Talk:Los Angeles River

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 11 January 2022 and 28 April 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): LuckyDatLlama, BonklesMcGinty (article contribs). Peer reviewers: HandsomeSquidward311, Sassafrass15, ChrispinPerez, Girlscout2009.

HOW IS IT POSSIBLE THAT THERE IS NO INFORMATION ON THE ORIGINS/CONSTRUCTION OF THIS RIVER?!?!?!??? If nothing else, there should be an origination year about this particular man-made construction. Who came up with the idea? Who built it? And most importantly, WHAT YEAR WAS IT CONSTRUCTED????? Jeez... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kpm2448 (talk • contribs) 05:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

A complete timeline can be found here: http://ladpw.org/wmd/watershed/la/larmp/LARMP-33%20Appendix%20A%20-%20History%20of%20the%20Los%20Angeles%20River.pdf If someone can add a paragraph about the time between the beginning of the 20'th century to 1941 using this timeline, I think it would probably work.

Los Angeles River floodplain

The article states that "millions of residents" would need to relocate if the river were restored. Where does that number come from; it sounds awfully big (and vague). Is that everyone in the floodplain?Gwimpey 04:36, Nov 18, 2004 (UTC)

I agree. I doubt that anyone has ever seriously proposed a wholesale restoration. There are many other factors that limit opportunities for restoration, but I don't think that a need to relocate millions of people is one of them. Unless someone provides a citation soon, I suggest that that clause be removed or re-drafted. Willmcw 08:44, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It comes from Patt Morrison's book on the river, the Gumprecht book, and an L.A. Weekly interview with the head of Tree People. Some of the most densely populated communities in greater Los Angeles are in an area that would suffer significant flooding every winter were the river dechannelized. Those within at least a quarter-mile of the river's current channel would absolutely have to relocate, and a "50-year" flood would inundate most of Bell, Compton, and other such cities. After a 50-year rainstorm in the mid-'90s left considerable debris deposits atop the walls, and the Corps of Engineers proposed raising the walls as a result, the most vocal support for the project came from the city governments of Lynwood and Compton. --Slightlyslack 09:08, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

If you've got the sources that go ahead and add the material. Cheers, -Willmcw 21:11, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

I know that after the big rainstorm in the '90s, the Corp of Engineers greatly expanded the area that thought would be covered by a 100 year flood. We need to see if those maps are online someplace. I remember the LB Press-Telegram printing the map, and a good proportion of Long Beach was expected to be flooded. ^BlankVerse 10:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Films

I am responding to the remarks about relocating millions of people, but I did not see an edit button for that talk. I'm new to this article and Wiki. The aritcle is very thorough and deseves kudos, but like so much other writing about the River it is mostly about the inconveniences it poses to civilization. As a result, it doesn't create an image of what kind of river this was in its natural state. There are also some minor inaccuracies. I would like to propose some changes. Chaca06 17:01, 21 April 2006 (UTC) 4/21/06

I put in another section for films that have been filmed at some point in the LA river, but the only ones I know for sure are Them and T2. I believe Grease and an episode of Knight Rider were also shot there, but couldn't find any proof. I did some googling but couldn't find any more, even though I'd bet that a complete list would be greater than 100 films/episodes. If anyone runs into a list of anything that has been filmed there, it would be a nice addition. --66.215.44.176 05:57, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

There was an amazing helicopter chase down the river in a movie in the 1980s, with James Woods I think. What about "Grease"? I recall seeing a car chase in '50s cars in some movie. The bridges are used routinely, but often for such short bits that they wouldn't be worth mentioning. -Willmcw 07:39, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

FYI, it was Blue Thunder, with Roy Schneider. -Will Beback 19:39, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

For awhile during the '70s & '80s it seemed like every cop show filmed in LA had a chase scene once a year that ended up involving the LA River. There have even been a few of scifi films that have used the LA River. If we ended listing every TV show and film that used the LA River, it would be a very, very long list. The rule should be that something should only be listed if the LA River played a significant part in the TV show or film, and it was being used as the LA River and not just as a convenient length of concrete to do dramatic chase scenes on. ^BlankVerse 13:13, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

The Cats

No mention of The Cats? If you don't know, you don't know. I'll cover it later. Alexander 007 10:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Well? 199.120.30.198 (talk) 02:23, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Headwaters

I grew up in the area and believe the headwaters to be in the Santa Susana Mtns, in the northwestern part of the valley. I edited the article to reflect this, but can I have a definite source, please?

