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ChineseWilshire Center Car-Free Earth Day… O RLY?
Today I decided to be all green and jump on the Purple Line to go the Wilshire Center Earth Day Celebration down at Wilshire/Western.
I’m not a particularly “green” dude in that I don’t really care about Mother Earth and Gaia and Saving The World and all that crap. I do, from an economic standpoint, appreciate the logic of conservation and dislike the idea of unnecessary waste. I don’t own a car because I don’t think it’s a very effective or economical mode of transportation in Los Angeles, nor do I like the burden of having to store and maintain a 2-ton multi-thousand dollar piece of machinery on my own. I work enough, thank you very much, and I like to get paid for my work, not pay out the ass for it.
This being said, my transit oriented lifestyle has invariably led me to terms like “green” and “sustainability” as well as events like “Earth Day”. I’ll admit, this is the first Earth Day anything I’ve been to since probably 3rd grade when my class made various ecological shapes out of construction paper to paste on the halls of the school. So I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I walked out of Wilshire/Western and onto a car-free Wilshire Boulevard.
What I got was a bunch of hippies selling crap.
Four blocks of Wilshire, from Western to Harvard, were blocked from traffic, creating an oasis amidst the traffic such a move surely caused. Whatever, I wasn’t driving or riding in a bus, so I took the car-free pavement without care. Tents lined the middle of the street and a moderate crowd (Songkran Festival this was not, at least at this time) of young and old walked down the boulevard. It was only when I paid closer attention to the exhibitors did I realize that the majority of the tents were devoted to hawking hippie wares. Mostly t-shirts, but also Cliff Bars, incense, Bhudda statues, canvas grocery bags, and herbal teas.
I was eager to find the car-free section, since that was to be the theme of the day. The holy grail I was looking for was the Metro booth. I wanted to see what they had set up, expecting something spectacular, perhaps an “Imagine” booth promoting the Long Range Plan and give-aways of their new eco-shirts. I did pass a number of booths promoting the bicycle culture and/or products, but not as many as I expected. The Los Angeles Bicycle Coalition had a booth as well as a company from Oceanside that sells folding electric bicycles.
Bum or hippie?
In my continued search for the Metro booth I passed bad folk singers, hand writing personality tests, solar panels, New York Times salesmen, and witch doctors, among other things. Other than the bicyclist here or there, there wasn’t much telling me how to live car-free in Los Angeles. I did end up stopping at a booth sponsored by the California High-Speed Rail Authority where I picked up some nicely printed literature and learned that high-speed trains would make for a greener California if voters approve the bond in November.
As I reached the far end of the festival I checked out the pricey organic offerings from The Green Truck, which puts a decidedly hippie twist on the L.A. institution of the taco truck. Good for them, and I wish their venture success, but I’ll stick to my $1.25 greasy pig meat tacos. Unfortunately, I was at the end and had not seen a Metro booth. I walked back towards the Purple Line station, past brainwashed children dancing under the instructions of a woman who looked suspiciously like Gaia. I also walked by a large group of children painting positive eco-messages on a makeshift plywood wall in front of a typical Los Angeles fenced-off empty dirt lot. Looked like fun, too bad about that dirt lot.
As I neared Wilshire/Western, I noticed something that was the antithesis of Car-Free Day. It was a brightly painted Toyota Prius in front of a booth. The booth was for a company called Drivers Ed Direct, which purports to “save the world, one new driver at a time”. Hoo boy, car-free day, eh?
As I approached the Wilshire/Western Purple Line Station, something caught my eye. Over in the corner, amidst construction scaffolding and behind the elevator I saw the familiar Metro logo. Tucked in a corner off the main strip of booths, behind plywood walls and other elements of the construction of Wilshire Solair was the Metro booth! A piece of paper with the Solair logo on it read “Lemonade Stand” and a young Asian woman was seated at the empty booth, texting away on her phone in front of pitchers of lemonade. There were no brochures, pamphlets, Long Range Plans, DVD’s, or eco-tee give-aways… just lemons, lots and lots of lemons.
Los Angeles, car-free.
O RLY?
Not so much.
Discussion
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Fred, I admit I had wanted to go myself but I had to take care of a most pressing matter for me. After your account I must say I’m glad I did not go and I feel for you bro. And I’m with you regarding tacos… the way I feel about them is no meat=no taco.
Dewd, y would metro take the opportunity to reach out to a group of peeps that might actually be open to using and propmoting their service? Grow up hippy. To save the earth u have to buy a prius. Get informed PLLEEZZEE!!
lol!!!
God I hate this “green” movement. I’m with you, Fred. I don’t care about saving the damn planet. The Earth is fine. It’ll be here long after we’re gone until the Sun explodes and gobbles it up in millions of years.
