Explore Urban Trails With Experimental Mobile Site From Los Angeles State Historic Park

On October 16, 2014, UCLA REMAP, California State Parks, the National Park Service, the California Endowment and the City of Los Angeles will celebrate the public release of LASHP Trails, an experimental mobile website featuring urban trails that explore the past, present, and future of the neighborhoods surrounding the Los Angeles State Historic Park (LASHP). At the same time, they will unveil Wellspring, a digitally interactive sculpture that serves as the mobile website's trailhead.

The celebration will take place underneath the historic North Broadway Bridge at 1800 Baker Street. At 5:30pm faculty from UCLA and rangers from California State Parks and the National Parks Service will lead a brief guided walk demonstrating LASHP Trails. The celebration begins at 6pm, featuring opening remarks and refreshments, followed by live performances by Mike the Poet and Timur, and at 8pm the projection of the Olmsted Legacy documentary film.

The highly anticipated LASHP Trails event will also announce a significant Memorandum of Understanding and between the UCLA Center for Research in Engineering, Media and Performance (REMAP), California State Parks, the National Park Service, and the City of Los Angeles. This collaboration will focus on expanding the LASHP Trails into a city wide participatory network for exploration and dialogue about Los Angeles.
LASHP Trails is the evolution of an idea that began with students from Franklin High School who designed urban trails connecting their neighborhoods to LASHP in conjunction with staff from the National Parks Service and the Department of City Planning. The students envisioned the park as a “community trailhead” linking Downtown, Chinatown, Northeast LA, and the LA River with a healthy system of pedestrian and non-motorized transportation opportunities within a 650 acre area surrounding the park.

Inspired by the students, UCLA REMAP's Interpretive Media Laboratory (IMLab) developed the concept of a mobile website that intensifies users' connection to place by exposing them to the often hidden history and potential futures of the spaces in which they are physically standing. LASHP Trails marks one of IMLab's initial efforts to connect place-based content with the promotion of physical activity through urban trails near the Park. The project’s experimental stage realization was made possible by the generous support of the California Endowment.

Wellspring is an original sculpture by artists Michael Parker and Troy Rounseville with interactive light and sound created by IMLab. The cylindrical sculpture hints at the Zanja Madre and the importance of water in our city's history, while also reflecting the beauty of Los Angeles' industrial grit. The sculpture is made entirely from repurposed materials from the Interim Public Use phase of LASHP, which served as a community hub for almost a decade. The interactive sculpture creates a new “pocket park”, open to the public, at the end of Baker Street underneath the iconic North Broadway Bridge.

L.A. State Historic Park Unveils Tool for Urban Exploration
Location: The Viaduct (under the North Broadway Bridge), 1800 Baker Street
Schedule: Thursday, October 16, 2014
5:30pm Demo Walk
6:00pm Official Unveiling & Reception
7:00pm Mike the Poet – Timur
8:00pm The Olmsted Legacy documentary.