You can download this map here (.pdf) Metro just completed a set of meetings with the community regarding a transit study area they're calling the Harbor Subdivision. Like the Westside Extension process, everything is on the table from light rail to rapid buses to doing nothing (well, except a subway). If a rail line were to actually be put in, you're looking at connections with the Blue Line, Green Line and possibly the Crenshaw......

Not only will there tens of thousands of volunteers participating in Heal The Bay's Coastal Cleanup Day tomorrow morning, but thousands more will be tree planting, painting our graffiti, taking a workshop and picking up trash at 40 or so sites around South LA for the Mayor's Day of Service. These city volunteer events take place about every two months in different parts of the city. If you remember last month, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa visited......

Detail photo of reward poster by Tom Andrews/LAist (more photos here) The "Grim Sleeper" has eluded the LAPD for 23 years killing at least 11 people and leaving one survivor all in the South LA area. But investigators believe at least six of the 30 unsolved murders they are looking into right now will turn out to be victims of the serial killer. The LA Weekly, who broke the story, just found an anonymously......

Cultural critic and South LA blogger Jasmyne Cannick was at a gas station at Crenshaw and Adams in West Adams yesterday morning when a car chase came to an end. Being a blogger and all, she got it on videotape. That was, of course, after the first moments after it scared the bejesus out of her... "Apparently, they had been chasing a suspect that had refused to pull over and I guess after there......

In order to garner the public's attention, the LAPD released a poster today showing the twelve victims' faces of the serial killer dubbed the "Grim Sleeper." The man has eluded police for over 20 years, making him the "most enduring serial killer in California history and the longest-operating serial killer west of the Mississippi," as the LA Weekly put it in their story that broke this case open to the public. "He's a maniac and......

For the Los Angeles region this weekend, it was a deadly one. At least ten people died by CBS2's count, four of them within Los Angeles: A shooting in Carson left one dead A transient was stabbed to death in Woodland Hills A boy of unknown age shot to death in South Gate A doorman at a bar was gunned down in Compton A 25-year-old was shot in South LA near Century and Figueroa Blvds.......

The family of 14-year-old Andrea Wilson-Smith and the LAPD are asking the public's help in finding the teen that disappeared Tuesday from the 10500 block of Saint Andrews Place in the Athens-Westmont neighborhood of South LA. Detective Harry Lee with the 77th Division told LAist that Andrea went outside in front of her house around 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday night before she disappeared. Andrea and her grandparents had just returned from Las Vegas a couple......

Now that fast food is banned in South LA in order to make way for healthier options to exist in the region, what's next? In New York, it was reported today that "food stamp sales have grown to $90,000 in 2007 from $3,000 in 2002." Part of the increase comes from technological advancement with wireless or scrip debit food stamp machines at the markets. 118 markets in California use these machines with over 25 of......

Photo by halighalie via Flickr A ribbon cutting ceremony will take place today at the newly greened Exposition Park Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Regional Branch Library on Western Avenue near USC. The green library is a first for the South Los Angeles region, also receiving the highest second highest rating from the U.S Green Building Council's LEED standards. Here's what made it certify at "gold," according to the city (.pdf): Landscape & Exterior Design......

A 17-year-old on a bicycle was shot and killed last night when a car with two men inside pulled up and shot the teen in the unincorporated area of Westmont. On Sunday night in the unincorporated area of Athens, four men were shot, leaving two dead, about one-mile away from last night's slaying. Both neighborhoods are located in the South LA area near the 110 and 105 Freeways. Updated: The Daily News reports that three......

Is this a redeeming quality of McDonald's? While they may be banned from opening new stores in South LA, there is also a right-wing group boycotting the fast food franchise. The same group is working on getting troops to vote to ban gay marriage on the November ballot as well. McDonald's donated $20,000 to the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC) and the The American Family Association (AFA) has chosen to make a......

Like an episode of Weeds, LA City firefighters responding a warehouse fire last night in the Vermont Knolls neighborhood of South LA discovered marijuana plants as they fought the fire on the second floor of the building. Easily knocked down in 20 minutes, police investigators later found at least 50 full-grown marijuana plant and several pounds of dried product ready to ship, according to the LAPD, per KCBS. According to the media relations office at......

An LA City Council committee has made a unanimous decision to ban new fast-food restaurants in South LA for one year; the decision goes to the full council and the mayor this week. Spearheaded by Councilwoman Jan Perry, the ban would "prevent fast-food chains from opening new restaurants in a 32-square-mile area, including West Adams, Baldwin Village and Leimert Park. The moratorium would be in effect for one year, with the possibility of two......

LA Update, a daily weekday update on what's going on at City Hall (aired on Channel 35) reported today a common fact still needing to be addressed: healthy grocery stores are harder to come by in lower income parts of the city. "A newly released report urges Los Angeles city leaders to encourage major grocery chains to open the same quality stores in low income communities. The Alliance for Healthy and Responsible Grocery Stores report......

California Attorney General Jerry Brown is all about crime fighting. The former Governor (and possible future Governor again) is in Los Angeles today after 30 plus search and arrest warrants were executed in South Los Angeles locations as part of an ongoing gang enforcement operation in the City of Compton. Why is the state getting involved in a local matter? "State agents crack down on local gang operations when the violence reaches a level that......

