Saving L.A. from becoming a third-world city

LOS ANGELES -- Many of America's cities are in the crapper thanks to years of policy that's favored suburbs and sprawl, writes The New York Times' architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff. But with a city guy in the Oval Office, and billions being pumped into urban centers, this trend is reversible and opportunity especially lies in four cities: New Orleans, Buffalo, New York City's Bronx borough, and Los Angeles.

Ouroussoff acknowledges our city has fared better than most (our booming population has been spared from natural disasters), but our limited transit network and our lack of green space threaten the livability of L.A., and if unchecked, could turn the city into a North American Cairo. But a "citywide plan that anchored Los Angeles along two major axes -- the green river and the asphalt boulevard -- could save it from becoming a third world city," writes Ouroussoff, a former architecture critic for the Los Angeles Times. [Image via the L.A. Times]  more...