Adele Yellin on LAPD Headquarter Plans

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — Adele Yellin, the widow of prominent Downtown visionary Ira Yellin, has a commentary that runs in today’s LA Times. In it she reiterates her disapproval for where the city is trying to place the new LAPD headquarters and goes over the idea of the park as presented in the 1997 Civic Center master plan.

My late husband, Ira Yellin, was a leader in re-envisioning downtown Los Angeles. Among his successes were the reclamations of the Bradbury Building, Grand Central Market and Union Station.

A civic park on the old Caltrans site was a dream. He saw it as a physical and emotional gateway between the city’s revitalizing historic core and its halls of government; he saw its potential to anchor and animate the surrounding area. He envisioned the park as a central gathering place for this city without a center.

This is an issue that is just going to get more interesting as the draft environmental documents start to show up.