Touch the Water previews start tomorrow!

Touch the Water performances start tomorrow!  Performances are Wednesday through Sunday at 8pm.  Previews are Thursday May 28th through Wednesday June 3rd, then full-fledged theater premieres and continues through Sunday June 21st.  It’s outdoors along the river, and gets kinda cold after dark - so BRING WARM LAYERS, even BLANKETS!  Make your reservation at the Cornerstone Theater website.

Director Juliette Carillo and actor and creek freak Joe Linton on set along the L.A. RIver (from the Downtown News, photo by Gary Leonard)

There’s a good preview article in the L.A. Downtown News.

Don’t forget to come early and take a walk along the river with an expert.  The site, called the bowtie parcel at Taylor Yard, is one of the nicest and most natural stretches on the entire river.  During rehearsals we’ve been enjoying checking out an osprey that’s been circling and fishing.  There’s also plenty of herons, ducks, cormorants, and tall willow trees.  See the free pre-play walks schedule here.

Rio Limpio Tule River Clean-Up

Well… it’s a bit far afield for L.A. Creek Freaks, but I thought I’d let you all know about Rio Limpio – a Tule River Clean-Up, mostly because I designed the above bumper sticker for it (and because I’ve been too busy at Touch the Water to spend enough time blogging here.)   My brother and his wife and family are involved in the Tule River clean-up. The creek freak streak runs in my family, no? They live in the town of Springville, California “The Gateway to the Tule River Redwoods” which is near Sequoia National Forest where my brother works.  Springville is located along both sides of the nicely natural Tule River, which is a favored hangout site during  hot Central Valley summers.  The river flows from the National Forest, through Springville, and into Lake Success (formed by a US Army Corps of Engineers dam) then through Porterville and into the now-dry Tule Lake.

Rio Limpio (Spanish for “Clean River”) is a series of three clean-ups, hosted by the non-profit Wild Places, the first of which takes place this Saturday May 30th.

(Cross-posted in slightly different forms at L.A. Creek Freak [river blog] and Handmade Ransom Notes [art blog])

Pre-Play Walks at Touch the Water

Moving a tree on the riverside set of Touch the Water (photo by Terry Young)

As you probably remember from creek freak’s blog entry a week or so ago, Cornerstone Theater Company is presenting the L.A. River play Touch the Water. Previews start next week! I am in the play and excited to get lots of people there (make your reservation on-line here,) so I’ve been working with the Cornerstone folks to set up a series of short pre-play walks that will be lead by some of my favorite local creek freaks.

The play starts at 8pm at the Taylor Yard bowtie parcel (2800 Casitas Avenue, L.A. 90039 – like many spots on the river it’s a bit hard to find – use bike/bus directions here or driving directions here.) The following performances will include pre-play walks. The walks will start promptly at 7pm, so they can conclude by 7:45pm, in time for participants to take their seats in time for the play. Folks who participate in the pre-play walk will get preferred seating for the play.

In addition to the walks below – most Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays – there will “talkbacks” (post-play discussions with with cast and others) on Thursday nights after the play.

The pre-play walks are free, and the play itself is pay-what-you-can (suggested $20.) Make reservations online at the Cornerstone Theater Company website. You don’t need to register for the pre-play walks – just show up!

Friday June 5th
Melanie Winter, Founder and Director, The River Project

Sunday June 7th
Jessica Hall, Senior Associate, Restoration Design Group
(and, of course, L.A. Creek Freak blogger!)
on “L.A. River Tales”

Wednesday June 10th
Sabrina Drill, University of California Cooperative Extension
on “Fish in the L.A. River” (see also our earlier post on fish)

Thursday June 11th
Nidia Garcia, Holly Harper, and Aaron Thomas, of North East Trees

Friday June 12th
Jenny Price, writer, Los Angeles Urban Ranger, and LA River tour guide
on “Los Angeles, the River City: Past, Present, Future”
>Don’t miss Jenny’s upcoming lower L.A. River tour on Sunday June 14th!

Sunday June 14th
Shelly Backlar, Executive Director, Friends of the Los Angeles River

Wednesday June 17th
Miguel Luna, Urban Semillas

Thursday, June 18th
Robert Garcia, Executive Director, Counsel and Founder of The City Project

Friday June 19th
Dorothy Kieu Le and Aurisha Smolarski of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition
“Bike Night at Touch the Water”
>Don’t miss LACBC’s upcoming Los Angeles River Ride on Sunday June 7th!

Walking Santiago Creek in Santa Ana

David Schmid leading our walking tour of Santiago Creek

I had a fun time this afternoon meeting up with three of my closest friends from my high school days in Orange County. Todd McHenry, Kyle Tonokawa, David Schmid and I all attended Tustin Presbyterian Church together, as well as being active in Boy Scout Troop 33. It was great to catch up with these folks – thanks, in part to the wonders of Facebook. I shared my book with them, and David and I ended up speaking about creek restoration efforts that he’s been involved with in the neighborhood where he lives in Santa Ana.

