Zach Behrens

Photo: blogdowntown Has the building boom stopped in downtown's South Park neighborhood? The crane at the soon-to-open Ritz Carlton tower on the LA Live campus is currently being dissembled, according to blogdowntown, which notes that "in the summer of 2007, a half dozen of the cranes stood within a few blocks of L.A. Live, with the two on-site at the complex joined by others atop South Group's Evo, Hanover's 717 Olympic, Meruelo's 717 W....

Map Detail of Day 1's Walk | See all the maps and timetables here Los Angeles loves stair cases. For health, for efficiency or just the fun of exploring our city, staircases are one of this city's more unique assets. When LAist posts about staircases, the stories balloon in traffic and interest. Remember our exploration of the secret stairs of Hollywood Heights, the Hollywood Bowl and Hollywoodland in Beachwood Canyon. That's just a start....

Geotagged map of invasive plant locations, play with an interactive version of this map here When a bald eagles disappear from the Channel Islands allowing room for Golden Eagles, who eat really cute little foxes, to take over, everyone freaks out (got 20 mins? Watch this amazing short documentary). When a pretty flowering Spanish Broom begins to grow, not many take notice despite it being one of the top invasive and harmful-to-the-ecosystem plants found...

See more photos here, here and here | Photo by Tom Andrews/LAist For the second time this summer, traveling troupe Cirque Berzerk has extended their run, this time through the end of August. This just confirms to us that Los Angeles is indeed ready for permanent high quality acts. Soon Cirque du Soleil will be arriving for a 10 year show at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, but what else? Can this city support...

Photo by manfrys via Flickr Let's face it. The city of Los Angeles is truly in the stone ages when it comes to technology. City workers may be addicted to their crackberries and the City Council File Management System may be pretty sweet, but other than that, our tax dollars are disappearing into a non-efficient system. Now enter the idea of partnering with Google's e-mail and apps program. From the LA Times: If approved...

Photo by jvoves via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Two weeks on the job and Carmen Trutanich is making his mark, making heads turn and fighting the fight, whether you like it or not. Because the bar was one of the first to take a risk and open in the new downtown, a big Happy 5th Birthday to the Golden Golpher! Cheap lunch date? Lucky Strike downtown is offering a recession deal...

People are annoyed with Jury Duty enough. Apparently, the message that the courts were closed for a budget-saving furlough day didn't make it to all the jurors, according to the Daily Breeze: "Some people complained that they were not told that Wednesday was a furlough day. Even those who had been asked to do their civic duty." Add to that those who traveled from afar to the courts. A man who drove out from...

Today a Metro committee on Measure R funds were to discuss the possibility of pushing up the opening dates of three rail projects in the county--the regional connector in downtown, the second eastside extension of the Gold Line and the Green Line to LAX. After the meeting, Foothill Gold Line Extension advocates (they want the line to run beyond Pasadena towards Ontario) announced that the acceleration of project timelines in the agenda were picked...

Last night, Los Angeles lost a true Angeleno. Photographer Julius Shulman, 98, died last night, according to an LA Times breaking news e-mail alert. Shulman was a blunt--yet hilarious--critic of architecture and he showed the works he loved through his work. In a new documentary about Shulman, screened in Los Angeles at Dwell on Design, he would call most of the city's housing design style a pile of junk. The audience burst out laughing.

Will it be a madhouse at the beaches this weekend? This photo was taken last year this weekend | Photo by Jonathan Alcorn via LAist Featured Phots on Flickr With temperatures reaching above 90--even above 100--degrees from downtown to the valleys and beyond, public health officials are warning the public to take note and not act dumb. “While people don’t need to be told it’s hot outside, they do need to be reminded how...

He did it! 17-year-old Zac Sunderland left Marinda Del Rey on June 14th, 2008 (he was 16 then) to journey across the world only to make it home today. That's a 28,000 mile trip for the Thousand Oaks native who saved up $6,000 for his 36-foot Intrepid sailboat. Although he has beaten records, a younger sailor is already trying to beat him with a faster boat, but Sunderland shrugs it off knowing someday his...

Kogi on the Streets | Photo by Jolts via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr In what appears to be inspiration from the street (or a complete rip off) Baja Fresh is bringing new Kogi Korean BBQ menu items to its new concept test location in Irvine. Not only can you get alcohol and cilantro lime rice at the fast casual restaurant, you can get Korean BBQ inspired tacos and burritos that just happened to...