/horse bridge crossing the LA River from Atwater Village into the park cannot begin until migratory bird nesting season is over, which is anticipated to be the end of July.

• Traffic study was just completed at the Zoo entrance by the Autry. Traffic calming solutions may include a traffic light. Yes, a traffic light in an urban wilderness park. Something is really wrong here.

• LA Opera wants to simulcast its opener on big tv screens on the Wilson-Harding Golf Course.   w-t-f?

• LaBonge is still talking about adding cell towers on water tanks throughout the park, same as he has been for the past four years or so.

• LAPD wants a 'public' horse arena on the Atwater Village side near the new bridge that they will have preferential use of... but the public can use it when they're done using it.

• The LA Zoo - which is on Griffith Park property - will be 'offering' preferential parking for $5. Looks like paying to park in our City parks now has a toe-hold.

• The Eco-Moron Award-winning LADWP Holiday Light Festival is finished as a vehicle event, but it may move entirely into the LA Zoo as a foot traffic event with all of the lights and noise. I'm sure the animals will love it.

• LADWP will be rebuilding the tree root-damaged sidewalks on Riverside Drive at LaBonge's behest. What do ratepayers think about this?

• the GP Senior Center in the Friendship Auditorium parking lot wants LaBonge to re purpose (? kick LA Shares out?) the building by Mulholland Fountain for an "Arts Center" that they will be using.

• LaBonge wants a trail from Lake Hollywood to Cahuenga Peak on LADWP right of away.

• After physical attacks upon both an LAPD officer and a peace officer Park Ranger by illegal flower vendors at the Forest Lawn entrance to the park, a public safety task force will be working on this issue.

• Related to the above issue, the Headworks plan calls for the removal of the fence that helps keep illegal flower vendors from completely impacting every inch of that section of roadway and park. This decision was called into question and may change.

DWP funding for Holiday Light Festival goes bye-bye

Shed no tears for the half-million idling cars that won't be clogging up Griffith Park, I-5, Los Feliz streets, and the air you breathe come Thanksgiving.

The DWP as part of a $400 million cost-cutting measure has axed the EcoMoron Award-winning Holiday Light Festival.

LA Times:

Among the items eliminated, officials said, is the popular Holiday Light Festival, the annual light show in Griffith Park between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. The DWP has funded the festival for 14 of the last 15 years. Also to be cut are two smaller holiday light festivals, one in Leimert Park and the other on the 1st  Street Bridge. The DWP will save $1 million a year eliminating the holiday light shows, said Joseph Ramallo, a DWP spokesman.

Now take a deep breath - count to three - and listen for Tom LaBonge announcing how he will fund his own EcoMoron-candidate version. Wait for it... wait....

Park pic of the day

Turn out the lights!

Today the LA Times finally picks up on the DWP cancellation of the EcoMoron Award-winning pollute-a-thon.

McHoliday

Happy drive-thru holiday everyone!

Hope you didn't breathe in too many hours of joyous carbon emissions!






adrianabidasio @Catchdizzy   ugh tell me about it! i'm trying to remain in the christmas spirit, but the griffith park light festival can seriously bite me.   about 10 hours ago from web

missashleeeyyy   Traffic in griffith park to see a light festival...no bueno!   about 10 hours ago from txt

omnilila   in line for griffith park lights for 1.25 hours.   about 10 hours ago from mobile web

MissBurks   Still in TRAFFIC at Griffith Park UGH. We just wanna see the light show!!! 2hrs strong uugghh @marlonwade thanks for take'n over the wheel   about 11 hours ago from UberTwitter

ShunnaJones   STILL waiting to experience Festival of Lights. Been in traffic to Griffith Park for 2 hrs. Should be called the Festival of Brake Lights!   about 11 hours ago from TwitterBerry


 MissBurks   TRAFFIC at Griffith Park UGH   about 12 hours ago from UberTwitter 


 

GP Light Festival: "Dat shit was backed up 2 Glendale"

Just one of the many reasons that the Holiday Light Festival in Griffith Park is an Eco-Moron Award winner:


