Despite offering some of the best views in the Los Angeles Basin, the Baldwin Hills have had a tough time earning their due respect.
They've been scalped and terraced, deluged by a burst dam in 1963 and pecked away by hundreds of creaking oil pumps for more than 70 years. High above the urban plain, the terrain now is a mix of eroded ravines, middle-class homes and working oil fields.
But these weedy slopes could be in for a transformation. A group of community activists, conservationists and state legislators is seeking to convert the oil production area and other connected open space--the largest swath of undeveloped land in urban Los Angeles--into a park bigger than Golden Gate Park in San Francisco or Central Park in New York.
They say they already have $32 million in state money to buy 100 acres from private landowners--and are looking to acquire at least 600 more.
"This is rolling," said state Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Culver City), who has written a bill to create a Baldwin Hills Conservancy. "It's not a pie-in-the-sky thing."
The ambitious plans signify a growing shift in the environmental movement toward the creation of urban open space. Many officials say that it is desperately needed in a city with a severe shortage of parks.
The diverse communities surrounding the Baldwin Hills, like much of Los Angeles, have less than one acre of park space per 1,000 people--a fraction of state and national standards.
On Saturday, a coalition of residents, environmentalists and landscape architects discussed plans for the area at a community hall in Culver City.
Their ideas ranged from skateboarding and baseball to weddings and hiking. "How about radio-controlled airplanes?" asked one woman.
The Baldwin Hills are at a cultural nexus between South-Central and the Westside, the Crenshaw district and Inglewood. It is crossed by some of Los Angeles' major inner-city boulevards: Slauson, Jefferson, La Cienega and La Brea.
Murray said it is crucial to have open space to which local youngsters can ride their bikes or take the bus.
"We save finch. We save fish. We save redwoods," Murray told those assembled Saturday. "This is an opportunity to save children."
Murray has been working for several years with a nonprofit group, the Community Conservancy International, to create the Baldwin Hills Park Project around the existing 350-acre Kenneth Hahn state recreation area. In total, the project's supporters hope to weave together 1,200 acres--two square miles--of open space.
