Griffith Park

Editorial: Griffith Park road closes for good. Hooray! Which streets should be next?

From LATimes.com

That was fast. At the end of June, the city of Los Angeles temporarily banned cars from a segment of Griffith Park Drive to reduce speeding cut-through traffic and protect park users. The test was such a success that the parks department has decided to permanently close the two-thirds-of-a-mile route to vehicles.

Good. Now do it again.

The test showed that Angelenos are ready to embrace car-free streets, particularly when the closures result in safer recreation spaces. The response from park users was overwhelmingly positive, officials said. Now cyclists, equestrians and pedestrians can travel that stretch of Griffith Park without fearing a motorist will come barreling around a corner.

It also demonstrated that L.A. can move quickly and decisively for safer streets. The road closure pilot was launched and completed in a matter of weeks. That is lightning speed for the city, noted Councilmember Nithya Raman, whose office helped drive the effort.

(Screenshot via Google My Maps)

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That Car Ban In Griffith Park Is Now Permanent — And More Road Changes Are On The Way

From LAist.com

By Ryan Fonseca

The car ban on a short stretch of road in Griffith Park that started out as temporary is now here to stay. The city of L.A.’s Board of Recreation and Parks Commissioners voted unanimously on Thursday to make the ban permanent.

Back in late June, a ⅔ mile section of Griffith Park Drive was closed to car traffic from the Travel Town Museum to Mt. Hollywood Drive. The road had become a popular route for speeding drivers looking to avoid slowdowns on the nearby 134 and 5 freeways. That made the park a dangerous place for the people walking, biking, riding horses or otherwise enjoying the public space as intended.

City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who oversees Griffith Park as part of the city’s 4th Council District, had already been exploring ways to improve traffic safety in the park. But those efforts were fast-tracked after cyclist Andrew Jelmert, 77, was killed by a driver there in April.

“I am so excited to bring the road revolution home to Council District 4,” Raman said in a news release. “Our office, in partnership with the Department of Recreation and Parks, worked with lightning speed to make this closure along Griffith Park Drive a reality, and we have been overwhelmed with the outpouring of support from the community.”

 

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Griffith Park road may remain a car-free zone

From TheEastSiderLA.com

By Brenda Rees

Since late June, a nearly mile-long section of roadway through Griffith Park has been temporarily closed. It’s part of a pilot program to deter commuter and cut-through traffic through the park and improve safety for pedestrians, cyclists and wildlife.

Now, officials are poised to make this temporary car-free zone on Griffith Park Drive permanent. In addition, big changes may also be in store for another major park artery: Crystal Springs Drive.

On Thursday, city staff will recommend that parks commissioners keep Griffith Park Drive – from Travel Town near the 134 Freeway up to the Mount Hollywood Drive turnoff — closed to unauthorized automobiles and motorcycles.

“Due to the closure, cyclists, pedestrians, equestrians and wildlife are now able to enjoy this segment of roadway in Griffith Park in a safer manner without the vehicle speeding and cut through traffic that was occurring prior to the closure,” according to the city staff report.

The project will involve installing two T-Bar gates, asphalt resurfacing, road markings/additional signage and adding speed humps. A maximum of $540,000 is slated for the project.

Closing Griffith Park Drive is based on recent traffic studies from the transportation consulting firm Kimley-Horn. Some of the findings:

  • Before the closure, about 1,950 vehicles traveled along Griffith Park Drive on a typical weekday; about 2,000 on a typical weekend day. After the closure, the numbers plunged to about 80 authorized vehicles per weekday and 20 on weekend days.
  • Traffic has not increased significantly on Zoo Drive between Griffith Park Drive and Riverside; consultants suggest that drivers are possibly staying on the freeway rather than opting to use a cut-through in the park.
  • Another factor in this traffic reduction is more traffic enforcement and additional speed feedback signs on Crystal Springs Drive and Zoo Drives.

Photo by Nico Amatullo on Unsplash

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Opinion: Griffith Park is a bit safer for cyclists and pedestrians. That’s worth celebrating

From LATimes.com

BY PAUL THORNTON

Good morning. I’m Paul Thornton, and it is Saturday, July 9, 2022. Let’s look back at the week in Opinion.

I hope you’re wearing sunscreen, because there are a few rays of sunshine poking through all the doom and gloom of late. (And dark it most certainly still is — we’ll get to that later.) After weeks of bad and worse news from the U.S. Supreme Court, and indications that more trouble is on the way, there is an uplifting development right here at home, a tale of a public servants responsive to the people’s needs: The city of Los Angeles is making Griffith Park safer for cyclists, runners, walkers and anyone else not encased in thousands of pounds of moving metal and glass by closing a road segment to cars.

Vehicle road closures in a local park might strike some as the kind of hyper-local “area man bites dog” story that shouldn’t lead off one of the gloomiest weekly reads around (sorry, but the real-time decline of democracy will do that to an opinion journalism newsletter). But as a cyclist, hiker and lapsed runner whose preferred method of exploration is bipedalism, I cannot be happier about a local news item than this. For all of its adulation as one of this country’s largest urban parks, Griffith Park remains largely inaccessible to anyone who’d rather not golf, drive or bike on dangerous roads or hike over mountains. Its primary entry points include traffic-choked roads and, yes, an interstate freeway offramp.

Make no mistake: Griffith Park is still that. Of course, this being L.A., the closure of a segment of Griffith Park Drive to cars isn’t some forward-looking transportation overhaul, and it may not even be permanent. Rather, it’s a temporary change that comes on the heels of something that should never have happened: the death of a well-known cyclist on Crystal Springs Drive, which remains open to cars and dominated by speeding commuter traffic. And we’ve seen what happens when windshield-biased residents complain about a much more meaningful, permanent slowing of traffic, such as when the city reversed course on the Vista del Mar “road diet” near LAX.

Photo by Dhoomil Sheta on Unsplash

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Get ready for a road closure in Griffith Park

From TheEastsiderla.com

Los Feliz — A section of roadway through Griffith Park will be closed to cars starting next week. It’s part of a pilot program to find ways to reduce cut-through traffic and improve safety for pedestrians, cyclists and wildlife in the city’s largest park.

Starting June 27, the north end of Griffith Park Drive near the 134 Freeway will be closed to personal vehicles from Travel Town to the top of the hill near the Mount Hollywood Drive turnoff, according to information posted by the Recreation and Parks Department.

“If all goes well after a few weeks, it is anticipated that we will move to a permanent closure of this stretch of road,” said a posting on a NextDoor group by the Recreation and Parks Department. City of LA vehicles will still be accessing that stretch of roadway during this time.

Department officials did not return calls and emails for information about the closure and timeline for other possible traffic calming plans.

Closing the road was one of the recommendations in a study to improve safety and transportation on Crystal Springs and Griffith Park drives. That study was already underway when a 77-year-old cyclist was struck and killed by a driver on Crystal Springs Drive in April.

At the May meeting of the Griffith Park Advisory Board, the transportation consultants working on the study presented an overview of the problems on the two roads, including speeding and a lack of separation between motor vehicle traffic and pedestrian and bike paths. The study described the section of the upcoming road closure as a “conflict area” involving speeding drivers, cyclists and vehicles headed to the Griffith Park Composting Facility.

Photo by Connor Jalbert on Unsplash

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