Revitalization

Is it just me or does that section sound a bit like advertising? A prime example is the first sentance: One of the most exciting initiatives shepherded over the last three years by the Ad Hoc River Committee is the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan.' Perhaps someone should edit this to sound more like an encyclopedia and less like an ad for the various agencies involved in the "revitalization". In fact the whole section sounds a little off (who determined that the river was in need of "revitalization"?). I am not sure what should be done (hence I didn't edit it) but at minimum I would suggest the removal of terms like "exciting initiatives" and "powerful mandate". Duncan St. Ives 07:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

You can tell, because that entire section doesn't have a wikilink or reference in it, that it wasn't written by a regular Wikipedia editor. It looks like much of it may have been copied or paraphrased from [1].

The section is in need of some serious WP:NPOV and and weasel words editing. After that, it will need proper references. Finally, it will need some adding to, because some of the local cities are actually taking small steps at remediation, whereas the regional efforts are, for the most part, still in the planning stages.

But then the whole article looks like it needs some attention. For example, the article doesn't mention the booms at the mouth of the river in Long Beach, which have probably been there 4-5 years at least, and greatly reduced the amount of trash going out to sea, especially after storms.

As the "Encyclopedia that anyone can edit", you will also find that sometimes the only way that things get done is if you do them yourself. ^BlankVerse 10:36, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Agree. I will take a look at the article. It looks like it could use some cleanup.

Cleanup to remove tag

• My first recommendation is to shorten the first paragraph to one or two sentences that accurately describe the river in a short and sweet manner consistent with most wiki articles.
• Second, would to move the rest of paragraph in another header which probably should be the first header called Geography.
• Third, would to link more of the cities, rivers, etc. Ronbo76 19:21, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

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Left and right tributaries

Are the left and right tributaries switched in the Infobox or is there something about rivers and direction that I don’t understand? jengod (talk) 13:31, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

I have no idea, jengod. Is "left" supposed to be the west side of the river, and "right" supposed to be the east side of the river? -- RobLa (talk) 05:43, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

Length of the river

The info box says 47.9 miles, the lead says nearly 51 miles. Perhaps one or the other could be chosen as the length. I see the numbers are close, but not the same. The source for info box is a USGS National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data, accessed in 2011 and the original data are not visible from the links in the citation. The source of the length in the lead is not given. It is possible that this sentence is the source: “LOS ANGELES RIVER Description of Invert and Cross Section Data The Los Angeles River is approximately 52 miles long, with headwaters near Bell Canyon and discharging into the Pacific Ocean. ” from this California Waterboards [here https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/losangeles/board_decisions/basin_plan_amendments/technical_documents/2005-006/04_0712/Dry%20Weather/LA%20River%20Metals-Appendix%20A.pdf], dated July 2004. Anyway, it seems best to choose one source, and to explain different results from different sources for length of the river with concrete banks. - - Prairieplant (talk) 14:09, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

here, That is what I meant to type. - - Prairieplant (talk) 14:10, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

Lack of info about the concrete sections

The most striking feature about the LA river is how large parts of it are made of concrete, yet the only part of this article that deals with how this happened is this:

"The incidents resulted in the US Army Corps of Engineers beginning an ambitious project of encasing the river's bed and banks in concrete."

and in the wildlife section: "The native species of the Los Angeles River were extirpated by the conversion of the natural riverbed into a concrete trapezoidal channel in 1938."

No dates, no details, nothing about the design, decision making, how long it took, how expensive it was, how the city was affected, we just get the vague impression that this happened around 1938. A major aspect of the river is treated like a minor detail. 31.178.42.82 (talk) 08:42, 9 August 2024 (UTC)