While the streets around Dodger Stadium were jammed with opening day traffic this afternoon, the skies above also attracted some game-day visitors. Martha Benedict snapped these photos from Montecito Heights, where residents caught sight of the wedged-shape B-2 Bomber that swept over the stadium shortly before the game began at 5 p.m. The Goodyear blimp kept its distance. Said Benedict:
As the Good Year blimp circled lazily over Cypress Park, we did enjoy several northeastern approaches by the B2 Stealth Bomber. The fly over Dodger Stadium was a let down since we could only just make out its minimal profile .
Baseball Project plays The Echo; The loud, noisy & talented find a home at The Boulevard; Walking Sleep take up Silver Lake residency
Thursday, March 31, 2011
The Baseball Project peforms at The Echo tonight
By Alfred Montez
If you couldn’t get tickets to today’s Dodger season opening game, how about a rock show all about our national pastime?
Tonight, The Baseball Project will be performing down the road from Dodger Stadium at The Echo in Echo Park. This baseball themed supergroup includes Scott McCaughey and Peter Buck, both of R.E.M., and Steve Wynn of Dream Syndicate. They have crafted two albums full of great baseball stories, and situations any fan of the game would be familiar with. Tunes like “Chin Music” and “Fair-Weather Fans” are woven like fables, timeless stories about baseball etiquette, and how the game should be played.
They also draw upon some of the more interesting moments in the game’s colorful history. Take for example, “Buckner’s Bolero”, all about Bill Buckner and his famous mishandling of a ball that cost the 1986 Boston Red Sox the World Series. These songs are like folk music for sports nuts, but they still rock, as do the stories themselves. A real treat for any sports fan, the show is $13 advance, $15 at the door, 18+.
Brass bands-for-hire playing to a Latin-Polka beat competed with DJs and thumping sound-systems in Elysian Park this afternoon as they performed before crowds celebrating ahead of the season opener at Dodger Stadium . Unlike previous years, today’s opening game begins later in the afternoon, at 5 p.m., which met with the approval of some fans. “It worked out a lot better,” said Oscar, who has attended at least a half dozen season openers. “You get more time to enjoy it here with friends and families.”
While many fans showed up later in the day, LAPD was out bright and early to issue traffic tickets and cite people for drinking in public, said one officer. LAPD, and even some officers with the FBI, are scheduled to be on hand the rest of the day, said on officer on the scene. In fact, police were using the former 76 gas station on the stadium property as a command center, he said.
Echo Park and Solano Canyon residents should prepare for more noise - including swooping military jets – and traffic as the afternoon progresses.
* Update: The LAPD also seems to be a fan of the opening game’s later start time. Lt. John Cook with the Northeast Division said the later arrival of fans for tail-gate parties gave LAPD units the time “to set the tone” for behavior by issuing warnings and tickets for drinking in public, amplified music and double-parking. Of course, there was plenty of those things going on this afternoon but no major problems had been reported as of about 3 p.m.
Also, FBI officials were on hand to help the LAPD use surveillance cameras to monitor the crowds inside and outside the stadium, police said.
Huizar sides with Wyvernwood Garden Apartment tenants in opposing 4,400-unit development.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Councilman José Huizar this morning said a $2 billion proposal to redevelop the Wyvernwood Garden Apartments in Boyle Heights would force many of the existing 6,000 residents to leave “the only home they have ever known.” In announcing his opposition, Huizar said the plans by the developers, the Fifteen Group, would dramatically increase the density on the 70-acre parcel. The development would result in 4,400 units of housing where there are currently 1,187 units, mostly in two-story buildings constructed in 1939 as part of the city’s first large-scale, “garden-style” development. Neighborhood activists and the Los Angeles Conservancy have been waging a lengthy battle against the proposed development, which is currently undergoing an environmental impact review. Said Huizar in a press release:
“In Boyle Heights, Wyvernwood is a community within a community with its own significant and rich history. I cannot support a project that would tear down this proud community one building at a time and replace it with a denser, lesser version of itself. Generations of families would be adversely affected by this community dismantling and today I am joining a vast majority of Wyvernwood residents in opposition to this proposal.”
Related story:
Eastside councilman against $2-billion plan to raze sprawling Boyle Heights apartment complex. L.A. Now
The Eastsider would like to welcome Wallaby family development as an advertising sponsor. Here is more about Wallaby:
Wallaby family development center in Silver Lake offers a variety of services for children 0-3 and their parents, including play-based parent & me classes, a unique parent education, support and hobby curriculum, and children’s birthday parties.