Councilwoman Jan Perry made do with a one-year moratorium on the addition of new fast food restaurants in South Los Angeles that went into effect last year, but now she's gearing up to fight the battle of the bulge in a more permanent way by asking for a complete ban on new fast food joints in the area. According to the Los Angeles Business Journal, "The ban is intended to stop the proliferation of eateries......

"The neighborhood surrounding the Watts Towers presents a stark contrast to the well-maintained aesthetics of this national monument, and currently the residents have limited means to capitalize socially or economically on this cultural currency," reads a pamphlet about the Watts House Project, which self-describes themselves as an an artist-driven urban revitalization project that hopes to be a catalyst for solutions and change in the community. Leading the charge is Los Angeles artist Edgar Arceneaux who......

Actor Kirk Douglas gives children at the Lillian Elementary School a high five in Los Angeles Wednesday, May 28, 2008 (AP Photo/Nick Ut) Since 1997, actor Kirk Douglas and his wife Anne have donated about one playground renovation per week to Los Angeles area schools. Yesterday at Lillian Elementary School in South LA marked their 401st and last. The playground project began in 1997 "while Anne Douglas was reading in the Los Angeles Times......

In the latest of Los Angeles immigration raids by federal investigators, ICE raided a two-story house in South LA near Normandie and 103rd, arresting at least 61, according to KNX1070 live on the radio. Officials say a criminal investigation into smuggling led to the raid at the house, which was home to sixty or so people, all members of four families. One woman was pregnant and those detained are from Guatamala, Nicaragua and El Salvador.......

This morning's greater alarm structure fire in Hyde Park was knocked down after one hour and twenty-two minutes with over 100 firefighters responding to the scene. One civilian male was injured with second and third-degree burns and is in stable condition. Ron Myers said the fire started in a cabinet shop when a flammable liquid fell and spilled near a power tool which ignited fumes. The fire, located at 2327 Southwest Drive in the Hyde......

Just a few blocks away from last week's massively big fire that nearly leveled a city block at Gage and Gramercy in the Hyde Park neighborhood of South LA comes another fire this morning at 2327 Southwest Drive that was called in at 10:38 a.m. this morning (map below). Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Ron Myers reported via a text message alert that a two story office building was showing heavy smoke from the upper......

A man who ran a red light in South LA led police on a chase that ended in the Harbor area, more specifically off the Port of Los Angeles' Berth 194 in the water. For fifteen minutes, he "stood shirtless on his van's roof, dove into the water and eluded officers by swimming around for 15 minutes," according to KCBS. Finally, he boarded a Los Angeles Fire Department boat and was taken into custody. Then......

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Smoke as seen from the Arts District in Downtown Los Angeles | Photo by Callie Miller On air news reports are saying that one whole city block is basically destroyed in a fire that started in the Hyde Park neighborhood of South Los Angeles around 2:15 p.m. this afternoon near the major intersection at Western and Slauson, more specifically at the industrial block of Gage and Gramercy. As of 4:30 p.m., fire officials said......

A strong fire is rocking through a one-story commercial warehouse that manufactures and stores wooden palettes in an industrial part of the Hyde Park neighborhood in South LA at 6236 Gramercy Place (map below). The wooden palettes are fueling the fire so much, it is being described as a huge bonfire. Not too long after the arriving, Los Angeles firefighters had to evacuate the building because the damage to the building made it unstable and......

Photo by Steven Fernandez via Flickr The results of a recent survey administered in seven public schools in South Los Angeles are downright depressing. Students feel scared, unmotivated, unsupported, and ignored, and it's causing many to experience the symptoms of clinical depression. Administrators and psychologists agree, noting that the multiple killings of youth in the community leaves a pall on the students, and that their choice to skip school because they are "tired, had......

In a big "oops, that was the gas pedal" moment, a Silver Lake Teen accidently ran over his dad at their home this morning. The 4:45 a.m. incident took place at the 700 block of North Occidental Avenue, which is near Sunset and Silver Lake Boulevards. The father was freed from under the vehicle and taken to the hospital in stable condition. The LAPD said there was no evidence of drinking. In North University Park,......

A 19-year-old woman was shot and killed early this morning when exiting the northbound 110 Freeway at the West Slauson Avenue Offramp. Only one witness has come forward so far for the 12:30 a.m. shooting. He said at least five shots were fired and a truck was seen fleeing the area. After noticing a car had sat still on the off-ramp for many light cycles, the witness investigated and found Samantha Padilla dead inside. News......

To mark the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., Los Angeles author and political commentator Earl Ofari Hutchinson thought up the idea of having a 40-hour "murder moratorium" from 6:01 p.m., Friday, to 10:01 p.m. Sunday. Those 40 hours this past weekend saw three murders across Los Angeles county, two of which were in South LA, reported KNBC. A man was murdered one block away from the Watts Tower around noon......

View Larger Map Yesterday evening, an explosion rocked a home a 1108 E. 32nd St., injuring one man. It was caused by a "bug bomb." No, it's not terrorism, it really is something to get bugs. This one just got out of control. This morning around 6:45 a.m., at 1258 W. 58th St. 1 story single family home caught on fire with two people trapped inside. Only on person survived. According to KCBS, it was......