Message From the Dean: Recent Events in the L.A. City Council All of us — not just prominent people and elected officials but especially them — must do more to make the world a safer, saner place.

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Oct. 11, 2022

Friends, Colleagues, Students:

I am once again called upon to communicate to you in a moment where I find myself almost speechless. The wildly offensive racist, anti-Black, anti-indigenous, antisemitic and homophobic conversation among three members of the City Council and a local labor leader deserves all the condemnation it’s receiving and then some. That one party of the conversation was, until two years ago, a member of this academic community is personally painful and deeply disappointing.

We are called upon in moments like this to remember that the cause of human equality and a commitment to decency, equity, and inclusiveness is an ongoing project, one requiring self-examination and vigilance. Let us use this moment to once again repudiate anti-Blackness, repudiate derision directed toward indigenous communities, repudiate antisemitism, repudiate homophobia and demand that all of us — not just prominent people and elected officials but especially them — do better and do more to make the world a safer, saner place in which we all might flourish.

The School is not permitted to take public political positions. However, I wanted you to hear from me that today, in my personal capacity, I signed onto a letter from community and civic leaders across academic, philanthropic and political organizations. The letter calls for the resignation of all three officials, an important first step toward rectifying this injustice and allowing healing to begin.

Our times remain vexed. Emotions remain high. Let’s work to make our better selves the authors of the future.

In solidarity,

Gary M. Segura

Professor and Dean

Zepeda-Millán on Labor Organizing, Activism and Scholarship

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Chris Zepeda-Millán spoke of his Boyle Heights roots, early activism in labor and anti-war movements, and inspiration to pursue a doctorate to broaden the perspectives heard in academia during an interview marking his selection as chair of the UCLA Labor Studies Interdepartmental Program. An associate professor of public policy and Chicana/o and Central American Studies, Zepeda-Millán grew up hearing about the challenging conditions his grandparents faced as garment workers and migrant farmworkers and learning about the importance of labor organizing. It was not until pursuing higher education that he would discover the connections between his family’s work, economic and social inequality, race and immigration status. In college, “for the first time in my life I was able to read books and stories that literally took place in my neighborhood,” he said. “I saw these courses as intellectual ammunition. I was learning how to defend my beliefs, to be able to call out things that I knew were wrong.”

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Luskin Scholars Join UCLA’s New Initiative to Study Hate

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UCLA is launching the Initiative to Study Hate, an ambitious social impact project that brings together a broad consortium of scholars to understand and ultimately mitigate hate in its multiple forms. Supported by a $3 million gift from an anonymous donor, researchers including UCLA Luskin scholars will undertake 23 projects this year, the first of a three-year pilot program. Through his work with the UCLA Institute for Society and Genetics, Aaron Panofsky, professor of public policy and sociology, will map the ways white nationalist groups selectively use and reject science to perpetuate themes of otherization and dehumanization online. Researchers from UCLA Luskin Social Welfare will participate in three projects: Doctoral student Emily Maurin-Waters and associate professor Laura Wray-Lake will examine prejudicial violence against LGBTQ youth and the impact of whether it is framed as bullying or a hate crime. Doctoral student Taylor Reed will lead a team including Sara Wilf and Victoria Millet MSW ’22 to study racism and discrimination within organizing spaces, as experienced by Black and Latinx individuals taking part in youth gun violence prevention movements. And assistant professor Brian Keum and doctoral student Michele Wong will join a team from the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health that will explore the spillover effect on the mental health of Asian Americans in the wake of the mass killing of spa workers in Atlanta, Georgia. From Urban Planning, master’s student Eliza Franklin Leggett will disrupt the built environment in an Alabama town with a history of white supremacy by inserting historical markers documenting hidden Black histories.

