City officials in Los Feliz say they're looking at redesigning a tiny little concrete island at Vermont Triangle, a traffic median off Hollywood Boulevard after residents have pushed back against the homeless who put up tents on the 7,000 square-foot site.
The original redesign included planting sycamore trees, adding grass, and seating areas where people could cool their heels while waiting for the bus. But, now, all that is covered by vagrants who have pitched their tents there.
Officials say they're considering a new design for the space that would include adding large planters to make it far more difficult for the homeless to pitch their tents there. But, even the community members who support a new design are tired with the city spending so much time and energy on one lousy median.
"It should have stayed the way it was," Jeff Zarrinnam, a member of the board of governors of the East Hollywood Business Improvement District, which maintains the median told the Los Angeles Times. "But everyone has all these different, wild ideas. People think it's a park, and it's not park. It's a median, that's a traffic median, that's all it is."
The 2008 design was intended to help improve pedestrian's access to the Red Line station at Sunset Boulevard and Vermont Avenue. The project was funded by the federal government, with the rest of the money coming from the city's now defunct Community Redevelopment Agency.
Shop owners say they have problems with the homeless coming in and defecating and urinating in front of their stores, or even hassling their customers for money.
This isn't the first time the city has used large planters to displace the homeless - Venice tried something similar, placing stones and plants at two different parkways in an effort to discourage the homeless from camping there.
Hopefully "Third time's the charm" is also applicable to redesigning a traffic median.
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