Map of Santiago Creek - from the Santiago Creek Greenway Alliance Website (click for larger image - the spot we explored today is in the lower left)

Dave is excited about the idea of a greenway trail along the lower portion of Santiago Creek, a tributary of the Santa Ana River (which I used to bike along to get to the beach, when I was a kid.) Dave’s been discussing it with some folks at the Santiago Creek Greenway Alliance which works to preserve and restore the creek.

Flower Street Bridge over Santiago Creek

After lunch, we decided to head over to walk the John Fisher Park Hiking Trail – or what exists of it today.  It begins at John Fisher Park in Santa Ana, near the intersection of Flower Street and Memory Lane. The above picture shows Todd, Dave, and Kyle atop the park-adjacent Flower Street Bridge over Santiago Creek – apparently a City Beautiful era bridge that was recently re-built. The first things Dave pointed out were these 1930′s WPA-built retaining walls, with steps leading down to the creek:

WPA-built Steps into Santiago Creek

Here’s a photo from the middle of the park.  As an L.A. River advocate, these sorts of hole-in-the-fence access points looked very familiar:

Creek Access!

We went through a similar gap at the end of the fence at the back (east) end of the park, and walked along the north bank of the creek. There was a well-traveled dirt path along the bank of the dry creek (David is standing on the path in the photo at the top of this entry.) The existing trail has quite a few mature cottonwood trees and other vegetative cover. There was also plenty of arundo donax – an invasive bamboo plant that we also get too much of in many Southern California waterways. Though it’s a weed, it does indicate that there’s water underground at the site.

We continued upstream until we crossed under the 5 Freeway. Dave explained that the city of Santa Ana had worked to excavate earth below the freeway to create vertical clearance so a connection can be made to the bike path on the east side of the freeway. In that area, a parking lot for the Discovery Science Center had unfortunately encroached on the creek. Here’s the view upstream from the bike path bridge there:

View Upstream

David spoke about how he’s hoping that he can improve the rudimentary trail in this area. The project could include making unofficial access more official, removal of exotics, planting tree cover, and making the path more accessible for hikers and possibly mountain bikes. He’s hoping this might possibly as part of an Eagle Scout project, now that his son is part of Troop 33 that we’d all been in. He told us though, that there had been a fair amount of neighborhood opposition. On the north side of the creek, there’s accessible space between homes and the waterway, but on the south bank, homes directly abut. Downstream of Flower Street for just under a mile before the confluence with the Santa Ana, there’s very little right-of-way, with homes directly adjacent to the creek.

David had repeatedly mentioned various homeowner opposition, and as we were speaking, looking downstream from the bridge, one of them drove up. The woman pulled over, but left her prius running, as she sat in her driver’s seat and lectured us on how diligently the neighbors had worked to keep the creek inaccessible. She spoke at length about issues with homeless, gangs… and how the police can’t access the area to respond to these issues. I was thinking of trying to point out that bike access would mean that police, too, could have access… but David and I merely acknowledged that she was bringing up important issues. It wasn’t the place and time to confront.

I guess I should be (and am) grateful that this part of Santiago wasn’t paved with concrete, but I was struck by how dry the terrain there was. Well upstream of the site, there’s a dam at Irvine Lake. There were hardly any storm drains entering the creek, and no water on the surface. While it’s not uncommon for southland tributaries to be dry during the drier parts of the year, I wished that creek had a little more wetness… so it could be a little more recognizable as a waterway… and hopefully get a little more respect. Good luck to Dave and the Santiago Creek Greenway Alliance in their efforts.

Dry Santiago Creekbed

Rehearsing Touch the Water – A River Play

Touch the Water postcard

I bet you didn’t know that some of your favorite creek freaks are learning to be actors?!?  Well… I am in the thick of rehearsals for the new play Touch the Water which is being created by the Cornerstone Theater Company.

Cornerstone is a very community-based theater company.  They commission a playwright, in this case Julie Hébert, to go into a community and interview folks.  The playwright then comes up with an original play that incorporates the stories, issues, settings and characters.   At that point, Cornerstone encourages community folks to audition for parts in the play… then the next phase of work begins. From the Cornerstone mission: “By making theater with and for people of many ages, cultures and levels of theatrical experience, Cornerstone builds bridges between and within diverse communities in our home city of Los Angeles and nationwide.”  This is very true – the cast comes in all colors, ages, shapes and sizes, kinda like the communities along the river.  Touch the Water is directed by Juliette Carrillo, who also directed Lydia which is on-stage right now through May 17th at the Mark Taper Forum (and phenomenal – go see it!)

I play a character named Joe Swift, who is  a US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) biologist who really wants to make a difference – “to work with nature instead of trying to control it.” I think of Joe Swift as a kind of mix of Carol Armstrong, Heather Wylie, Carvell Bass, and Sabrina Drill (these are real people who work for, respectively, the LA City Bureau of Engineering, formerly USACE, USACE, and University of California Extension.)  The character in the play who I think most resembles me is an activist named Jade Kenton-Denton Green – an architect who leads tours of the river.  River activists Lewis MacAdams, Terry Young and Lane Barden also have roles, as well as folks I’ve met from the Glendale Narrows community of Frogtown, including Cecilia Dominguez, Ricky Dominguez, and Joel Jimenez.  Rounding out the cast are many excellent actors and musicians who’ve worked with Cornerstone on past productions.

