California

In what looks like a developing battle between states and cities over redevelopment, the California state comptroller announced that he will audit 18 redevelopment agencies.

January 28, 2011 - Los Angeles Times

When Los Angeles drained Owens Lake to bring water into its quickly growing urban basin, it simultaneously created a dry lakebed and one of the worst dust pollution problems in America. Various efforts to fight the problem have only failed.

January 27, 2011 - Places

New Urbanist Stefanos Polyzoides is profiled by the Los Angeles Times, which mentions a few projects the architect and planners is working on in East L.A. and Fresno.

January 27, 2011 - Los Angeles Times

Former Palo Alto Mayor Yoriko Kishimoto has formed "Friends of Caltrain" to help prevent the train from spiraling downhill due to lack of funds. The tri-county train faces a $30 million deficit, with a total budget of just under $100 million.

January 26, 2011 - Streetsblog San Francisco

While transportation activists in Los Angeles are getting behind a plan to cram 30 years of transportation projects into a decade, environmentalists in nearby San Diego want to do 50 years worth in the same amount of time.

January 26, 2011 - Streetsblog LA

Artist Tracy Snelling makes obsessively detailed miniature reconstructions of mundane landscapes like liquor stores, strip clubs, McDonalds and Walmarts.

January 25, 2011 - Hi Fructose

Redevelopment agencies are vital to job creation and necessary for central cities to stem suburban job sprawl, claims Gerald Metcalf, executive director of a SF urban think tank (SPUR), countering CA Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed elimination of them.

January 24, 2011 - San Francisco Chronicle - Sunday Insight

There are 12 community benefit districts in San Francisco, which raise their own taxes to create funds for various local projects. But some argue they favor big businesses.

January 24, 2011 - San Francisco Chronicle

A group of city leaders and activists gathered in Sacramento to protest Governor Jerry Brown's plan to close the state's redevelopment agencies.

January 24, 2011 - San Francisco Chronicle

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa recently visited Washington D.C. to discuss his plans for expedited transit projects in L.A., but the new congressional leadership is not as supportive as the old.

January 22, 2011 - Los Angeles Times

Rising sea waters are eroding the coast of California. The City of Ventura faces reality, and moves a wasting bike path inland.

January 20, 2011 - The Los Angeles Times

Redevelopment agency officials throughout California are moving rapidly to prevent a threatened takeover by the state (to reduce deficit) by signing deals on projects potentially prematurely. LA just turned $1 billion in 275 projects to the city.

January 20, 2011 - Los Angeles Times

Three California schools are seeking to quantify the effects of efficiency-conscious driving in a study to establish a baseline for drivers' behavior.

January 19, 2011 - TheCityFix

DOT Secretary Ray LaHood responds to a Washington Post editorial that condemned not only the California High Speed Rail project, but President Obama's vision for a national high-speed rail network.

January 17, 2011 - The Washington Post

For many immigrants in Los Angeles, bicycling is the only viable way to get around. A group of activists is trying to make that transportation reality safer and more reliable.

January 14, 2011 - Good

Motorists driving into San Francisco during the morning rush hour are getting onto the Bay Bridge four minutes faster since July, largely due to congestion pricing.

January 14, 2011 - AltTransport

The city still known for its smog will not have its buses to blame - the last of its diesel-fueled ones retired Jan. 12 in a celebration. All but 7 of the 2,221 buses will be compressed-natural-gas powered; electric and gas-electric the remainder.

January 13, 2011 - Los Angeles Times: Environment

Mayor Villaraigosa of L.A. and Mayor Chuck Reed of San Jose have both spoken publicly against Governor Jerry Brown's plan to eliminate all of the state's redevelopment agencies to save cash.

January 12, 2011 - Curbed LA

Just as failing industries marked the decline of the Midwest after WWII (hence the name 'Rust Belt'), the new declining cities will be denoted by their percentage of foreclosures, found particularly in California, the Southwest, and Florida.

January 10, 2011 - International Business Times

California's high-speed rail project is in fact going to be built despite the state's looming budget crisis, but many are beginning to question what kind of impact the project will have if the right development around train stations is not met.

January 7, 2011 - The Bay Citizen