General News

The 30-10 Transportation Plan Update

March 11, 2010

As you know, support has been building for our 30-10 initiative to accelerate construction of the 12 mass transit projects funded by the voter-approved Measure R. Our goal is as ambitious as it is critical to LA’s transportation, environmental, and job creation needs: get all 12 projects built in 10 years, instead of 30.

Court Facility Projects – Funding and Contracts

March 11, 2010

The money that currently is financing the acquisition of land and contracts with architects for the $5 billion court facility improvement program remains threatened in the Legislature. Some judges and the court employee unions are asking the Legislature to divert the money to the court system general fund to offset budget cuts. The AIACC is a part of a coalition to protect the capitol improvement money. The coalition includes other design professional associations, contractor and sub?contractor groups, construction unions, and the Administrative Office of the Courts.

Rail~Volution 2010

March 10, 2010

Rail~Volution 2010, "Building Livable Communities with Transit," is a conference for passionate practitioners - people from all perspectives who believe in the role of land use and transit as equal partners in the quest for greater livability and greater communities. The conference will be held in Portland, Oregon on October 18 - 21, 2010. The success of the conference depends on the quality and diversity of presentations. Help enliven the discussion! Send in your ideas now! Proposal deadline is March 31st

Baseline Hillside Ordinance

March 9, 2010

Staff is currently processing all of the comments made at the workshops and will try to address as many of them as we can in the proposed Baseline Hillside Ordinance. We will take into consideration written comments received up to Monday, March 15, 2010 in the development of the proposed Ordinance; please email them to . We will continue to accept your comments after the 15th, but will unfortunately not be able to be incorporated in that iteration of the proposal. For those individuals who attended and/or gave us their input, thank you for your time and participation.

USC School of Architecture Dean Qingyun Ma earned international recognition from BusinessWeek

March 8, 2010

According to BusinessWeek, Qingyun Ma, dean of the USC School of Architecture, joins Apple design guru Jonathan Ive and spaceplane designer Burt Rutan as one of “the 27 most influential designers making an impact on business today.”

BUILDABLE VISIONS: SUSTAINABILITY INNOVATIONS IN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENTS OF CAMPUSES AND THEIR COMMUNITIES

March 8, 2010

The Ninth Annual California Higher Education Sustainability Conference: Golden State Green Opportunities, hosted by Los Angeles Trade Tech and the Los Angeles Community College District at Trade Tech June 20th-23rd, will share best practices designed for California campuses, introduce student leaders creating change for sustainability, present green business leaders and their products – and will showcase several specific design concepts in specified project categories toward sustainable environments: the Buildable Visions Design Competition seeks to accelerate this campus-to-community-to-society innovation transfer.

Young Architects Forum (YAF) of Atlanta Announces Design-Build Challenge

March 5, 2010

Young Architects Forum (YAF) of Atlanta Announces Design-Build Challenge

WWCOT to join DLR Group

March 2, 2010

WWCOT to join DLR Group

Cyclorama Center on the battlefield at Gettysburg

March 2, 2010

You many know that my father, Richard Neutra was one of the only Southern California architects to receive the Gold Medal up to the 70s. One of his most important achievements in 1962, was the construction of the Cyclorama Center on the battlefield at Gettysburg, which he characterized as ‘The Shrine of the Nation’ because he felt the commemoration of Lincoln’s Address was equally important to memorialize along with the battle and its implications. (the ‘address’ was uttered no more than 200 yds from our site). I was project architect on that project, and as such, have an emotional attachment to it. I also happen to believe it is one of our best commissions of our 85 year practice, in the way it responded to its program and context

Commission Sets Stage for Economic Action Plan

February 26, 2010

The Little Hoover Commission on Thursday urged the governor and the Legislature to restructure the leadership and coordination of the state’s economic development programs. When the Technology, Trade and Commerce Agency was shuttered in 2003, largely due to controversy over its overseas trade offices, the state’s economic development programs were dispersed to various agencies and departments. The lack of a single state economic development organization created room for local economic development associations and regional collaborations to emerge and set bottom-up priorities for economic growth. The Commission calls on the state to once again play a leading role.

SCAG is now accepting nominations for its Fourth Annual Compass Blueprint Recognition Awards

February 25, 2010

SCAG is now accepting nominations for its Fourth Annual Compass Blueprint Recognition Awards The Compass Blueprint Recognition Awards are presented annually in recognition of projects that demonstrate excellence and achievement in the four key elements of Compass Blueprint planning: Livability, Mobility, Prosperity and Sustainability

Position Statement Process

February 25, 2010

The Los Angeles Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA|LA) engages the public in many ways. We craft Press Releases announcing events, achievements and initiatives, we formally develop Issue Briefs as part of our annual Legislative Day at City Hall advocacy efforts, and, additionally the Chapter develops Position Statements to represent the professional interests of architects and our members. These Position Statements serve as advocacy tools to help shape public policy and our environment.

