I don’t know if anyone remember this, but there was this ginormous wildfire in Griffith Park last year that took the cooperative efforts of our gallant county and city fire departments to control before it spread to neighboring communities and obliterated the park altogether. As amazing as this was, in the following months the civic pride recognizing the rescue efforts was quickly replaced by community outrage that large portions of the park were off limits to regular citizens.

While park and city officials argued the extended closures were required for displaced animals to readjust, vegetation to regrow, and to ensure trails were safe again for the public, critical residents accused Rec & Parks of mismanagement, poorly updating the public, and dragging their feet; city councilman Tom LaBonge of using the fires to pursue his own agenda while (and hiking in the park without restrictions), and mostly expressing their eagerness to get back to walking, biking, or riding the trails.

And there are those people who thrive in this ego and fame obsessesed city, the “self important jackholes” who expect and demand special treatment from regular citizens because of who think they are or who they know. These are the people who shamelessly drop the line, “don’t you know who I am” either verbatim, or in coded speak. One reader wrote he’d once seen “Kevin Spacey utterly cringe as his boyfriend demanded a table at Fred 62, even though there was a 45 minute wait, screaming ‘Do you know who this is?’” Although, in my experience, A list celebrities are less likely to lower themselves to this behavior than agents and, worse, talent managers.

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Saw this on my morning constitutional TODAY! (Slaps hand to forehead)

While driving back to Los Angeles after a trip up north a few years ago, I tuned into KNX to get traffic conditions for the best route back into town. A report came in: there is a couch in lanes. I couldn’t wait for those six minutes to go by to hear the next report: two car accident at the couch in lanes. (This is one reason I LOVE LOVE LOVE Los Angeles traffic reports.) Couches and mattresses seem to be very hard to dispose of for most people. But honestly, how hard is it to call 311 and schedule a bulky item pickup? I have to admit, I do like the recycle mentality: you can put stuff on the sidewalk or in the alley and if the item is decent, it will be gone within the day, sometimes within a couple of hours. But if it’s not gone, you can’t let it hang out for months, rotting in the elements. You know who you are and you can’t camouflage the rotting sofa with a Christmas Tree in January. We see them both. Do your civic duty.

Speaking of mattresses, I’m a great sleeper. I’m an early to bed early to rise kinda gal. However, there are times when I’m out with the husband, seeing a movie or going to a lecture, and we want to eat afterward. This can be very tricky and annoying in Los Angeles. If it is past 9:30 there just aren’t that many choices. (I know there are plenty of Denny’s to go around, but really, after you’ve seen Harry Shearer talking to Al Gore, Moons Over My Hammy® is not going to cut it.) For late dining there is Canter’s, Kate Mantilini and Swingers. (Please tell me how wrong I am, please, with great detail and addresses and menus in the comments section, please!) Why can’t decent, interesting, good restaurants stay open past 10? Is there no night life in Los Angeles? What gives?

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(Poll closes April 7.)

Read more of the 64 Worst Round I polls and results.

This faceoff is a battle of institutions.

Personally, I would not have picked the Los Angeles Times and the Los Angeles Police Department as two of the “worst things about Los Angeles.”

I think the LAPD is – for all its high-profile abuse cases and street-level bad-ass reputation – generally doing the best job it can with horribly outnumbered ranks and still managing to keep the bulk of the city safe at night. Nearly all LAPD officers do their jobs well.

I also think the Times is – for all its high-profile gaffes, blowhard op-ed columnists and tragically slow-on-the-uptake history of web strategizing – doing the best job it can with a horribly shrinking budget and still managing to show us news of some worth about the other institutions governing our lives. Nearly all L.A. Times journalists do their jobs well.

But the Metblogs audience insisted they face your vote because, perhaps, the Times and the LAPD are so damned important and should be so much better … Read the rest of this entry →

Which is worse: No Metro Service to Dodger Stadium or Americana at Brand?

The Dodgers have called Los Angeles home for 50 years. To celebrate, they added 1000 parking spaces for your 4-wheeled convenience. Subway? Nope. Streetcar? Keep dreaming. Shuttle? We’re still waiting in line to get to the Coliseum. MetroRiderLA reported Metro’s failure for that historic occasion on every level. Crappy shuttles, long wait for trains, and one very blue fanbase:

Some fans were still stranded at Dodger Stadium while the game had been going on for an hour some six miles away. These people will likely never attempt to go to a baseball game without a car ever again.

For another spectacle, we turn to the world of development and retail. Very, very exciting. Read the rest of this entry →

Oooh, this is a tough one because – in a sense – we brought both these curses on ourselves.

L.A. has the worst air in the United States because, by and large:

• We got addicted to cars early and permanently
• We then engineered one of the nation’s great public transit systems (the Red Car) out of existence
• We’re too lazy/busy/cheap/classist to use existing public transit, bikes or other alternative transportation, and
• Damn, we do like owning vintage V8s, gas-powered leaf-blowers and one of the largest, most diesel-spewing ports on the planet …

Read the rest of this entry →

My first blog post in the “64 Worst” series was about McMansions vs. People Who Don’t Pick Up Their Dog’s Poop. (Currently the vote is dead even…) I went out to empty my trash and was greeted by this lovely item out my back gate. Hmmmm. Has some disgruntled dog owner figured out where I live?

If you want to get the full impact, just click on over to the other side. (But if you are eating lunch, come back later…)
Read the rest of this entry →

I’ve recently noticed a trend that reminds me of L.A.’s many ironies: people who used to complain about how spread out Los Angeles is are now worried about skyscrapers and further residential development within city limits. Are they expecting the population of L.A. to stop growing?

Urban density seems to be the hot topic lately, as property developers have been able to twist arms in city government to change zoning laws to allow more to be built on existing space with less restrictions. This means taller buildings, and less requirements to ensure adequate parking even though more people will be encouraged to live in the new developments.

Robert Cruickshank at California Progress Report believes Los Angeles and other cities throughout the state, need more urban density:

Whether they know it or not, those who oppose density are helping establish a “homeowner aristocracy” – where the benefits of society go only to those who were lucky enough to buy a house before 2000, or who inherited from someone who did.

Urban sprawl pretty much defines Los Angeles, with its hundreds of suburbs, thousands of minimalls, and millions of miles of congested roads, along with resulting blight, as affordable housing and better living conditions move further from wherever they work in the city core (a loose term in L.A., to be sure).

A city can be victim to both, but is there a solution? Of course, the more appropriate question here is – which is worse?

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In LA we can make a religion out of anything. This is why people in other, more sensible parts of the world mock us (well that and the pot vending machines).

Let’s take Scientology: Never mind the creepy greed and cultlike actions of the LRon-ites, these people believe aliens live in their elbows and we are all descended from giant clams. Sadly, while one might expect that someone claiming that their head cold is a byproduct of body-colonization by space aliens might be directed toward some sort of psychotherapy or at the very least antipsychotic medication, in this town they are given lead roles in blockbusters and rockstar parking spaces.

In the other corner, we have Pinkberry, perhaps even greater evidence that Angelenos can turn anything into a creed. Scientology promises enlightenment, even perfection, Pinkberry on the other hand promises frozen yogurt. Five dollah frozen yogurt. Frozen yogurt that people speak with a reverence and fervor usually reserved for gurus and soccer matches. And like a holy spot where the Virgin Mary was sighted, Pinkberry pilgrimages clot the neighborhood. Hellishly snarled traffic and sidewalks clogged with crowds of cell-yapping Britneys whose every too-loud sentence ends in a rising intonation.

It’s a hard call folks. All I know is if PT Barnum were alive today, he’d be living in LA.

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Poll closes Friday at 7pm.

Which is worse: Mayor Villaraigosa or Tagging?

Antonio Villaraigosa promised to build a subway to the sea, and increase funding for public schools. He would clean up Skid Row and take back the city from gangs. He would make Los Angeles the greenest big city in America. Then, he spent his time in office going shopping with Mirthala, and road-tripping with Hillary.

Tagging is a graffiti writer’s personalized signature that can be found on any public or private surface, AKA vandalism. A 15-year-old tagger named “Zoner” went mainstream in ’07 when he famously tagged Villaraigosa’s bus while the mayor was at the Santee Education Complex in South L.A. to celebrate the relocation of a bus stop out of gang territory. Zoner was sent to his room, and the mayor went back to shaking hands and kissing reporters.

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What makes living in L.A. more unbearable, LAUSD or the lack of a middle class?

I asked some fellow teachers, “In one quick sentence, what is the worst thing about LAUSD?”

Their responses?

