Waymo comes to L.A., Overcrowded housing, and more

Head to Bunker Hill this weekend, as the Los Angeles Downtown Center Business Improvement District’s (DCBID) launches "Grand Ave Augmented," a new augmented reality public art showcase. Staged in partnership with the AR publishing platform Hoverlay, Grand Ave Augmented is free of charge. All you need to access the public art is a mobile device.

Running through June 2023, the AR display will include more than 40 installations, 3-D animations, interactive holograms, and virtual music performances. It incorporates art and performances from MOCA, The Broad, Disney Hall, the Colburn School, and the Music Center.

The Ratkovich Company is buying up land not far from Metro's La Cienega/Jefferson Station.

This week, the Los Angeles-based real estate development firm announced that it has acquired the Bowcroft Collection, a series of buildings located between 5950 and 5978 Bowcroft Street near the intersection of Jefferson and Obama Boulevards. Ratkovich intends to modify the roughly 73,000-square-foot property to serve companies in creative industries, noting that the site sits near offices for companies including Amazon, Apple, Warner Bros. Discovery, Sony, TikTok, Nike, and Adobe.

A number of developers have eyed properties on the blocks surrounding the Bowcroft Collection, including Lincoln Property Company, which is working on a 329,000-square-foot office complex at the intersection of Jefferson and Obama.

Here's what we're reading this week:

Next Stop for Waymo One: Los Angeles Sometimes it seems like L.A. drivers are paying so little attention to what's in front of them that there might as well not be anyone behind the wheel. Soon, that may literally be the case, as Waymo has announced that is launching its autonomous, commercial ride-hailing service in Los Angeles. (Waymo)

"I failed:" Kevin de León tells CBS2 he is refusing to resign from LA City Council Kevin de Leon, one of the three Councilmembers captured making racist remarks in an October 2021 recording, has started an apology tour, and is rejecting loud calls to resign. (CBS 2)

Angels Landing Developers: ‘We Can No Longer Work With’ De León After Audio Scandal Meanwhile, the developers behind the massive Angels Landing complex in Downtown issued a letter on October 14 stating that they would refuse to work with Kevin de Leon moving forward, implying that racial bias may impact his treatment of the Black-led development team. The development team of Peebles Corp. and MacFarlane Partners is also in the midst of negotiations with the city with regards to the cost of repurchasing the land if the project falls through. (Commercial Observer)

‘Gil Cedillo needs to resign’ L.A. City Council members say at town hall Gil Cedillo, the third Councilmember captured on the October 2021 recording, has responded with near complete silence. He is termed out of office in December, after losing his re-election bid earlier this year to challenger Eunisses Hernandez. (LA Times)

Metro Transit Ridership and Service Rebounding, But System Still Hindered By Operator Shortage "Metro has the budget to fully restore transit service to pre-pandemic levels, but it doesn’t have enough staff to operate buses." (Streetsblog LA)

Packed In: Overcrowded housing in Los Angeles has brought death by design "It’s the cruel paradox at the center of Los Angeles housing. L.A. is known worldwide as the capital of single-family-home sprawl. Yet for three decades, it has had the most overcrowded housing among large counties in the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the fatal consequences, with death rates in L.A.’s most overcrowded neighborhoods at least twice as high as in those with ample housing....It didn’t have to be this way....The crowded conditions have been a century in the making, with local leaders designing Los Angeles in a way that made these circumstances inevitable." (LA Times)

LA Loses Much More Affordable Housing Than It Gains "Over several decades, city officials have mainly relied on relatively scarce federal government subsidies to finance housing projects built by private developers, in return for their promises to rent to lower-income residents at prices they can afford. The city has supplemented this by granting developers of new market-rate housing permission to build more units if they agree to rent some at prices low-income residents can afford." (LAist)