Sentinel Peak Resources, which took over the roughly 1.1-acre site in December, now believes that affordable housing is the “best beneficial use” for the land [...] Neighborhood leaders said they were interested in closing and re-purposing the site, but are awaiting more details. They stressed that regardless of any plans, they still want the city to pursue their concerns about violations at the site, which Sentinel Peak Resources has so far brushed off. — Los Angeles Times
According to the L.A. Times, “No official plan has been drafted and details are scant, but [L.A. City Council President Herb] Wesson said he was ‘unbelievably excited’ about the idea, arguing it could pave the way to convert other local drilling sites.”
But converting the site — which is located at 4th Avenue and Washington Boulevard across the Carson-Gore Academy of Environmental Studies — could become pricey, and state regulators “caution against building over wells, warning that even a properly plugged well can leak in the future.”
3 Comments
There are probably a million people in Los Angeles living on top of abandoned well sites, including in Beverly Hills, Fairfax, Echo Park, and Venice, many of which were repurposed prior to current abandonment standards. I don't know why building on this particular site, to current regulations, would be any worse than that.
As for the neighborhood leaders: I hope all of them are driving electric cars, because any petroleum not being extracted in Los Angeles is being produced in someone else's back yard, with much less oversight.
An interesting/related discussion took place back in 2010, as part of mammoth and company's; reading the infrastructural city. Specifically, in reaction to Chapter 3 by Frank Ruchala. To wit
"isn’t discovering that a certain swimming pool was the first oil derrick in Los Angeles more wonderful than turning that derrick into a museum"
Or
"If by 2040 oil and it's extraction will be completely erased from the LA basin, the land currently dedicated to it's extraction/production will become available for other uses...What will all that land be used for?"
Against " the fundamentally toxic nature of oil infrastructure"
To illustrate Janosh's point/nonchalance see also this gallery of "images of some of the sites and machinery still in use among the homes, golf courses, and shopping malls of Los Angeles"
bldgblog of course had a great take on how the primordial "black ooze", infrastructural ruins and "methane pockets" could "Taken out of context, this could be the plot of a new horror film—but it’s just urban life atop a still-active oil field"
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.