A Bold Housing Vision for the L.A. River

The concrete-lined L.A. River has attracted its share of bold revisions, and AECOM just put forth another one. Antonio Pacheco writes, "The firm's recently-published Los Angeles River Gateway proposal envisions a dense web of newly interconnected neighborhoods and recreational areas surrounding a four-mile stretch of the river."

While it "works within the confines of existing neighborhood plans and leans on already-approved proposals," AECOM's vision is ambitious in scope. "The plan calls for nearly 300 acres of publicly-accessible riparian areas surrounding the river. Those recreational and flood-control areas would be joined, according to the plan, by 36,620 residential units, including at least 7,874 affordable homes."

The plan imagines the area as a mixed-use hub with 150,000 additional jobs and a wide variety of options for pedestrian and transit access. "AECOM proposes a series of approaches for bridging over privately- and publicly-owned rail yards surrounding the river's banks on either side, including plans for underground tunnels that would serve high-speed rail, public transit, and private freight trains," Pacheco writes.