Griffith Park Blog » LADWP

Fountain of youth in Fern Dell?!

Donna Barstow — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:51:55 +0000

Made a great discovery for my first blog post in the LA Weekly! And I didn’t get any comments, but I got 3 tweets, which was nice.

L.A. mystery: Fountain of Youth natural spring in Griffith Park?

Did Fern Dell residents living along the southern edge of Griffith Park find a Fountain of Youth?

The mystery surfaced in the heat of mid-August, when the nearby American Film Institute (whose headquarters are located near Griffith Park), Immaculate Heart High School and two homeowners found water leaking into inappropriate areas. The Department of Water and Power insists its pipes — recently bursting and creating sinkholes in other parts of L.A. — are not to blame.

Back in 1929. a natural spring was discovered in Fern Dell, and some called it the Fountain of Youth. Here’s the fascinating story:

Local resident Gerry Hans says that in the 1920s, news of a natural spring spread among Angelenos, who dubbed it the “Fern Dell Spa.” He points to Mike Ebert’s book, “Griffith Park, A Centennial History,” which reads:

People were trekking to the southwestern corner of Griffith Park so they could fill jugs and bottles with water. Word had spread that the water from a particular spring at Fern Dell was special…Others attributed health-enhancing qualities to it. There was even some playful talk that it was the fountain of youth.

The Park Department capped the spring and had it piped to Los Feliz Blvd., but neighbors complained that it flooded the street. Later, the Park directed it to spigots, and even in 1967 people were coming for the water.

Nice photo! Of Fern Dell walkways, by chotda.

Go read the whole thing (slightly edited by Jill Stewart) over there.

It started when the all-knowing Bernadette Soter mentioned to me that Fern Dell had some unusual water problems in 2 houses there, and also at AFI and the Immaculate Heart High School. Since both the Park and the city are desperate for water, this was interesting enough. But it got much hotter when Gerry Hans quoted Mike Ebert’s book above! (I really have to get that book. Several people on the PROS committee have quoted things from there, and it’s amazing how TMZ-like some of the stories are!) What if this IS that healthy spa/fountain that bubbled up back then? Wow!

What I didn’t include in the LAW post: they still have that original underground fountain of youth water in 3 spigots at the Ranger Station! It did go bad in the 60′s – they suspect from runoff from lawns, so I don’t know if it’s potable now, as LADWP never got back to me (SURPRISE.)But I will let you know when/if they do. Because I will be the guinea pig and go get some of it if it’s not poisonous.

Or were you looking for one of these?

Now’s your chance to change the world!

The DWP almost ruined my dinner plans.

Donna Barstow — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:26:11 +0000

I hate the annual Christmas Light Festival in Griffith Park. The idea that the cash-poor city of Los Angeles decides that wasting tons of electricity is the best way to celebrate Christmas is almost as obnoxious as the truly knockout fumes from the cars if you get stuck in traffic there. Or the traffic snarls for hours on the 5 going South, as the lineup of cars snakes out of the park every night. For many years I’ve had to avoid going anywhere in the valley for 6 weeks a year, as the traffic jam coming home, sometimes for miles, just isn’t worth it.

Here’s a link to the DWP site, with all the info: http://www.dwplightfestival.com/. Here‘s a PR review of the light festival by LA Splash, which I never heard of before:

If you want to drive, load up with hot cocoa, or spirits for the adults not driving, and patience for the follies of others. Play some holiday songs you can sing along to. There is music along the Festival mile, but the wait coming up Crystal Springs Road from Los Feliz can be as much as a couple of hours…

The surreal stroll with blinking and animated light displays made us giddy and we laughed and sang like silly kids as we pointed and marveled.

Another great photo by Tambako the Jaguar! From Creative Commons. No, not from Griffith Park.

I didn’t feel at all giddy. I was scared. I was supposed to meet my friend for dinner in Toluca Lake on Nov 24, and I decided to take a nice drive through the park, and follow Forest Lawn Drive, rather than take the 5. Note that this is 3 days before Thanksgiving. There’s not supposed to be any light festival before Thanksgiving, let alone Christmas! I didn’t see any blinking sign in front, because there wasn’t any.

