#  So, How DO Common Sense and Compromise Survive in the Planning and Transportation Wars?

     Details    Ken Alpern   ![logo](https://www.citywatchla.com//templates/ja_teline_v/images/logo.png)         August 04 2016      [  ![](https://www.citywatchla.com/images/stories/Aug-2016/063b.png)    ](https://www.citywatchla.com/los-angeles/11589-so-how-do-common-sense-and-compromise-survive-in-the-planning-and-transportation-wars)

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> GETTING THERE FROM HERE--Most of us are reasonable people--willing to give, but not willing to be taken. Taken for a ride. Taken down that primrose path. Taken to the cleaners. Taken for granted.
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> So it's not hard to figure out the agony that more than a few of us have over the need to fund more transportation, homelessness reduction, parks, schools, and other civic needs because we're ALREADY paying a lot for that, and we're pretty concerned about where more money would go if spent by the SAME folks who got us into this mess to begin with.
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> My personal focus of transportation has been sullied by a variety of agendas, not the least of which is the Planning Politburo of the City of Los Angeles, that has been aided and abetted by an out-of-touch and developer-owned Sacramento and legal elite all too happy to create laws, and/or misinterpret laws, which destroy the basic tenets of compromise and common sense.
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> Hence we've got the choice of "just voting no" on the transportation, homeless, parks, and school bonds/taxes initiatives this November and "making a statement" but letting unresolved issues remain ... well ... unresolved ...or
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> ... voting in favor of some or all initiatives and getting clobbered in the same way we'd be clobbered if we gave our substance-abusing parents some money to buy groceries and presume they'd not spend it on something horrible. Or allow something horrible to happen.
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> For years we've been told that we should vote for more transportation, and--in all honesty--it's easy to support this November's transportation initiative for the County of LA as one of the more transparent gestures that Metro has made for a countywide transportation system. At this time, I intend to vote for it, and I recommend that anyone reading this does the same.
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> But a "no" vote might just be the only way we can prevent the formation of mega-developments, of unsustainable high-rises, and of future transportation/mobility failures because Planning interprets a new transportation project as a way to support politicians and developers high on "taxpayer crack" when we just want some more mobility, a little bit of densification, and a whole lot of common sense.
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> Does that new development have to be seven stories tall, and out of alignment with the 1-2 story region?
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> Does that new development have to be "affordable" with rents/monthly fees being $2000/month or more?
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> Does that new development have to have such a ridiculously-low number of parking spaces that spillover parking impacting the law-abiding neighbors is inevitable?
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> Does the reality that even [Portland](http://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/index.ssf/2015/09/portland_bike_commuting_rate_t.html) has only 7% bicycle commuting rates get allowed into any public discussion, suggesting that there's a limit to what bicycling (and other non-automobile forms of transportation) can do for traffic and mobility improvements?
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> Does the public and the Neighborhood Councils ever get allowed to work with, and compromise with, [high-rise-obsessed developers](http://argonautnews.com/the-other-side-of-the-seven-stories/) building either in the Westside or elsewhere and ask for appropriate balance of developing density versus traffic/parking/infrastructure mitigations.
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> I will end this article the way I ended my [last one](https://www.citywatchla.com/index.php/the-la-beat/11557-beware-more-government-overreach-big-is-not-always-better).
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> Development and Transportation is a form of progress, but ...
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> Neighborhood Councils are also a form of progress, and one where the "little guy/gal" has a place to go.
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> We NEED a Neighborhood Integrity Initiative.
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> And we also NEED a good lawyer or two to help us defend ourselves against governmental overreach, whether it’s from Downtown LA, the County, or even Sacramento ... as part of a successful new portion of LA City government.
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> *(Ken Alpern is a Westside Village Zone Director and Board member of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC), previously co-chaired its Planning and Outreach Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of its MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He is co-chair of the CD11Transportation Advisory Committee and chairs the nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at*  <alpern@marvista.org>***.*** *He also co-chairs the grassroots Friends of the Green Line at [www.fogl.us](http://www.fogl.us)**.** The views expressed in this article are solely those of Mr. Alpern.)*
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> *-cw*

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