Op-Ed: Over-Regulation Makes Public Spaces Exclusionary

"In recent years, Los Angeles has invested mightily in its public spaces in efforts to create a 'world class city,'" according to an op-ed by Laura Barraclough. "Great Streets Initiative, to the pop-up parklets and plazas being created along the L.A. River and all around the city, a certain energy around a revitalized public sphere pervades the air," adds Barraclough.

Despite these high profile efforts, however, Barraclough sees reasons to wonder whether the city is living up to its potential—or its promises. She writes: "From the loudly-hyped debut of Grand Park, to Mayor Eric Garcetti's Great Streets Initiative, to the pop-up parklets and plazas being created along the L.A. River and all around the city, a certain energy around a revitalized public sphere pervades the air. Much has been made of the design element of this revitalization, which is crucial, but little has been said of its legal architecture: the hundreds of municipal codes that regulate the city’s public spaces, often in exclusionary ways."

Barraclough lists a surprising inventory of regulations of these spaces, made in the name of public safety. Nearby jurisdictions are just as likely to enact exclusionary regulations. A new dog park in Beverly Hills, for example, will only be open to the city's residents.

After listing several reasons why such regulations unfairly exclude populations that need the space the most, Barraclough goes on to cite Jane Jacobs and William Whyte in presenting a case for more democratic use of public spaces.