It’s not shaded on their website. It’s not a car night. It’s not ANY night, but it has a little star to say it’s Kick Off bike night – in other words, DWP closes down a major back road, through the park, because they feel like showing off the lights early, before the festival has even begun.

So as we got to the point where only bikes were allowed, we were all shunted off into a separate area of the park. I had no idea where I was going. Okay, I figured, other people probably know the park better, and I’ll just follow the line of cars ahead of me. Worked fine for the first half mile.

You have to realize, there aren’t any lights in Griffith Park after dark, except near the Golf Course and the Ranger Stations. Really pitch black. So I followed the backlights in front of me, but within a few minutes, I lost him. And then came to an intersection, in the pitch dark, with no indication which was the right way out or to the Freeway or anything. I noticed another car behind me, who was obviously following ME, and didn’t know anything, either.

The roads go on forever, but fortunately I had taken the right one, and ended up near Travel Town, where it intersects Forest Lawn Drive. Did I make it to my restaurant date on time? Yes, by one minute. No thanks to the gas wasted, and the unexpected detour where you don’t want your car breaking down.

And it will be just like this, but worse, until December 30th. Only 37 days a year for the DWP to take control of your travel plans. Hallelujah.

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This is what a million dollars looks like.

Donna Barstow — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 00:28:30 +0000

This black mass in Silver Lake is millions of bird balls, made with big oil, from Exxon or Mobil. Hundreds of thousands of LA residents will drink this water.

Black bird balls fill Ivanhoe Reservoir; only one corner of clear open water remains, until they get more bags. These are untested HDPE plastic balls, cooking in the sun. They are unrecycled plastic, and 95% of this plastic is never recycled after use, either.

LA dwp filled Ivanhoe Reservoir in Silver Lake with plastic balls which have NOT been tested properly. The LADWP has lied about this. These bird balls will leach in the water for at least 4 years.

These plastic balls cost the city of LA one million dollars.

In the very top of this photo you can see a swimming grebe and 3 seagulls. They only have a few inches of water, but on this hot hot day, they are willing to share. They will soon have not even one inch of water.

Or were you looking for one of these?

Plastic, plastic, everywhere, and not a drop to drink.

Donna Barstow — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 00:37:54 +0000

Ever wonder why water in bottles has an expiration date? It’s the plastic. It does bad things as it dissolves. Heard John and Ken talking about it this afternoon, while discussing emergency earthquake supplies. Not only do you have to keep checking the batteries and canned goods – should you go the nervous ant-like way of even having earthquake supplies – and I’m not saying which way I roll, cause maybe I’m a selfish ant – you gotta keep changing the water, too.

Of course, this doesn’t concern the DWP, or the City of LA, or H. David Nahai, or Mayor V., as proven by the tons of HDPE plastic bird balls they keep dumping in our Ivanhoe Reservoir drinking water. DWP has promised they will only stay in the water for 4 years. Okay, for 5 years, in some reports. Plastic for all!

From treehugger.com. Sad.

I just checked the water I’m drinking now. All my water is bottled, and although I enjoy trying different brands of water, I can taste very very well, and prefer distilled water most of the time. (I can even taste differences in that!) I enjoy Whole Foods 365 Brand in a lot of foods, including their water. My bottle of distilled water – with no minerals, as pure as you can get- has an expiration date of June 9, 2010. (my birthday!) So the bird balls baking in the sun in a reservoir for several hundred thousand people, today and every other day, – which is apparently, SUNNY. Again.- are supposed to last at least 2 years longer than my distilled water bottle?

As I reported here several times, these plastic bird balls have NOT been tested by the only water-approved lab in the country, NSF, for anything besides 17 days in water at a temperature of 73.4 degrees. What does the LA County Health Department have to say about this? We shall find out.

Speaking of plastic, a subject I never get tired of, very happy to see LA has banned plastic bags. Treehugger says:

This new vote by the LA City Council is likely to engender vigorous opposition from the plastic bag industry, represented by the creatively named Save the Plastic Bag Coalition, which has already filed a lawsuit challenging a LA County measure to lower plastic bag use 30% by 2010.