Diskedo   Tried 2watch da Light shw @ Griffith park last nite! Didn't! Dat shit was backed up 2 Glendale ! We ll hit it up again 2night wish us luck
about 4 hours ago from Tweetie

Cathyroxx    Ok so I went to see lights on Griffith park & it was a complete of my precious time lol we got stuck on traffic for 2 hours just 2 see...
about 13 hours ago from Twitterrific

Totaltrafficla   Griffith Park 5S is slow 134 to Los Feliz. 5N is slow 2 to Glendale Blvd slowing is due to Griffith Park Observatory Christmas lights
about 14 hours ago from web

OzzyFavela   Griffith Park Christmas Lights here we come. Can't wait, but traffic is horrible.
about 14 hours ago from web

The way it should be

If the City Council insists on wasting money and dirty coal-generated energy with a cheesy, unoriginal lights show that is easily dwarfed year after year by neighborhood displays, then the least you can do is to restrict it to green transportation and healthy viewing.

From today's LA Times slide show of last night's festival debut. See the rest of the slide show here.

Aliens in Griffith Park

Twitpic by s2ams show aliens landing in the park last night during the Holiday light Festival.

Hope they brought their bikes so they could enjoy the festival cause motorized vehicles weren't allowed..

GP Light festival bike night invite*

Is LaBonge going to ride with the masses for five hours? Doubt it, so if you want to hang with the Councilman, you had best get there right at 5pm.




*ObEditorialComment: Who do you think did most of the work on this event, the party in large print or the party in small print? And who is missing? Only the department whose facility is ensnarled by this event for an entire month each year - Recreation and Parks. 

Green way to see the Light Festival

The Light Festival opens December 3rd with a Bike Night preview.

Cowboy up for the Festival of Lights

Go green for the Light Festival,  19th century-style!

From December 9th through the 30th, horse fans can enjoy the DWP Holiday Festival of Lights in Griffith Park on horseback, 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays only. Recreation and Parks personnel will be on hand to control the safe use of the path between the riders and walkers.

Group rides are welcome. The equestrian entrance to the Light Festival is at the Griffith Park  Park Ranger station. Do not enter from the Zoo side (the Zoo is the exit).

For those without their own horses, rental horses and guides are available at the Diamond Bar Stables. Call 818-242-8443 for information.

For those wishing to trailer their horses in, ample parking is available in the dirt lot across the street from the Live Steamers (next to Travel Town). Exit the 134 Freeway on Forest Lawn Drive off ramp. Travel Town and Live Steamers are east of the exit on Zoo Drive (left turn at the stoplight to access Zoo Drive, next to Martinez Arena). There is a wide trail along the 134 Freeway , past the Autry Museum and on to entrance to the Light Festival at the Ranger Station.

2009 Holiday Light Festival goes half-green!

Dear Friend of Griffith Park,

Thank you for registering your opinion about changes you would like to see in the annual LADWP Light Festival in Griffith Park. The combined input of the 125 responses we received has had a powerful effect.

This year, for the first time, there will be more walking nights than driving nights.

1. Last year's festival was 1/3 people power, 2/3 engines. This year there will be 15 non-driving nights vs.13 driving nights.
2. Last year's festival deployed buses on walking nights to shuttle visitors from parking lots far from the walking route. This year the LADWP will discontinue the buses and direct visitors to the Zoo parking lot, saving $$$ and lowering pollution.
3. Last year's festival prohibited bicycles except for a single Bike Night. Although the LADWP did not accede to the request that bikes enjoy nightly access, this year it will make extra bike racks available at both ends of the light display.

Another significant change...this year's event will be ten days shorter, beginning on December 3 instead of Thanksgiving week.

Incremental progress is being made towards a combustion-engine free Light Festival. Whether you sent a letter or an e-mail, advocated in person or petitioned, we thank you. As we go forward, there are several ways to continue to promote reform...walk this year's fest and document it, send positive feedback to the LADWP for the changes it has made (contact info following), and please e-mail me or the GGPNC if you have other ideas.

The breakdown of the survey and the official LADWP announcement of 2009 Light Festival dates are copied below.

