ArroyoFest Bulletin #1 – March 4, 2002

ArroyoFest Planning Meeting - The planning meeting on February 20th drew 80 people to the Community Room at the South Pasadena Public Library. There were also a large number of people who contacted our office expressing a desire to help but saying they were unable to attend on the 20th. There was a diverse representation of residents and organizations from across the Arroyo. James Rojas brought a large contingent from the Latino Urban Forum. Tim Brick of the Arroyo Seco Foundation gave a power point presentation on the event and people broke down into small groups (minutes of small groups attached). People in attendance were very enthusiastic and it was clear the planning committee has reached a critical mass to accelerate the planning efforts.

Outreach Efforts Kick Into Gear - Marcus Renner from the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute (that's me), made a presentation on the event to the Mt. Washington Alliance on Monday, February 25th. The event was well received and the Alliance began discussion about what it could do to help the event. This was the first of what will be many presentations to the neighborhood councils and homeowner's associations up and down the Arroyo. Please contact our office if you'd like to schedule a presentation to your group.

On March 3rd, Chuck Witham from the Foothill Bike Initiative and I passed out 600 flyers at finish of the L.A. Bike Marathon Bike Ride at USC. The flyers, beautifully desgined by Peter Aeschbacher from the L.A. County Bike Coalition, were enthusiastically snatched up by bicyclists eager for the chance to ride their bikes on the oldest freeway in the West. Asking "Want to ride your bike on the freeway?" pretty much stopped the cyclists in their tracks.

Bike Subcommittee Gets to Work - The bike subcommittee met on Saturday morning, March 2 at the Rose Bowl Aquatics Center. Volunteers enjoyed bagels and organic oranges from the Pasadena Farmer's Market as they worked out many of the details for the ride's staging area at the Rose Bowl. The committee decided it would be good to have a second staging area (perhaps at Avenue 60)to register riders from northeast Los Angeles that might find it difficult to get up to Rose Bowl for the start.

Important Traffic Meeting - Several members of the steering committee will meet on Tuesday, March 5th with representatives from the Cities of Los Angeles, Pasadena, South Pasadena and Caltrans to discuss detour routes for the day of the event. This will lay the foundation for our traffic management plan and help facilitate the permit process.

PR/Promotion Contacts Needed - If you or someone you know has skills in PR, Media Relations, Promotion or Marketing and would be interested in helping with ArroyoFest, contact our office. We'd like to have a meeting soon to discuss strategy for managing the PR around the event.

ArroyoFest Calendar Posted - Thanks to UEPI's webmaster, Mahnaz Ghaznavi, ArroyoFest now has its own calendar of events. You can refer to the calendar to keep track of ArroyoFest meetings and activities. The calendar is at http://www.uepi.oxy.edu/arroyo/calendar.htm

"Re-Envisioning the Arroyo Seco" Course Presentations - On Thursday, March 14th students from UCLA, Occidental and Caltech will present their work in the unprecedented three-campus collaboration covering all things Arroyo. Presentations will be from 1-5 p.m. in the Los Feliz Room at the Los Angeles River Center and Gardens at 570 W. Avenue 26 (between Figueroa and San Fernando Road). The public is welcome to attend.