[Lapg] City Repair talks and workshops with Mark Lakeman Dec. 3, 4, 5, 6 Los Angeles

[Wesley Roe and Marjorie Lakin Erickson]

UPCOMING EVENT SPONSORED BY CRSP INSTITUTE FOR URBAN ECOVILLAGES & L.A.
ECO-VILLAGE in association with Councilman Eric Garcetti, MTA, Latino Urban
Forum, Eco-Home Network, Bresee Foundation, TreePeople, Ecology Center of
Southern California, Southern California Permaculture Guild, Los Angles
Permaculture Guild, Permaculture Institute of California,
HopeDance Magazine

Visit our website for other upcoming events:  www.ic.org/laev/

FRI., SAT., SUN., MON. DEC. 3, 4, 5, 6

THE VILLAGE LIVES:  STREET AND INTERSECTION REDESIGN FOR NEIGHBORHOOD
CONVIVIALITY WITH

MARK LAKEMAN FROM PORTLAND OREGON'S CITY REPAIR PROJECT (www.cityrepair.org)

TWO PUBLIC SLIDE SHOWS & TALKS WITH MARK LAKEMAN:

Friday, December 3, 7:30 pm at L.A. Eco-Village, 117 Bimini Pl., $10
(sliding scale ok), reservations recommended, 213/738-1254 or
<crsp at igc.org>

Monday, December 6, noon, at the MTA Headquarters, One Gateway Plaza (where
the Redline and Goldline end), 15th floor conference room, check in on 3rd
floor.  This is in Downtown Los Angeles where Cesar Chavez Bl. and Vignes
St. meet.  No charge for this event.  Bring your own brown bag  lunch.

More info below on Mark Lakeman and City Repair!

CITY REPAIR WORKSHOPS WITH MARK LAKEMAN AND OTHERS DEC 4 AND 5, L.A.
Eco-Village, 117 Bimini Place, LA 90004

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4, 10 am - 4:30 pm

10-10:30 am:   Registration

10:30 am - 12:30 pm:   Mini 30 minute introductory workshops on
permaculture, (Dr. Bill Roley), traffic calming methods, reducing auto use
and auto dependency, dealing with neighborhood water more sustainably (Joe
Linton), neighborhood composting (Esfandiar Abbassi), building with cob
(Camille Cimino & Ray Cirino), Making Your Neighborhood More Bicycle
Friendly (Jimmy Lizama & the Bicycle Kitchen staff), tours to the Bimini
Slough Ecology Park (Lara Morrison), Community Planning Basics (David Diaz)
and more.

12:30 - 1:30 pm:  Lunch.  Bring a brown bag or potluck to share.  Also,
Mama's Hot Tamales will be available for sale.  Inexpensive Thai food and a
variety of fast foods are available within a block (but we support the slow
food movement).

1:30 - 4:30 pm:  Mark Lakeman will facilitate a Design Workshop  and
dialogue for intersection repair and street redesign in LA Eco-Village.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 5, 10 am - 4:30 pm

Mark and others experienced in natural building will lead us in remaking our
intersection at Bimini and White House Place in L.A. Eco-Village based on
the design concepts developed on Saturday.  Wear old clothes and shoes.
This is a hands-on work day making art in, for and around the intersection..
Music, celebration, bring food to share.  Bring your talent and musical
instruments.

FEES:
Fri., 12/3 Public Slide Show & Talk at LA Eco-Village: $10 (sliding
scale ok)

Sat., 12/4 Design Workshop at L.A. Eco-Village:
              By donation $25 - $100 (sliding scale)*

Sun., 12/5 Hands-on Workshop in the street at L.A. Eco-Village:
         By donation $25 - $100 (sliding scale)*

Mon., 12/6 Public Slide Show & Talk at MTA, One Gateway
                Plaza, 15th floor conference room.
                  No Charge

Reservations/Questions:  Call Lois, 213/738-1254 or <crsp at igc.org>

*NOTE:  No one turned away for lack of funds.

ABOUT CITY REPAIR AND MARK LAKEMAN

Join visionary architect Mark Lakeman as he inspires and guides the grid
structure of a typical American city into a vital social commons with
Portland's City Repair Project <www.cityrepair.org>.

Now a national movement (just google it to get a sense of it), City
Repair is about cities, towns, grids and the intersections where our
lives can converge.

Multidisciplinary, City Repair combines architecture, urban planning,
anthropology, community development, public art, permaculture and ecological
design in projects that transform public space.

Intersection Repair is the citizen-led conversion of an urban street
intersection into a public square.  It is a form of grassroots city
planning that can nurture art, public gathering and volunteerism in your
neighborhood.

"Mark is the most inspiring speaker I have seen in my 25 years of local
activism," says Lois Arkin.

The Public Square is the Heart of the Community. We create gathering places
because sharing time and space with each other is the starting point of
community. By helping people reclaim their urban spaces to create
community-oriented places, we plant the seeds for better neighborhood
communication, community empowerment and revitalized local culture.

City Repair's pioneering efforts can lead to accelerated community building
in the congested neighborhoods of Los Angeles. Join L.A. Eco-Villagers, and
our neighbors as Mark helps to facilitate the redesign of our intersection
and sidewalks to create artistic and ecologically-oriented placemaking that
honors the interconnection of our human community and the natural world.

Architect Mark Lakeman spent several years in the 1980's as a lead
designer of large scale corporate projects.  In the 1990's Mark embarked on
a series of cultural immersion projects with indigenous societies in order
to derive placemaking patterns which could be applied to urban settings in
the U.S. These patterns include broad participation, local ownership,
transference of authority to local populations, creative expression in
planned and unplanned processes, and social capital as the primary economic
engine of change.

Mark is the principal of Communitecture, a private design firm
specializing in ecological building and planning projects at many
scales. He also sits on the Board of Directors of Southeast Uplift,
Portland's proactive neighborhood coalition that is undertaking numerous
initiatives to remake the civic landscape.

With other citizen activists, Mark co-founded City Repair in 1996 as a
multi-disciplinary, non-profit organization which works with place-based
communities to creatively recreate the infrastructure of the public commons
where people live. Whether converting street intersections into public
squares, or organizing other forms of permanent or ephemeral place
interventions, City Repair is effectively engaging citizens in the
reinvention of the public landscape. All of these projects are ecological in
emphasis, using natural building and permaculture techniques.  City Repair:

* Educates people about why most American neighborhoods are socially
isolating and culturally inactive, and how we can transform them from the
grassroots

* Inspires people to both understand themselves as part of a larger
community and fulfill their own creative potential, and

* Activates people to be part of the communities around them, as well as
part of the decision-making that shapes the future of their communities.

Born out of a successful grassroots neighborhood initiative that
converted a residential street intersection into a neighborhood public
square, City Repair began its work with the idea that localization (of
culture, of economy, of decision-making) is a necessary foundation of
sustainability. By reclaiming urban spaces to create community-oriented
places, we plant the seeds for greater neighborhood communication, empower
our communities and nurture our local culture.