Los Angeles After the Freeway

A daily mix of stories about cities, city life, and our always evolving neighborhoods and skylines. [Curbed]( WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 29 STREET VIEW [Los Angeles After the Freeway]( A less car-dependent L.A., already in motion, may have something to teach the rest of the country. Photo: Tierney/Adobe Stock, Image courtesy Rizzoli New York, Renewing the Dream: The Mobility Revolution and the Future of Los Angeles, 2023 Sometime during the second hour of a 20-minute drive on the 101, after my fourth phone call to my brother saying I’d be a little — make that pretty, no, very, okay, outrageously — late for dinner, I wondered yet again why Angelenos tolerate these routine episodes of paralysis. It has been nearly 60 years since John Fowles sang of Los Angeles as lithe and flexible, like a dancer’s body: “The great flow of power up and down the freeways, easy and controlled and fast — everywhere this characteristic American mode of moving, a sort of jet age tempo.” The city still finds its way back to that loose-limbed rhythm now and then, but a lot of the time it moves more creakily. Freeway traffic shuffles, lurches, or, as in La La Land, [gives up on the idea of going anywhere at all](. Standstill traffic is not an occasional malfunction; it’s the logical outcome of the way the city was designed over many decades and at great cost. You’d think a high enough pile of miseries — blown meetings, kids not picked up from school, deliveries unmade, birthday parties missed — would lead to a consensus that the entire metro area needs a mobility upgrade. The wonder is how many years the city grumbled and shrugged, with a New York–style whaddayagonnado? [Continue reading »]( [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( The Latest [Landlord King Charles Has Shady Methods He’s been secretly upgrading his portfolio with money from his dead subjects.]( By Clio Chang [A Postcard From Driverless San Francisco Unexplained stops. Incensed firefighters. Cars named Oregano. The robotaxis are officially here.]( By Theodore Gioia [The ‘Airbnb Alternative’ Black Market New York’s Airbnb crackdown has driven hosts and visitors back to Craigslist and neighborhood listserves.]( By Kim Velsey [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( [Read More From Curbed]( Introducing The City Desk, a weekly newsletter about New York. [Sign up to get it every Thursday](. [GET THE NEWSLETTER]( [logo]( [facebook logo]( [instagram logo]( [twitter logo]( [unsubscribe]( | [privacy notice]( | [update preferences]( This email was sent to {EMAIL}. Was this email forwarded to you? [Sign up now]( to get this newsletter in your inbox. [View this email in your browser.]( You received this email because you have a subscription to New York. Reach the right online audience with us For advertising information on email newsletters, please contact AdOps@nymag.com Vox Media, LLC 1201 Connecticut Ave. NW, 12th Floor Washington, DC 20036 Copyright © 2023, All rights reserved