This
week
I decided to comment on another classmate’s blog post. The blog post itself
detailed the student’s drive from UCLA to downtown LA amidst the typical downtown LA traffic in order
to spend time with his cousin. The blog post details the trip itself, as well
as the area surrounding his cousin’s apartment, specifically the LA live area.
Here is the comment left on his blog:
I
really enjoyed reading your blog seeing as, as a Los Angeles area native, I am
all too familiar with the frustrating monotony of LA traffic. I especially
liked your use of metaphors and colorful language to illustrate this concept, as
well as the identification of the freeways you took, which allows LA residents
to truly empathize with your situation. As for your observations around the LA
Live area, I again found your colorful descriptions of how the area “becomes alive during the night” to be both
illustrative and indicative of the area for those who have never explored it
and, in a sense, nostalgic for those that grew up amongst it.
As
far as the blog’s relationship to themes and ideas covered in class and in the
readings, I think you did a great job relating the LA Live portion of your trip
to class concepts, but I would have liked to see you analyze how your trip down
the 10 and 405 freeways embodied, or failed to embody, other class-related
ideas. Specifically, while I thought it was clever that you related the sense
of anonymity and, as you put it, “dog eat dog” mentality you saw in the LA Live
area to the post-metropolis theme of individualism that we covered in class, I
would have liked to see you incorporate other ideas of the post-metropolis into
the freeway portion of your trip. For example, considering how Los Angeles is a
proverbial poster child of the post-metropolis, I find the sheer fact that such
horrendous traffic exists in Los Angeles rather contradictory. Seeing as the
post-metropolis is characterized by several specialized hubs that are all
connected by automobile, it is not surprising that an area as dense as the Los
Angeles Metropolitan area would have a few congested freeways. The interesting
aspect of this gridlock is that it seems to revolve around a common center,
downtown LA, a concept represented very well in your blog. Seeing as the
post-metropolis is characterized primarily by a secular trend of
decentralization, it is very curious that Los Angeles would display such blatant
centralization as it pertains to traffic trends. One final point, I feel that
your blog would benefit by comparing the individualism you saw at LA Live with
Robert E Park’s quote that, “The City
is a mosaic of little worlds which touch but do not interpenetrate.”
Overall,
I really enjoyed your blog and I hope these few suggestions both inspire and
assist in writing your future blog posts.
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