LOCAL NEWS
Historic Rampart Beautification Project May Break Ground

By Roggie McFadden

LOS ANGELES February 22, 2005 -- Historic Rampart Boulevard in Los Angeles may be in for a big boost with one resident’s proposed improvement plan for the strip. Local resident Thom White claims to have contrived a proposal that already has L.A. City Councilman Ed Reyes’ office abuzz. The neighborhood plan calls for a simple remedy to Rampart’s ugliness ills: no more dumpsters in the front yard.

“How are you really going to make Rampart nice if you see everybody’s trash piling up before entering the building?” said Mr. White, a baseball card salesman. “Why don’t these apartments simply put the garbage ‘round back?”

Mr. White, who has lived in the area some 30 months, says he has not contacted anyone in particular about his plan but thinks it is a good idea. “I am not a certifed city planner, but it seems to me that Rampart is the key to turning around the whole neighborhood. I have walked up and down this street many times. And instead of noticing the elements that could make it a pleasant, inviting boulevard, the wide, scenic view towards Silver Lake, and the frolicking familias playing and chatting and combatting, I have only noticed the funk and filth of these open dumpsters at each apartment’s front gate.”

There is a reason for this garbage-at-the-front-door design. These building were erected so closely together in the 1920s and 1930s, that the necessity decades later of spiked iron fences between each property made it so that the modern trash bin, the dumpster, cannot fit down the narrow paths to the backyard between each building.

Part of Mr. White’s proposal would require dispensing with the single bulky dumpster for each building, and using instead several smaller mobile rolling trash bins. “How much more would this cost? It is simple and it is healthier too,” Mr. White said. For this reason, he has offered the name Rampart Saludable (“Healthy Rampart”) to anyone who would like to organize residents to encourage the property owners on Rampart to make this project happen.

“Once the true beauty of Rampart can shine through again, the whole area south of the 101 from Alvarado to Vermont could see change too,” said Mr. White.
Beginning at the Tommy Burger at Beverly, Rampart is laid out like a grand Parisian boulevard in the style of Napoleon III. It is wide with quaint homes and apartment buildings and small, terraced lawns and shrubbery.

The main area in question is the block of Rampart Blvd. between 6th Street and 3rd. Though certain spots between 3rd and Beverly also suffer from a dumpster-in-the-front set-up, most property owners provide superior “trash in the back” living arrangements for residents, and so already comply with Rampart Saludable standards.

DOWNTOWN L.A.
Change of Address
at 911 Wilshire

By Thom White

LOS ANGELES April 7, 2005 -- In order to bolster its property value in the face of a new American psychological reality, the street address of the plain-looking office building located on the north side of Wilshire, right east of the 110 freeway, has been changed from 911 Wilshire Blvd. to 915 Wilshire Blvd.
The building’s address was officially changed in late 2003 or early 2004, but the new numbering only became apparent to the public in the last weeks. Three tall, slender, golden numerals, “9-1-5” now deck the main entrance of the building, and loud, blinding rectangles of white light surround each shining number.

Diamond-shaped engravings of 9-1-1 in the pavement by the front steps remain for the moment, the last remnant of the building’s former address. The 9-1-5 address will be reflected soon enough in the sidewalk, according to Larry in security. New lighting and other upgrades in the lobby were also recently finished. 915 Wilshire is home to the U.S. Corps of Engineers, and URS Engineering (formerly the offices of Dames & Moore).

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