L.A. River

The Los Angeles City Council last week approved an update to the Los Angeles River Implementation Overlay to encourage good quality river centric development and begin removing some of the concrete that covers the river and its banks.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has made final a decision that says much of the Los Angeles River is not navigable, and is therefore not a river. It will retain some Clean Water Act protection, but developing on its watershed may become easier.

A draft decision by the Army Corps of Engineers says that because a boat cannot navigate its waters, the L.A. River doesn't qualify as a river. Environmentalists are outraged, as hundreds of square miles of watershed are at risk of losing protection.