Garden Apartments

la.streetblog.rg/2013/04/17/saving-wyvernwood-is-the-environmental-choice/

In the continuing spirit of Earth Day 2013, I thought it would be nice to take a look at an ongoing preservation project in Los Angeles, efforts by the Los Angeles Conservancy (http://www.laconservancy.org) to save the Wyvernwood Garden Apartment from the wrecking ball.  The question of whether or not save Wyvernwood is something that more and more people are dealing with as the city of Los Angeles prepares to decide on the proposed Boyle Heights Mixed Use Community Project.  On the anti-development side, the focus of the argument is based on preserving a cultural landmark and avert another mass displacement similar to that of Chavez Ravine.  Regardless of what side of the argument you're on, a rehabilitated Wyvernwood will change Boyle Heights, one of the largest in the United States, will result in ecological change for Boyle Heights.

Before plunging ahead, a little bit of background is necessary.  Wyvernwood Garden Apartments was designed by David J. Witmer and Loyall F. Watson together with landscape architect Hammond Sadler.  The complex was intended to provide middle-income and worker housing close to downtown and the nearby industrial centers.  It was privately finances by the Hostetter Estate and insured by the Federal Housing Administration.  Wyvernwood was a testing ground for the FHA's new program for building this type of housing development and served as a model for similar garden apartment complexes in the Southern California area, such as Park La Brea in the Miracle Mile area, and throughout the country that offered affordable modern housing that met the standard required by the FHA.  Based on garden city planning principles, Wyvernwood orginally consisted of 143 two-story buildings laid out on six super blocks.  The super blocks allowed individual units to have open vistas in multiple directions.  Wyvernwood was lauded as "America's largest privately-owned community of rental homes," in regional and national publications such as Architect and Engineer, Architectural Form, Architectural Record, and California Arts and Architecture.  The complex is also significant as a primary example of the garden apartment movement in the United States.  In 2007 the American Planning Association recognized the important role of garden apartments for their design, function, sustainability, and community involvement.

This sounds like New Urbanism, an urban design movement that promotes compact, mixed-use, walkable neighborhoods as ecologically better alternatives to auto-centric developments, doesn't this?  Truth be told The garden apartment movement in the thirties and early forties were, if you want to extrapolate, the historical basis for New Urbanism.  The idea was first promoted by Ebenezer Howard in late nineteenth century Great Britain as an antidote to the urban social ills brought about by the Industrial Revolution.  In the United States, Clarence Stein adapted Howard's principles on the East Coast.  Eventually, the idea of pedestrian orientated, mixed-use, affordable, modern worker housing made its way to the West Coast.

Currently, the Miami based company, the Fifteen Group, which owns Wyvernwood has proposed to replace the seventy acre campus containing 1,187 homes and over 6,000 tenants with a more upscale development.  Sounds a bit like the proposal for the Jordan Downs Complex in Historic South Central.  The proposal contains plans for 4,400 condominiums and rental units; 325,000 square feet or retail and commercial space; recreational facilities for residents; and parking for 9,048 cars.  Just exactly who does the Fifteen Group envision living here?  More pointedly, how are they going to attract their targeted residents to come to East Los Angeles given the area's alleged louche reputation?  One of the key factors in attracting a more upscale clientele to providing amenities in the community so that people will want to roam about the area and check out some of the local businesses.  I seriously don't think that future renters and condominium buyers will just stay within the confines of Wyvernwood and patronize the amenities on the premises.  Of course you can argue that some of the local businesses will suffer if they have to compete with the on-site amenities.  I would argue that on-site premises would simply keep the residents isolated from the community at large and create a schism.  Since we're on the subject, what about the existing residents?  Would the be able to participate in a "right-to-own" program that would allow them to buy homes they currently live in?  Will they simply be asked to leave or will efforts be made to allow them to continue living in their homes?