David Lazarus, in the LA Times, wrote such a pathetically ridiculous take on this important environmental issue that I think I may have cackled. Lazarus quotes Eric Gutierrez and Elicia Ortiz, whose environmental expertise and objectivity are not at all influenced by the fact that THEY WORK FOR A PLASTIC BAG FACTORY. Lazarus writes:

[Ortiz says] “I’m a single mom,” she said. “Everyone who is against plastic bags should consider all the people who depend on this for a living.”

That’s certainly one aspect of the issue that merits more attention.

Lazarus probably gives money to the homeless, too. But before I got a chance to write this, lao points out Spouting Off, by the President of Heal the Bay, who beat me to the punch:

The whole piece took the side of the plastic industry, which argues that bags are harmless and that banning them will cost the public money and cause people to lose jobs. There was little mention of impacts to the marine environment, let alone the economic impacts of disposal, recycling and clean-up.

Clearly, the article’s premise is preposterous. Personally, I’m more than a little peeved because I spent a half hour talking to the guy and I shot down every myth he trotted out. No mention of HtB, nor a direct quote from me.

David Lazarus, meet H. David Nahai. I think you guys would hit it off.

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Who lurks in the shadows of the DWP?

Donna Barstow — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 05:17:17 +0000

It’s not just H. David Nahai anymore.

At LA Observed, which I read at least a couple of times daily, Kevin mentions Ron Kaye’s blog, RonKayeaLA.com. (Ron is the former editor of Daily News.) This is generous of him, because Ron totally disses Kevin for a suck-up bio on H. David Nahai that Kevin wrote for the July Los Angeles Magazine. Now, I like Kevin a whole lot, but I have to agree with Ron on this – this is definitely not a well-balanced article. (Maybe because most city magazines are rah-rah?) One point of Kevin’s story reads:

His pro-environment ethic, [Nahai says], “came to me as a result of a lot of reading.” [clip]

For Nahai, turning the agency into one of the environmental good guys is the fun part.

I’m glad he’s having fun. But 6 million plastic balls from new HDPE tossed into Ivanhoe and Elysian Reservoirs, HDPE which is only recycled 15% in this country, because it is so expensive to recycle, is called environmentally good?? How the dwp handled the bromate problem was lazy science; they dunked their own beakers in the water, tested them, and then gave up and ordered tons of plastic. Ugh.

Crow eyes Ivanhoe before the black balls of doom ruin it.

I think Ron is a better writer than I! He is clear and cogent. He writes about Kevin’s article:

…amazingly, the name of the man who actually runs the DWP, Brian D’Arcy, never appears.

D’Arcy is the head of the DWP union, the IBEW, and 95 percent of the utility’s workers take their orders from him, including most of the managers — a source of political cash and campaign workers that he uses ruthlessly to further his members’ interests and buy obedience from those who he helps get elected.

That’s why DWP salaries are so outlandish and rise 5 or 6 percent a year and why little happens at the utility without his approval.

That is especially true of the appointment of Nahai — a man without any experience as a manager or expertise in the field — to the $310,000 a year post. He’s pals with the boss, D’Arcy.

Brian, are you the guy behind the untested bird balls? This may still be Oz, but you are not the wizard I expected to see. Game on.

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You know what’s sad?

Donna Barstow — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 00:11:31 +0000

I actually added a category yesterday called dwp. That’s sad. What does that say about me? Am I the nerdiest geek ever? Must I pay attention to the utility commission now? Only H. David Nahai can save me now. By being the Superman I know he wants to be, and fixing up these egregious problems [...] No related posts.

LA DWP lies about the bird ball tests for Silver Lake.

Donna Barstow — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 11:49:28 +0000

Ivanhoe Reservoir is almost half full of the bird balls of doom now. Not as dramatic as the DWP and cb throwing them around like a game, but dramatic and scary nonetheless.

I notice Marty Adams, “some kind of scientist,” “explained” them in CSSLR the other day. (I started calling him “some kind of scientist” because LaBonge’s office referred to him as that, but as things get more serious to the community, if not to the dwp, I’m going to drop that. He is really an engineer, (or was), and PR person for the LA dwp. He’s also a good friend of LaBonge.)

