As you may have heard, Los Angeles City Council approved a plan Tuesday to restore the park surrounding City Hall post-Occupy L.A. The approved option calls for 51% less grass and more native, drought-tolerant plants. But what about other green, sustainable ideas like edible gardens? Farmscape, California's largest urban farming operation, has quite a few of these ideas and has been striving to get them heard. more ›

After months of restoration contemplation and astronomic cost estimates, L.A. City Council approved a plan today to revive the park surrounding City Hall. The 1.7-acre area, which once exhibited lush green grass, met its match when Occupy L.A. descended upon the land on October 1, 2011 and remained stationed on the grounds for nearly two months. more ›

They says one man's misfortune is another man's gain, and this might hold true per a new Department of Recreation and Parks initiative. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced a plan last week to inject more green into L.A.'s urban 'hoods by building 50 new "pocket parks" throughout L.A. by March 2012. Of the 50 parks, 10 will spruce up the sites of foreclosed homes. more ›

Los Angeles is out of large parcels of land that can serve as community parks, so the plan is to go small, but be prolific. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced Wednesday that 50 new "pocket parks" will be set up all over L.A. over the next two years as a way to put more green spaces in our urban neighborhoods. more ›

It sounds pretty heavenly: A 44-acre street level park "on top" of the 101 Hollywood Freeway. It's an idea that's been in the works since 2006 (though its roots trace back to nearly three decades ago), and, with the support of several politicians and organizations, is making progress on its timeline. more ›

Sure, a sunset happens every day, but that doesn't mean experiencing one can't be special. In fact, it can create an instant community. Just ask Nat Evans, a Seattle-based musician who has put together a unique national "event" that pairs his "site-specific" music with mother nature's evening gift, the sunset. more ›

If you notice several parking spaces around town being used as gathering places for plants, art, furniture, and people, you aren't losing your mind: You're witnessing the annual Park[ing] Day L.A. more ›

If you're a regular visitor to Echo Park Lake, you may wonder if that statue of a woman you're used to seeing in one place came to life and moved herself to a new locale. Well, no such fairy tale to tell today; the "Lady of the Lake" was picked up and moved as part of a massive clean-up project going on at the park. more ›

Rosie the Riveter, the American cultural icon representing female factory workers in WWII, can now pull her right sleeve up a little more and flex those muscles. She now has her own park, reports L.A. Now. more ›

A meeting today by the Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners found the matter of the future use of the land that was once the South Central Farm still undetermined, when the group opted to pass on making the call, instead sending the issue to the Los Angeles City Council for action. The Board says their inaction is largely due to the property's non-relevance to the Port of Los Angeles. more ›

Clearly, someone did not get the memo about the purpose of the "Summer Night Lights" program, which is meant to encourage safe, summertime evening park use in order to reduce gang violence. Shots rang out in Wilmington last night, interrupting the exodus of about 30 people from a "SNL" gathering at Wilmington Recreation Center, leaving two wounded. more ›

July is National Parks & Recreation Month, and all month long LAist will be featuring a hand-selected park a day to showcase just a few of the wonderful recreation spaces--big or small--in the Los Angeles area. more ›

Harvey Milk became a household name when his story was immortalized by writer Dustin Lance Black and Sean Penn in the 2008 film, "Milk." Now, KABC reports that Long Beach residents will continue the effort to honor Milk, with a proposal to name a park after the openly gay San Francisco city supervisor who was gunned down in 1978. The Long Beach Press Telegram reports that the proposal was introduced on Monday by City Councilmember Robert Garcia, who is openly gay. more ›

Authorities are asking the public for help in an animal cruelty investigation after gruesome discoveries of the remains of four cats at El Monte's Rio Vista Park (map). All of the animals had been duct taped and tortured in a similar fashion, leading El Monte police to believe there may be a serial cat torturer at large. more ›