This being Los Angeles, parking is always a big issue.  Despite the fact that the total number of proposed parking spaces is over five times than the current number, 1,799, the amount of proposed space could increase if Fifteen Group fails to obtain an exemption from the city minimum requiring 10,903 to 11,003 space for a development this dense.  While Fifteen Group justifies the project as a way to create "healthier place to live and work," in the same breath, the developers want to continue subsidizing automobile ownership after describing the current provisions, 1.5 parking spaces per home as "inadequate," corresponding to a time when there were fewer cars.  Truthfully, the average number of cars owned per Los Angeles households is 1.4, 1.1 cars per among renters.  Further, one of the selling points is proximity to several freeways.  Sounds great if you're a commuter, bad because those same freeways are responsible for Boyle Heights' unusually high asthma rates and other air pollution related illnesses.  In an effort to "improve circulation" within the complex, Fifteen Group proposes to triple the miles of car-accessible roads by cutting through the project area, eliminating the tree-line foot paths that a character defining feature of this community.  Does that sound ecological right to you?  I didn't think so.  In a stunning leap of logic, the developers contend that adding thousands of cars to the streets of Boyle Heights won't add to the environmental-related health issues because the new residents will likely be lured away from their cars by the seventeen bus lines serving the immediate surroundings.  In reality, only six of those lines are accessible by foot.  Nevertheless, the tendency for renters and minority low-income to walk, use a bicycle, or use public transit by necessity still holds for the current residents of Wyvernwood.  The numbers look something like this, 42% of the residents already commute to work by some means other than driving, and another 11% carpool.  There's no way to guess if the new residents would follow suit.  What is known is that higher income commuters generally drive solo.  Somebody want to tell the developers that this Los Angeles not Miami, where the car is an integral part of life. To quote the Missing Persons song "No Body Walks in L.A."

The Fifteen Group is offering ten acres of publicly available open space in a rehabilitated Wyvernwood, this number is a fraction of what was once widely enjoyed by the un-gated community.  Longtime residents have frequently complained about the curtailment of their own use of the open space-about 36 to 50 acres-after Fifteen Group bought the property in 1998.  This mega-project would not only create the most densely populated census tract in Los Angeles, approximately 94,000 people per square mile, even with the conservative estimate of 2.3 occupants per unit.  Does that seem like a lot people squeezed into one place?  I thought so.  Then add in the increase in automobile traffic and the need for sanitation services, you end up with something that's starting to sound like something not terribly well thought out.  Further, the project would bring the first set of high rises since the 14-story Sears Tower went up in 1927 in the area of Los Angeles east of the L.A. River (stop snickering we have a river).  Three buildings would stand 24-stories high, another three at 18 stories, and several more could reach seven stories.  Great, block out natural light.  Last, the Fifteen Group has requested that the New Wyvernwood be designated a supergraphics special district, which means Boyle Height residents could be subjected to bright digital billboard sitting on top of the skyscrapers lighting up the night.  Excellent.

Finally, the Los Angeles Conservancy has pointed out that whatever value in the proposed projects "green design" would be undermined by the demolition of 256 buildings that could be renovated, a more cost-effective approach to problems created by years of deferred maintenance.  Renovation and reuse are increasingly recognized as more sustainable than razing and rebuilding. To be certain, the Los Angeles Housing Department inspectors have the buildings targeted for demolition, to be structurally sound, in need of upgrades.  Further, the preservation of Wyvernwood would also prevent the loss of nearly 1,200 dwellings from the dwindling stock of rent-controlled housing, the city's valuable supply of affordable housing.  As previously stated, "the greenest building is the one already built."

With all these New Urbanist contradictions built into the proposal, it was mind blowing to read that the project received an award from the Congress for the New Urbanism (http://www.cnu.org).  Some insight into the decision is an article written by Mike Davis "Gentrifying Disaster" (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2005?10/gentrifying-disaster), which described the organization's participation in African Americans' exclusion from Gulf Coast communities following Hurricane Katerina.  Off topic for a second, this will be a forth coming blog.  Back to the subject.  Contrary to the democratic spirit of the group, the CNU's practice of judging proposals without asking the tough questions such as who or what might be replace and for who or what benefit-depicts it in the role of legitimatizing dubious projects.

"New Urbanism" is a potent buzzword, a rallying cry for its unquestioning supporters for any development.  Davis has been quick to point out that smart developers have been quick to label, what could be considered run amok land grabs and demolition, as New Urbanist.  Finally, one more reason to cast askance to the environmental claims connected to the New Wyvernwood, is first the promise that no one will be displaced and Fifteen Group's own history.  The company has no experience in real estate development but has acted more as the middleman for builders, carrying out mass evictions and unpopular demolition to clear off properties before selling them.  Still think that the New Wyvernwood is a great idea.  Me neither.

Happy Belated Earth Day.