Click for better view. The white line is the dividing rope between the good and the bad. I love the red T painted on the tree – that might explain the bad trim job on this mature tree, as too often happens by the dwp unskilled tree hackers.

CSSLR titles Marty Adams letter to them: Bird Balls on Ivanhoe Reservoir are Non-Toxic — Questions About Ivanhoe, Bird Ball Safety, and DWP’s Intentions. Marty writes:

Many of you recall correctly that DWP agreed years ago not to cover Ivanhoe Reservoir. Has that changed and are the bird balls permanent? Absolutely not. As has been reiterated over the past few months, the bird balls do not and cannot meet the new federal regulations that are causing DWP to construct a new reservoir at Headworks and take Silver Lake and Ivanhoe out of service…

Some have asked “Why is Silver Lake okay to leave uncovered?” Practically speaking, it is impossible to cover Silver Lake Reservoir… The uncovered Silver Lake can be managed and is okay to use for these peak demands…

Perhaps the greatest misinformation I have recently seen is the notion that the bird balls heat up and release toxic chemicals into the water. This is just simply not true. Granted, there are many different types of plastics and recent news has focused on certain plastics leaching chemicals. The reason DWP is using the bird balls is because they are the ONLY National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) drinking-water-approved product of its kind on the market…

As a matter of fact, other water agencies have contacted DWP out of recognition that this solution could have application for them as well…

The balls are made to survive in a hot, sunlight environment without breaking down, and they are warranted for 10 years – twice the lifetime we are looking for…

Please visit the CSSLR website for his full letter. I’m not going to go into my ideas about the CSSLR right now – and why Mr. Adams writes them personal heartfelt letters – but anyone using them as a media source should think carefully.

Not sure if you can see how lumpy and ugly the balls are. No reflections at night on that side of the reservoir. Also notice the delightful landscaping of carefully placed rocks, (although someone apparently got tired of carrying some of them), our own Silver Lake Stonehenge. Been there for a few months now.

My reply to Marty’s points:

1. He’s right, the bird balls don’t meet federal regulations. And so that’s a good idea to use them for the next 5 years?

2. So Silver Lake has NO bird balls, and it’s still okay! That’s good to know…so why are we producing these tons of plastic again? Why is Ivanhoe so lucky to get them?

3. Marty, Marty, Marty. As I said, you are no longer, “some kind of scientist,” but director of the dwp’s Water Quality and Operations (PR person). We had a good conversation, and you went into a lot of detail. Still, for your opinion on toxic chemicals to hold water?…not going to happen. Yes, you’re right, many plastics leach chemicals, INCLUDING many water bottles, which is why you aren’t supposed to leave them in the sun, Sparklett’s corporate office told me.

4. Ahem. The reason these bird balls are the ONLY NSF approved ones, is because they are the ONLY bird balls in the country! I could not find a single other manufacturer.

5. Just because you jumped off a cliff doesn’t mean the other water agencies should do it, too…but yes, they are looking at this issue, and I know this because so many of them come to my blog.

6. Here’s where the lies come in. I didn’t want to be hasty, so I called Cheryl Luptowski at NSF again, and spoke to her on Monday, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything the first time. The balls have not been tested for 10 years, or 10 months, or for longevity at all. And they are NOT made to survive in a hot sunlight environment; the test they passed is only for 73.4 degrees.

Ridges of bird balls in the water.

I was surprised and delighted that the well-regarded Aquafornia wrote about me, in a comment on Water SISWEB:

This blogger says they have only been tested at about 73 degrees – not hot enough for the temps we get down here.

And as I wrote a month ago:

Even better – NSF tests only the qualities the manufacturer asks them to! Does this astonish anyone else? Also: if the product fails any test, it’s completely confidential, and only the manufacturer knows the results of those tests!

Ken at Orange Products told me it took them 6 to 8 months of trying for NSF to pass them on even these limited terms. I’m sure it cost Orange a hella lot of money. And I feel bad that I’m speaking up about this small company, putting their hearts and soul into all their bouncy balls. And I’m sure they did their best.