Thanks again for your advocacy,
Bernadette Soter
Parks, River and Open Space Committee (PROS)
Greater Griffith Park Neighborhood Council (GGPNC)  

The GGPNC received approximately 125 opinions. Here is the breakdown

- 105 respondents preferred an engine-free festival with all walking and bicycling nights
- 6 respondents preferred a festival with some walking and some driving nights
- 1 respondent preferred a festival with all driving nights
- 7 respondents felt that the festival should be moved from Griffith Park to another setting
- 7 respondents felt that the festival should be discontinued entirely

Should the Holiday Light Festival go green? Vote!

Should the 2009 Griffith Park Holiday Light Festival be:

1. a fully walking - bicycling - equestrian event,

2. or remain primarily a driving - vehicle event?



 Click the link to email your response:  LightFestival@ggpnc.org

Fight to make Griffith Park Holiday Light Festival a shade greener

By Stephen Box at SoapBoxLA
Photo by Militant Angelino    

Holiday Light Festival - NC's Walk!

LA's Department of Water & Power has dusted off the Holiday Light Festival decorations and is busy investing the public's money in the event that won the "Eco-Moron" award last year for its ability to drawing idling vehicles in such numbers that Griffith Park, the adjacent communities and the 5 freeway all sit in gridlock for hours each evening of the holiday season. As the Park Rangers and the Department of Transportation grapple with the traffic, the DWP claims the "Going Green" title and then proceeds to go after more of your green.

The Griffith Park Holiday Light Festival is an old tradition, dating back to Councilman John Ferraro who visited San Antonio during the holiday season and came back all enthralled with the idea of a public light festival. In hindsight, it's only too bad that he didn't visit a city with Great Streets, one with holiday lights and people walking and talking and having conversations and singing and enjoying a human-sized people based festival. Of course, it's not too late to make some changes!

The Greater Griffith Park NC, the Atwater Village NC, the Los Feliz Improvement Association, the Oaks Home Owners Association and community members representing hikers, runners, cyclists, equestrians, and folks who simply like to breath clean air when standing in the middle of the America's largest urban wilderness park have joined together to ask the DWP to simply have motorists park their cars in the Zoo parking lot, then get out and walk through the Festival. The simple move to a pedestrian based festival, with ADA accommodations, would relieve the community from the idling queue that approaches the park from the south. It seems so simple!

The DWP's Public Affairs office, very nice folks who have one of the hardest jobs imaginable, putting a shine on the DWP's policies and programs, gave this year's version of "Why you can't have what you want but here is something shiny to distract you!" presentation, again to a full house and again to well-articulated arguments for the same old vehicular based paradigm for enjoying the great outdoors.

The Bike Writers Collective objects to the DWP's Griffith Park Holiday Light Festival for a few reasons, first because it excludes cyclists from the vehicular nights based on the recommendation of the LADOT that it is too dangerous to have motor vehicles and bicycles on the same road. This becomes a principle issue since one of the basic rights cyclists claim is the right to ride on the streets of Los Angeles. The DWP claims that it is exempt from the law and can exclude cyclists which leaves cyclists charging "The DWP is trying too hard to find a legal loophole to do something absurd, prevent cyclists from riding bikes in traffic that moves so slowly, the road resembles a parking lot."

Plans are already underway for a protest ride, The Festival of Rights, which will take place on Friday, December 18. The protest ride, which gathers at the Mulholland Fountain where cyclists decorate themselves with lights, has become an annual tradition and this will be the third year (2007 and 2008) that the absurdity of a vehicular light festival at the expense of the community, the pedestrians and the cyclists will be challenged by the cycling community. Cyclist should be cautioned that the ride is not without risk, participants who elect to breath while riding will be subjected to greenhouse gases, auto emissions and noxious odors.

As for the larger issue of the "Pedestrian Friendly" event that local community leaders have been proposing, endorsing and working to bring to fruition, the DWP Commissioners, the DWP Management and Councilman Tom LaBonge have all been notified that the Greater Griffith Park Neighborhood Council has polled the community and concluded with a resolution calling for the "complete environmental reform of the annual LADWP Light Festival in Griffith Park."