A charmless, desolate block-long traffic median in South Los Angeles is about to become the neighborhood's newest "pocket park" thanks to the efforts of Heal the Bay, some local school kids, and an infusion of grant funding from California State Parks. Located at the intersection of McKinley Avenue and E. 87th Street, this "dead" space is about to become the WAYS Literacy and Fitness Park, a green space that promotes sustainability and health by using water recycling and other eco-friendly practices and giving locals a new place to play and exercise. more ›

We're having wild weather, indeed, and with winter's arrival, it doesn't seem right to be thinking about cheery purple blooms dotting our greenspaces, and yet at Los Angeles State Historic Park they're already getting a preview of the lupines that will blanket the park come spring. more ›

Authorities in Anaheim have named their suspect in a bizarre case involving sexually explicit photographs left on trails and vehicles at a popular park, according to the OC Register, and they have issued an arrest warrant for a local man who is a former Huntington Park police chief. Paul Lawrence Wadley is accused of leaving photos of male and female genitalia in the park to be found by park-goers. more ›

The hyperlocal approach at its best: South Pasadena's Patch has published a mini-guide to the parks in their small city. There are six official community parks in South Pas (Garfield Park, Orange Grove Park, Arroyo Seco Park, Eddie Park, War Memorial Park, and Library Park), each offering history buffs, shade-seekers, playground climbers, and solitary amblers something different. For locals and picnickers with a penchant for patches of grass south of Pas, this is an excellent guide to help explore one of LA County's more charming small cities. Bonus: The author includes a video tour of the parks. more ›

Over 15 parking spaces will be turned into pop-up parks today as part of the annual global Park[ing] Day event. You can't park your car, but you can park your butt in the seats at the Park[ing] Day LA parks and talk to the space's organizers about why they are taking part in this event. more ›

Planned to go aside the Los Angles River, Long Beach's proposed expansion of Drake Park would include a boardwalk, community gardens, wetlands, recreation fields and more. This week the city revealed renderings of the project and announced funding for the next big step, the Environmental Impact Report (EIR), before construction can begin. more ›

A parking lot and construction staging area between two downtown lofts was set to become a park a year and a half ago. Now finalized designs have been released, finds blogdowntown. Spring Street Park will be 35,000 square foot and mainly feature green space. Planners originally proposed a more ornate space, but residents, who lack green space in downtown, wanted it to be simple. more ›

If the idea of getting out in nature is appealing, but the summer sun a deterrent, there's a walk in Griffith Park you might find a pleasant way to take a walk and escape the heat. more ›

Though the official groundbreaking on the Civic Park project was mid-July, work really has begun in earnest to transform the land between the Music Center and City Hall--bordered by the County Hall of Administration and a federal court building. more ›

The seven acres of space in front of and across from the Santa Monica City Hall [map] are going to be turned into two public parks, and the planners are turning to the community for input, according to the Argonaut. more ›

An approximately 6,000-square-foot parcel of undeveloped land at the corner of 4h and Molino in Downtown's Arts District will soon go from blight to bark, reports the LA Downtown News. more ›

A battle has been brewing over the past decade about a large swath of open space in Studio City along the L.A. River. Just north of Ventura Boulevard between Coldwater Canyon and Whitsett is Weddington Golf and Tennis, which owners want to turn into a condominium development for 200 seniors. But a faction of the community has asserted themselves saying the land should stay open and free of development. more ›

Wilson Canyon is located in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains just above Sylmar, and has re-opened following last year's damaging wildfires just in time for something else wild: wildflowers. more ›

One of Los Angeles' quirkiest claims to fame might be the La Brea Tar Pits, where prehistoric fossils were discovered in the early twentieth century in the bubbling ooze in what would eventually become a core area in a bustling city. William Warren Orcutt is considered a "pioneer of the oil production industry in California," and is credited as the "discoverer" of those fossils:

It was during [1901, his] first year in Los Angeles that Orcutt discovered fossilized prehistoric animal bones preserved in pools of asphalt on the Hancock Ranch. These would be the first of many fossils excavated from the La Brea Tar Pits. In commemoration of Orcutt’s initial discovery, paleontologists named the La Brea Coyote in W.W. Orcutt’s honor, Canis Orcutti.