But let’s be honest here, dwp; this is our drinking water! Want more proof? Take a look at the actual Press Release that NSF released:

Under NSF/ANSI Standard 61, the vapor control balls are exposed to three different test waters with varying pH levels for seventeen days.[my bold]

Samples of the test waters are then analyzed for a wide variety of contaminants, including metals and organic compounds, to ensure no contaminants were introduced at levels that would be considered a health concern.

I absolutely believe what NSF says; their reputation as a lab is everything. These bird balls are only guaranteed for: 17 days, not 10 years! And note that there is no temperature at all in this release. Because it hasn’t been tested (or failed) at higher or colder temperatures.

It’s the black paint on the balls that keeps the HDPE in the plastic stabilized, so it won’t leach (hopefully.) Someone smarter than I, who knows more about water than I do asked me (Aqua Maven, at Aquafornia!): What happens when the sun bleaches the balls out?

Indeed.

Mr. Adams, you seemed like a pleasant, forthright person when we talked a few weeks ago. I’m going to assume that what you wrote in your letter to the CSSLR was some kind of typo, or perhaps a misunderstanding. Blogs are great this way: if you correct what you wrote about the bird balls, I will immediately change this post to reflect that you corrected this. Let’s all get along.

How to reach the LA DWP to complain about anything you feel like:

(213) 367-1361 No busy signal! Real person answers.
email: joseph.ramallo@DWP.com

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DWP is afraid, very afraid.

Donna Barstow — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:25:10 +0000

I wouldn’t be surprised if the LADWP received threats because of the bird balls in Ivanhoe.

Two days after I blogged about the Corner o’ Rocks (TM) in slk that I thought was a graveyard, a guard started to park his car RIGHT there. For the first time. I had been running there for almost a year, and there had never been a guard there before; they are always at the guardhouse, or on the median, right between the 2 reservoirs. A couple times one of the guards would race along the inside road (you can see just the edge of it in the center of the photo) to get there just as I did. (And I think paranoia is just another way of saying, nothing left to lose. The dwp has already made the situation grave.)

Corner o’ Rocks (TM). The DWP interprets Stonehenge.

As you remember, on June 9, the dwp let it rip, and tried to make a funny game out of dumping literally tons of possibly toxic black bird balls into Ivanhoe. Our jolly Councilman, cb, who never lets a photo op go by without sticking his head in it, also made some jokes, and I slapped the Times on the knuckles for sucking up to the dwp without ONE question or ANY investigative reporting of their own! Talk about naive!

There was a lot of press about the balls, (and many repetitive jokes about the black balls.) Two nights after that I was running along the path that circles slk, around 2 AM. (Don’t ask.) You can see the beginning of the dirt path in the photo; a tall wire fence and barbed wire separates the public from the reservoir. There was no other person on the street for my whole run (as usual). Perhaps 5 cars passed me in that 45 minutes.

All of a sudden one of those police type headlights on the top of trucks that circle around and look down dark alleys was fixated on me. Not from inside the reservoir, but from the street, right alongside me. From a DWP marked truck. And not just one truck. Another truck followed the first one and also lit me up with their spotlight. They drove very slowly past me as I ran, huffing and puffing in my uncomfortable way. As soon as they were past me, they turned the corner, the lights went off, and they drove up to the guard shed on the other side of the lake.

When I staggered to the corner, I called to the guard inside the gate( parked at Corner o’ Rocks (TM), of course). I asked him if he had ever seen the DWP do that before. He said, No.

Then, last week, I saw a huge searchlight had been installed in Ivanhoe. It caught the water at an angle (the section not filled with decaying plastic balls- YET) , as if it was the moon shining across it, or as if it was a huge swimming pool. It was on the whole time I ran. (I wonder how many watts that uses up?)

The next time: The police came up to me as I ran. There was no one else on the street. They shined the car spotlight on me and kept it there for 5 minutes. But what could they arrest me for, not getting my target heartrate up?

What’s next? Catapulting those rocks over the fence at me? Kind of ironic that the dwp is threatening the safety of our water, and yet wants to deflect the attention to possible evil OUTSIDE the gates. But I certainly don’t want to imply that an organization as plodding and antiquated as the dwp could have intended such a sophisticated device as irony, so my apologies for that part.

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