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Loukaitou-Sideris on Benefits, Consequences of New Rail Line

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Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, professor of urban planning at UCLA Luskin, was cited in a Los Angeles Times article about how the construction of rail lines in South L.A. will serve as both a curse and a blessing to locals. While the railway system will benefit communities by de-isolating South L.A. from the rest of the city, it poses economic challenges as current residents find that increasing rent prices are driving them out of the well-established communities many grew up in. In her past studies, Loukaitou-Sideris found that census tracts closest to stations had the highest likelihood of gentrification. However, she is not opposed to the construction of the railway line. “It is not that we should not have transit stations. It is that we really need strategies for people to avoid displacement,” she said.

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A Solution to Increasing Traffic Concerns

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The Boston Globe spoke to Michael Manville, associate professor of urban planning, about the reasons traffic has remained heavy despite the widespread move to remote work during the pandemic. Manville explained that while many people are no longer commuting to work in the morning, they still have errands to run and children to drop off at school. “What really never changed was the idea in people’s heads that ‘when there is a place to go, I drive there,'” he said. A solution he suggests is pricing the roads similar to how airlines are priced to help combat increasing traffic congestion. During peak commute times like early mornings, Manville says roads should be priced higher than at late nights. He believes that, similar to water and electricity, roads are a public good but we don’t typically run out of water or electricity because they are priced.

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Matute Shares Insight on the Feasibility of a Hyperloop

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A New York Times article about the feasibility of a hyperloop transit system cited Juan Matute, deputy director of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies. For decades, hyperloop technology has captivated many with the possibility of transporting people at speeds close to air travel. In recent years, many companies have attempted to create a hyperloop, but the technical obstacles of creating such an infrastructure have prevented it from coming to fruition. “Time and again you see technological innovations attracting a lot of investment, and you can make a lot of money during the hype cycle,” Matute said. Companies like TransPod and Virgin Hyperloop have faced obstacles in funding as well as safety issues that come with transporting people at such high speeds. Matute said that, even if the hyperloop charges passengers rates that are less than air travel, the airline industry will likely lower their fees to stay competitive.

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An Active Example of Advocacy in West Los Angeles

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More than 200 people celebrated the architectural and cultural significance of the West Los Angeles Civic Center and Courthouse on Sunday, Oct. 2, during a public space activation. The event brought together UCLA architecture and urban planning students, public space advocacy organizations, and longtime users of the space in the third and final event organized by UCLA’s (Un)Common Public Space Group. Participants gathered to make use of the space and envision future uses of the bandshell, ledges and pathways, constructing skate obstacles and devising other amenities, learning about the history of the space, and enjoying music and food. The event encouraged dialogue among policymakers, developers and the public to safeguard community amenities. It also connected UCLA-based public space research with the city’s redevelopment plans for the space and engaged with the local knowledge and perspectives of advocacy organizations near the courthouse. Keegan Guizard from College Skateboarding and Alec Beck from the Skatepark Project hosted skateboard contests, highlighting the area’s history of skateboarding activism. The L.A. Conservancy informed participants about the historical importance of mid-century modern architecture, and students constructed future amenities like modular street furniture and colorful shade structures. Over 140 signatures were gathered for public petitions and comments to preserve community amenities and obstacles in the space’s future redevelopment. The (Un)Common Public Space Group activates public space with and for underrepresented and underserved communities in pursuit of spatial justice. The series was supported by the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies and the UCLA Urban Humanities Initiative. — Chris Giamarino 

image shows event organizers facing cameraA skateboarder launches off a DIY ramp over a shopping cart. Photo by Adam Lubitz
image shows event organizers facing camera
image shows event organizers facing camera

View additional photos and videos in a Google photo album

Roy on Cold Exposure Deaths of Unhoused People in L.A.

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Professor of Urban Planning and Social Welfare Ananya Roy spoke to The Guardian for a story about 14 unhoused individuals who reportedly froze to death in 2021 in Los Angeles. Despite L.A.’s reputation of year-round sunshine and warm weather, the story cites data showing that hypothermia fatalities have been on the rise in recent years, exceeding the rate in San Francisco and New York City combined. The story also references a report by the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, which tracked deaths of people who were unhoused during the COVID-19 pandemic, and which found that Los Angeles County shelters — while open during cold periods — are not always accessible. “Each time people go through this cycle and are sent back to the streets, they’ve lost social networks and personal belongings, they’ve often had to give up pets or been separated from loved ones, and so they return more vulnerable,” said Roy, director of the Institute.