• “LAUSD is too big.”

• “LAUSD is too bureaucratic.”

• “LAUSD lacks a clear vision.”

• “There is too much outside interference by superiors.”

• “LAUSD is the DMV, court, and post office, rolled into one.”

• “The worst thing is that one sentence is not enough to describe how bad it is.”

On the other hand, we have the lack of a middle class. If we take the middle class to mean those households with incomes between $35 and $75 thousand, then only 30% of LA qualifies.

The lack and diminution of the middle class is having a negative impact on our local economy. But LAUSD is undermining our ability as a society to develop a thriving middle class by providing a shoddy education to a generation of students unprepared for higher education.

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Poll closes Thursday at 3pm.

A Mansion is defined as “a very large, impressive, or stately residence.” A McMansion is defined by the OED as “A modern house built on a large and imposing scale, but regarded as ostentatious and lacking architectural integrity.” McMansions are generally built by developers in large subdivisions to appeal to…to…uh…people who think they are moving into a large, impressive or stately residence. Like porn, you know a McMansion when you see one. Buy hey, if people want to live in cookie cutter houses in Stepford like comfort, more power to you. However, if you want to come to my neighborhood full of sweet 1930′s and 1940′s houses, knock one down and fill the entire lot with a cheap ass Tudor-ish or faux plantationesque house, please, move to Texas or you may find dog poop thrown in your back window. (I would have thrown it into your backyard, but you don’t have one.)

Where would I find this dog poop as a non-dog-owning person? Why on the sidewalk or my front lawn, of course! Because that certain someone believes he or she is too French well-heeled to actually dispose of feces with their hands and a plastic bag. I like dogs, but I don’t own one because I don’t like dealing with poop on a large scale. (Trust me, cat litter scooping is much easier…) If you are going to own a dog and walk the dog in public, you must clean up after your dog. Why is this so confusing to some of you? Just do it! Don’t make me get all Cesar Milan on your ass.

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(Poll will close on April 3.)

Review the other 64 Worst Round I options so far.

I’ll just say it: Los Angeles has no Dunkin Donuts. We have Krispy Kreme, we have Yum Yum, we’ve got Bob’s. We even have California Donut (my personal favorite). But there is no Dunkin Donuts anywhere to be found. None of their legendary coffee, not one single Boston Creme. Here on the left coast, it is never “time to make the donuts.”

On the other hand, if it weren’t for all these damn transplants, LA wouldn’t be full of east coasters whining about their precious donuts. What the heck, transplants? If you miss it so much, GO HOME. And for heaven’s sake, stop planting grass in your yard. Native plants will grow better and make you look like less of a water-wasting ass.

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Continuing in our scientific investigation of the 64 worst things about LA I humbly present two stomach churning examples of rampant douchebaggery. People who park like complete dickfaces, and of course, The Grove.

We’ve spent a lot of time here talking about Parking Tards and with good reason. Being a car-centric city parking is important, and when some asshat strolls in and wrecks it for everyone else someone has to take note, someone has to stand up, someone has to speak for the little people and say “You sir/madam are a Parking Tard!” There are really only two excuses for this kind of behavior, complete and utter disregard for your fellow man, or complete ignorance of your surroundings. Both are equally crappy, and no question one of the worst things about LA.

But what could possibly hold it’s own on the suckatude scale against such a menace? Only something so shallow, so fake, so contrived that the simple mention it of brings the proudest Angelino to his or her respective knees. Something so appaling that tourists clap when they see the preprogrammed fountains splash around to pipped in oldies, something so forced that nimrods will wait 15 minutes to get on a fauxtrolly that will transport them all of 500 feet. Of course I’m talking about The Grove (incase you missed that from the title and lead in). It’s horrible and I wish it would die in a fire. But at least there are good views from the top of the parking structure.

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Poll closes April 1

Curb sneakers, noun
1. drivers who speed into the right turn lane at a red lights, then cut back into traffic when the light turns green ahead of the rest of us suckers.
2. bastards, assholes, scumbag alpha males

LADWP’s Festival of Lights, noun
1. the tackiest holiday display in the city
2. annual car only event billing itself as “eager-to-green” while marked by miles long lines of idling, emissions spitting vehicles, moving through at a snails pace while forbidding pedestrian foot traffic and providing only one bike only night per year.

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Poll closes Monday at 3pm.