[edluva]

great article ralossi. exactly how i've always felt about grand ave, la live, and other mega projects like them. in a more ideal world, the city would not need mega developers for viability. in the more ideal world, the free market would create a more diverse, more organic, more democratic mixture of development, not one project of which has the ability to homogenize the urban fabric by its sheer scale, and planning departments would actually be able to regulate this developent for public good. instead, our city requires the ubiquitous institutional "mac-developer", billions of dollars in pilfered subsidies, and corrupt politicians to see things through. but in LA there is no market for a city, so a "city" must be built and marketed.