I just want to get to work faster on a train without having to dodge the idiots on the freeway.
LOL, good to know the Militant isn’t the only one who doesn’t care much for the hippie-dippyness of the environmental movement. But he thought the festival was cool nevertheless, and as awareness grows to different and more diverse groups, we’ll see less of the hippie crap in the future.
Militant: Looks like from your write-up that the crowd on the lawn was a lot larger than when I was there (around 2ish). I don’t meant to be totally down on the festival… I still think it was pretty cool, I was just hoping for more of the car-free theme.
Actually, on the Wilshire Earth Day website, I remember it mentioning something about showcasing a Rapid bus or something, did anyone see that?
The Militant may or may not have been there between 2:30-4:30 p.m.
I saw several Rapid buses on Western Avenue and Sixth Street, for what that’s worth.
Wad:
Oh I saw that too. Some classic 720 Rapid bunching… at one point I saw four in a row.
That they attract crowds similar to this is why protests against the war in Iraq generally do not meet with the approval of ordinary folks, even those not favorably disposed toward the war.
Oh, and for what it’s worth, I bypassed this nonsense at 5 PM by taking the 81 from USC to Metro Center instead of my usual method of accessing the Red Line, the 754 to Wilshire/Vermont. I’m dating a lady who lives in Valencia and works in Burbank; on weekdays, we get together in the southeast SFV, where she picks me up in her car from the North Hollywood station. Transit-oriented romance!
Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about!
^^^^
They don’t call it “Kiss N Ride” for nothin!
On one hand, you make an excellent point…where was Metro, or DASH, BBB and the other transit agencies yesterday? Definately noticeable by their absence.
But I think you missed part of the wonder of yesterday. LA closed a major thorofare in the middle of the day, converted the street to public use, thousands of people showed up to the party (most of whom were normal Angelenos even if the booths were full of “hippies selling crap”) and the world didn’t end.
Look at the picture you have at the top of the page, those aren’t hippies enjoying the day and their street. Its regular people, and that in and of itself is pretty cool.
Next year we need to make sure that Metro etal are involved, but we also need to make sure that they do this next year.
[...] Different Take on Car-Free Wilshire (Metro Rider and Metro [...]
This is a perfect example of the blackout on transit in the “environmental” movement. Hippies are offered up in its place. The “green” movement considers public transit a “personal choice” and puts it somewhere below unplugging your waffle iron at night. This blindspot is no accident.
Damien Newton:
I guess I wasn’t too in impressed because it’s not like this is the first time a major thoroughfare has been closed off for public use in Los Angeles. Just the other weekend I attended the Songkran Festival, which closed down Hollywood Boulevard, and the crowds and transit usage put the Wilshire Earth Day to shame. To me the Wilshire Celebration was little more than just another street festival. I mean especially in this day and age where green marketing is all the rage, every street festival has booths promoting something that’s green.
I was just expecting a more cohesive car-free theme… maybe next year if MetroRiderLA is more organized, we can set up a booth. Same goes for Streetblog.
The difference for me is Songkran was on a weekend. Wilshire was on a weekday when people “rely” on that street as one of the major thorofares connecting the Westside to the Downtown. To go to the festival people needed to take off work, or tkae the kids out of school and people did…
…and the world didn’t end. In fact, the whole thing went off reasonably well except for some angry commuters and a pissed off pizza guy. We need more examples of this before we’re going to get the city to consider closing off other streets on a permanent basis. Festivals like this, Songkran and others bring us closer to our car free goal, even if the booths themselves don’t meet our expectations.
Right, next year let’s get a booth. We’ll split manning it, but I’ll get TOPP to foot the rental bill.
I agree. I think I’m just a bit cynical and for some reason, I just didn’t walk away from it feeling like I had just been to something really incredible. But maybe I just didn’t didn’t put it into perspective like you just did.
I seriously think this is a great idea.
If I can wear my tye-dye shirt that is.
(Warning, broad generalizations!)
I’m with South Park on this issue: I don’t like hippies. By and large they hold many great values and ideals, but lack the knowledge or discipline to get it done. Like a hippy I met last summer who hated the war in Iraq…but didn’t vote.
Fred,
Excellent post.
I was going to write a post on this, but you said it all. So horrible, so bad, so wrong, a bunch of materialistic dirty hippies, at least old school dirty hippies weren’t materialistic asses trying to sell you crap you didn’t need. They would sell you stuff like acid and pot and incense, stuff you really do need.
I only saw one incense table and heard a very crappy pseudo reggae band…
Browne
Wilshire Center Car-Free Earth Day… O RLY? | MetroRiderLA…
Today I decided to be all green and jump on the Purple Line to go the Wilshire Center Earth Day Celebration down at Wilshire/Western….
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