It has already been a great experience for me.  As I learn some of the craft of acting, I feel like I am stretching muscles that I didn’t know I had.  Just when I think I have a scene memorized, I find myself thinking about which way I am moving or facing, and then forgetting my line.  I promise I will get all those lines and movements down before we open, though!

I am not going to give away much of the storyline here, so you’ll still have to come and see the play.  It does involve plenty of magic, rain, pocket parks that filter stormwater, gentrification, Tongva, an architect, a biologist, a performance artist, fishermen, a community garden, a sledgehammer, a speargun, a sketchbook, a shopping cart, carp, a crow, a raccoon, a heron, an egret, ducks, and even a sea turtle.

Touch the Water performances are Wednesday through Sunday from May 28th through June 21st 2009.  All performances are at 8pm.  All tickets are pay-what-you-can, with a suggested donation/price of $20.  You can reserve tickets right now – online at Cornerstone’s website.

Performances take place along the northeast side of the Los Angeles River across from Frogtown (adjacent to Atwater Village and Glassell Park – by the 2 Freeway.)  The site is called the “bowtie parcel” of Taylor Yard (which was purchased by California State Parks as part of the Rio de Los Angeles State Park – but is not contiguous with the existing Rio de Los Angeles park!)  The address there is 2800 Casitas Avenue, Los Angeles CA 90039.  Like many spots along the L.A. River it’s kinda tough to get to, but it’s quite nice once you’re there – it’s in the Glendale Narrows, where the bottom of the river isn’t paved, so there’s lots of birds and trees and flowing waters.

To get to the bowtie parcel, you can either walk or bike along the northeast bank (the Atwater side) of the river from Fletcher Drive.  It’s walkable from the Metro 603 bus on Fletcher or the 96 on Riverside Drive.    If you drive, you enter from Casitas Avenue, which runs along the railroad tracks in Atwater.  From the map, it would seem like you could take Fletcher to Casitas, but they don’t actually intersect, because Fletcher goes below Casitas when it’s going under the railroad tracks.  Follow the driving directions on the Cornerstone website and you can’t miss it.  There is plenty of parking at the site.

We’re also working on putting together a series of walks and talks before and after many performances.  L.A. Creek Freak will let you know when the schedule is finalized for these – keep your RSS tuned here!

La Gran Limpieza is this Saturday!

La Gran Limpieza del Rio de Los Angeles

This Saturday May 9th from 9am to 12noon is La Gran Limpieza – the 20th annual Great Los Angeles River Clean Up – hosted by the Friends of the Los Angeles River.  It’s a great event that includes t-shirts, food, music, corporate sponsors, thousands of people, and… oh yeah… tons of trash leaving our local waterways!

Your creek freak blogistas, Jessica and I, have been cleaning up the river at these events for many years… and it still seems to get dirty when we turn around.  What gives with that… maybe we also need to prevent that trash from getting into the river in the first place.  Seeing the amount of disposable plastic and styrofoam in the river, does make me think about my own consumption patterns.

There are many sites from Tujunga to the San Fernando Valley to Pasadena to Bell to Long Beach.  Sites are on the main stem of the mighty Los Angeles, as well as the Tujunga Wash, the Arroyo Seco, and Compton Creek.  They’re all listed at the FoLAR website.  Nearly all these sites are the vegetated soft-bottom stretches – the very nicest parts of the river, but also where trash gets stuck on vegetation – so this is a great chance to go and spend some time getting to know the nicest and most scenic parts of our river.  See you down by the river!

If you miss this Saturday, you may have to wait until Coastal Clean-Up Day in September!

Springs hope…eternally

 

Water bubbles up at Kuruvungna Springs in Los Angeles

Spring relief drains in the Silverlake area.

The stream mapping is complete,  but that image of a stream’s flow spilling over and down a road stays with me, challenging the conventional wisdom about “urban slobber.”  If you’ve ever been out to the Kuruvungna Springs at University High School in West LA, you’d know that springs gush forth thousands of gallons of water every day, and this water doesn’t stay on site – what used to feed a stream now flows into a storm drain that feeds into the Sepulveda Channel and then Ballona Creek.  Other springs on site are directly capped, with only a manhole cover to hint at its presence.  So it’s not just headwater drainages whose flows get lost to these underground conveyances, it is also springs, and yep, LA still has some.

Old stormdrain maps sometimes can offer clues to the capped springs.  This image here is of a “spring relief” area in the Silverlake/Franklin Hills area.  I have seen a few – not many – of these areas on these old maps.  

Don’t get me wrong – plenty of urban slobber really is overspray from urban slobs.  But if we manage the springs’ flows that way, we miss something essential and precious about our native ecosystem, and we miss out on opportunities to restore pockets of habitat in the city. And you know, springs hope eternally.