As owner-director Ericka Tullis (UCLA early childhood researcher, former preschool teacher, and mother of two) explains, “As far as local programs go, Wallaby is alone in its focus on 0-3 year olds – a period of life when brain development and learning is happening more quickly than at any other time, and when a unique set of activities, materials and teaching styles are needed to meet children where they’re at developmentally.
It’s been more than two years now that construction came to a halt on a 114-unit condominium project in Glassell Park, leaving a giant pit filled with weeds, water and rusting steel columns. But, in a few months, this hole wedged between Eagle Rock Boulevard and the 2 Freeway near the Verdugo Road exit will be filled in and construction will begin on a 52-unit project called Glassell Park Townhomes. Who is going to pay as much as $500,000 for a condo wedged between a freeway and a busy street? Developer Charlie Tourtellotte and his partners are betting $25 million that there will be plenty of takers interested in living in new, centrally located housing. In fact, in a sign that more development is headed this way, Tourtellote and partners are scouting out other nearby sites to buy and build upon.
“Our preference is to be investing in infill locations,” said Tourtellote of TAAG Investment Management, which specializes in buying and finishing failed and uncompleted projects. “We feel like the demand is more significant because [Glassell Park and surrounding neighborhoods are] closer to employment centers.”
Now may be the time to make the switch. Echo Park parents unhappy with new campus may be able to enroll kids in other highly-rated schools.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
By Becky Koppenhaver
Many of the Echo Park parents who were disappointed when L.A. Unified selected a charter school to operate a new neighborhood campus now have to decide where to send their kids. Most of those parents have ruled out enrolling their children at the new school that will be run by Camino Nuevo Charter Academy, said Windy O’Malley, co-founder of Echo Park Moms and Dads Group for Education, which had lobbied for another group to manage the campus. As a result, she said many of those parents are in the midst of seeking out alternative schools for their children.
But some parents may not know the full-extent of the options available when it comes to choosing an alternative public school, said L.A. Unified Pupil Services Representative Emily Hernandez. If a child’s home address is assigned to a charter school, for example, parents can request a transfer through the district to a new school within their area, she said. And there are other options.
Officers have cordoned off a section of Highland Park tonight as they search for a gunman following reports of multiple gunshots near Avenue 53 and Monte Vista Street. The shooting was reported shortly before 10 p.m. Early reports indicate that no one was injured but an investigation is in the early stages, said an officer [...]
Story and photos by Valentina Silva There’s something going on in the 99 Cents Store parking lot in Highland Park. And it involves food. Every Tuesday night from 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. , Figueroa Produce hosts Din Din A Go Go, billed as a “weekly food truck feast” with vegan-friendly options. A little more [...]
Eagle Rock’s graffiti clean-up crews might want to invest in a high-powered spray-gun or rock climbing lessons. The top of The Eagle Rock – the massive boulder visible from nearly every corner of the neighborhood – has been tagged. It’s hard to make out the lettering but an Eagle Rock resident James Moe said the [...]
What was with all the gunfire and screeching tired at Echo Park Lake on Monday? Of course, some would say the sounds of gunfire and screeching tires are heard nearly every day around Echo Park but yesterday’s commotion – which included a pair of explosions and crashing cars- was courtesy of a day-long film shoot [...]
Murray Burns – tall, skinny, long gray hair and often wearing sandals – looks more like an aging surfer than someone interested in the prim and proper Victorian era. But it was while riding his bike through Angeleno Heights more than 35 years ago that Burns fell in love with the Victorians- or at least [...]
Living on the edge, Montecito Heights CBS News pays a visit to Echo Park’s Mario the Gander – aka Maria the Goose - at his new L.A. Zoo home. CBS $699,000 buys you three bedrooms and an outdoor shower in Mt. Washington. Curbed How to keep Boyle Heights hipster-free? Call it a “ghetto place,” says [...]
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While the streets around Dodger Stadium were jammed with opening day traffic this afternoon, the skies above also attracted some game-day visitors. Martha Benedict snapped these photos from Montecito Heights, where residents caught sight of the wedged-shape B-2 Bomber that swept over the stadium shortly before the game began at 5 p.m. The Goodyear blimp kept its distance. Said Benedict:
The Eastsider would like to welcome 
It’s been more than two years now that construction came to a halt on a 114-unit condominium project in Glassell Park, leaving a giant pit filled with weeds, water and rusting steel columns. But, in a few months, 
By Becky Koppenhaver
Cougar on a foggy morning, Elysian Heights | Photo by 
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The Eastsider publishes stories and news from the northeast corner of the City of Los Angeles and neighboring East Los Angeles. Who is the Eastsider? Where does the Eastsider roam? 