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Pierce Provides Cost-Effective Options to Ocean Desalination

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Gregory Pierce, co-director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, wrote an article for The Conversation to discuss how desalination may not be the most viable option for creating a more sustainable water supply. In an effort to combat California’s record-setting drought, Gov. Gavin Newsom has announced an $8 billion plan to increase the state’s water supply. The plan includes methods like water conservation, storage, recycling and ocean desalination. Pierce explains how desalination creates more consequences than solutions as it kills aquatic life, pollutes ecosystems with brine and wastewater that can end up in the ocean, and poses a very high cost. He instead suggests conserving water, reusing treated wastewater which is cheaper than desalination, and increasing storage capacity even in places with infrequent rain to capture stormwater. “Even cleaning up polluted local groundwater supplies and purchasing water from nearby agricultural users, although these are costly and politically difficult strategies, may be prudent to consider before ocean desalination,” said Pierce.

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Michael Storper Receives International Geography Prize The prestigious Vautrin Lud Award honors a scholar whose contributions are globally recognized

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By Stan Paul

Michael Storper, distinguished professor of regional and international development in urban planning and director of Global Public Affairs at UCLA Luskin, was selected by an international jury to receive the prestigious 2022 Vautrin Lud International Award for Geography.

Storper traveled to Saint-Dié-des-Vosges in northeastern France to accept the award at an Oct. 2 ceremony, part of the annual three-day International Festival of Geography founded in 1990.

The Vautrin Lud Award is typically given to a person who has made outstanding contributions to the field of geography and has achieved a wide international reputation as an outstanding scholar.

“It is always an honor to be elected by one’s peers around the world,” said Storper, who joins a select group of UCLA Luskin faculty who have earned the accolade. The late Edward Soja received the honor in 2015 and emeritus professor Allen J. Scott won in 2003.

Woman and man holding prize check

Associate Professor Celine Vacchiani-Marcuzzo of the University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne, left, presents the Vautrin Lud Award to Michael Storper. Photo by Andrés Rodríguez-Pose

“Michael Storper’s contributions have been transformative and, in the spirit of urban planning, provide practical guidance on developing metropolitan regions around the globe,” said Chris Tilly, professor and chair of Urban Planning at UCLA Luskin.

Storper, who received his Ph.D. in geography from the University of California, Berkeley, and who has been affiliated with UCLA for four decades, is an international scholar who focuses his research and teaching on the closely linked areas of economic geography, globalization, technology, city regions and economic development.

He holds concurrent appointments in Europe, at the Institute of Political Studies (“Sciences Po”) in Paris, where he is professor of economic sociology and a member of its Center for the Sociology of Organizations; and at the London School of Economics, where he is professor of economic geography.

The Vautrin Lud Prize, created in 1991, rewards the work and research of a single distinguished geographer, identified after consultation with hundreds of researchers around the world. The prize, sometimes referred to as the “Nobel Prize in Geography,” is considered the highest international award in the field.

The annual award is named after the French scholar who was instrumental in naming America for the Florentine navigator Amerigo Vespucci, whose account of landing on the North American continent found its way to the group of Saint-Dié-des-Vosges scholars directed by Lud. In 1507, the group used Vespucci’s accounts to publish one of the earliest geographical treatises regarding the New World.

The honor adds to awards Storper has received for his decades of work and research.

The American Association of Geographers awarded Storper its Distinguished Scholarship Honors for 2017, and he received the 2016 Gold Founder’s Medal from the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers).

Storper, co-author of the 2015 book, “The Rise and Decline of Urban Economies: Lessons from Los Angeles and San Francisco,” was previously named to the Thomson Reuters list of the World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds of 2014. In 2012, he was elected to the British Academy and received the Regional Studies Association’s award for overall achievement as well as the Sir Peter Hall Award in the House of Commons. He also holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands.