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By Christopher HawthorneLos Angeles Times Architecture Critic

January 23, 2014 , 10:47 a.m.

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CicLAvia announces new routes, aims formonthly events by 2017

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CicLAvia wants to be a regular fixture on the Los Angeles

calendar.

Organizers of the popular open-streets festival for cyclists

and pedestrians, modeled on programs in Latin American

cities, are planning three events for 2014, including a first

route through South Los Angeles.

Aaron Paley, CicLAvia’s executive director, also said in an

interview Wednesday that the group is planning an event in

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Cy clists cr ow d a n a r ea ca lled th e disem ba r k a n d w a lk zon e on Wilsh ir e Bou lev a r d a t Fig u er oa Bou lev a r d

du r in g CicLA v ia in Ju n e. (Gen a r o Molin a / Los A n g eles Tim es / Ju n e 2 3 , 2 01 3 )

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the San Fernando Valley for the first time in early 2015, as

well as routes outside Los Angeles city limits.

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But the bigger news is some new detail on CicLAvia’s longer-

term ambitions.

Thanks to new foundation funding and a commitment from

the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to pay for a

range of open-streets events -- including some not organized

by CicLAvia -- the group hopes that such festivals will

become monthly in L.A. County by 2017. CicLAvia aims to

hold nine routes that year and envisions another three

planned by other cities around the county with Metro’s help.

“We have a path to get to one event per month,” Paley said.

That expansion is significant not just for CicLAvia but for Los

Angeles and its civic ambition. As the city slowly builds a

mass-transit network and tries to move past its dependence

on the car, events like CicLAvia have played a revelatory role

and given Angelenos a chance to see the city and its

architecture with fresh eyes.

But their temporary nature has limited their long-term

impact. What Southern California needs now are some

efforts to make changes to the design of its streets

permanent, or at least more regular and predictable on the

calendar.

The recent news that Pasadena will redesign sections of

Colorado Boulevard to make it friendlier to pedestrians is

one sign of progress in that direction, building on changes to

the Eagle Rock stretch of Colorado, which until recently

operated as a miniature freeway that was actively unfriendly

to pedestrians and cyclists.

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So are new public spaces like the Sunset Triangle Plaza in

Silver Lake, which closed a short block to car traffic and was

inexpensively redesigned by the firm Rios Clementi Hale

Studios.

A CicLAvia planned every month in L.A. County, even if the

route moved from event to event, would help cement some

of the tentative signs that a more public and connected Los

Angeles is emerging.

“This has really captured the imagination of the city,” Paley said of CicLAvia. “It has taken off like a

rocket. And from an administrative point of view we’re just catching up with that.”

CicLAvia’s budget has increased more than tenfold since the event was launched in 2010, to a figure

this year of $1.4 million. The projected budget for next year is $3 million. Attendance at CicLAvias

has increased nearly as quickly.

Paley, describing the recent growth as "exponential," called 2014 "a key year for us. Before we were

riding the wave from event to event. We’d do one and sit back and think, 'How soon can we raise

enough money to do another?'"

Now, he said, the goal is to extend the planning calendar much further into the future and become

more strategic about fundraising goals and partnerships with city and county officials.

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He also wants to keep adjusting the design of CicLAvia routes to make pedestrians feel as welcome as

cyclists, who were the first to embrace the event. Recent CicLAvias have included sizable pedestrian

plazas where cyclists are asked to walked their bikes.

This year CicLAvia will be held on three Sundays. It will return to Wilshire Boulevard on April 6 and

follow a new route linking Echo Park, downtown and East Los Angeles on Oct. 5.

The final event of the year, on Dec. 7, will trace a route through South Los Angeles, including

stretches on Leimert Boulevard, Martin Luther King Boulevard and Central Avenue.

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In addition to receiving new funding last year from the Wasserman Foundation and the Rosenthal

Family Foundation, CicLAvia has been attracting larger gifts from individuals. Paley said a nameless

donor mailed the group a check for $500,000 just before Christmas.

“This is a truly anonymous gift,” Paley said. “It just came in the mail. I couldn’t quite believe it.”

He paused. “And the check cleared.”

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