Mayor Villaraigosa's 30/10 Plan

February 24, 2010

This week I've traveled to Washington DC to advocate for my 30/10 plan, which calls for federal assistance to help get our top 12 measure R funded transportation projects built in the next 10 years, instead of 30. My plan would not only get LA the transportation system it deserves sooner, it would create 166,000 jobs and get thousands of cars of the road.

L.A. County Strategic Plan for Economic Development

February 24, 2010

With Los Angeles County struggling with double-digit unemployment, BizFed last week took a significant step toward aggressively working for a more business-friendly environment to spur jobs and help all of our communities thrive in this new decade

HPOZ Board Openings

February 23, 2010

The Office of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has contacted AIA Los Angeles with four immediate openings on boards of Historic Preservation Overlay Zones. The Mayor's appointee needs to live in the City, but does not need to live in the HPOZ or in the associated Council District; however, he or she should be able to comfortably attend the meetings without "distance hardship."

9th Annual CA HIGHER EDUCATION SUSTAINABILITY CONFERENCE

February 22, 2010

The CA Higher Education Sustainability Conference and Los Angeles Community College District encourages you to submit a proposal to present at our upcoming conference. The conference was established in 2001 for the exchange of best practices between people engaged in, or seeking to learn more about, campus sustainability from teaching and academic research to all aspects of campus operations.

APA-AIA High Speed Rail Initiative

February 20, 2010

Friday, February 19, 2010 APA-AIA High Speed Rail Initiative Initial Organizational Meeting

The discussion began as a general awareness building effort about High Speed Rail,urban design, and station configurations in California, particularly Union Station in Downtown Los Angeles. There are several design issues around station configurations, and as currently proposed, the California High Speed Rail system is not considering the potential opportunities to create vibrant, urban centers at these train station, like is done in Asia and Europe. The group agreed that whatever the approach, the APA and AIA should work toward creating a set of recommendations on the Union Station alignment and to generate a station area design plan. I think in the end, we all agreed that there was a lack of vision in the California High Speed Rail Authority, and that it was being run by engineers (for good or worse). This issue about generating a set of recommendations quickly focused the immediate discussion around Union Station as opposed to a more regional or Statewide scope for the initiative.

AIA|LA ASKS LEGISLATORS TO PROTECT SB1407 FUNDS FOR COURTHOUSE CONSTRUCTION

February 18, 2010

LOS ANGELES, CA, February 18, 2010: in letters to California Legislators, the Los Angeles Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA|LA), expressed strong support for protecting funding for the court facility renovation and construction program created by the passage of Senate Bill 1407

Downtown L.A. Streetcar Project Competes for $25 Million

February 12, 2010

LOS ANGELES (Feb. 10, 2010) —The City of Los Angeles, on behalf of the public-private partnership advancing the streetcar plan, today submitted its application to the Federal Transit Administration for a $25-million grant for the Downtown Los Angeles Streetcar. Los Angeles will compete with a number of other cities in the U.S. seeking funds from the recently announced $180 million Urban Circulator grant program, part of President Obama’s Livability Initiative.

Baseline Hillside Ordinance Public Workshops

February 12, 2010

The Department of City Planning has been conducting a citywide study on how to best address the issue of out-of-scale single-family development in the hillside area. The Department has developed a citywide proposal that would ultimately address key issues raised by various communities including floor area ratios, height and stories, and grading limits.

The Positive Results in Integrated Project Delivery Case Studies

February 12, 2010

Sacramento, CA (January 28, 2010) – The American Institute of Architects (AIA) and The AIA California Council, (AIACC) today announced the results of a joint project focused on real building projects that utilized and implemented Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), during the building process. IPD is a construction project model in which owner, design professional and builder jointly share a project’s risk and reward. These studies demonstrate the successful application of IPD in a variety of building types and scales in diverse regions of the country, and are the first installment of an ongoing evaluation process of how the IPD model might be incorporated nationwide to protect against project losses. In particular, all six participants in the study delivered projects on time and within budget using the IPD model, thus demonstrating the effectiveness of its use.

The Launch of PARAsite

February 11, 2010

USC School of Architecture is pleased to announce the launch of PARAsite: http://arch-pubs.usc.edu/parasite/. This blog has been set up as a forum for debate about recent developments within the USC School of Architecture in the area of parametric and algorithmic design. PARAsite also serves as a repository of records of past events, such as the Intensive Fields conference held on 12 December 2009. Full video documentation of this conference is now available at http://arch-pubs.usc.edu/parasite/intensive-fields/video-archive/