Twenty years after the Arroyo Seco Parkway was closed off to allow civilians to walk, bike and more on the LA freeway, ActiveSGV, a non-profit focused on civic and environmental engagement in the San Gabriel Valley, will spearhead a revival of ArroyoFest 7 a.m to 11 a.m Oct. 29.
According to one of the first organizers of ArroyoFest and Emeritus Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy (UEP) Robert Gottlieb, the main goal of the festival was to increase dialogue about alternative forms of transportation. Gottlieb said the event was a success.
“ArroyoFest was an event that had a practical impact in that it was the power of the imagination,” Gottlieb said. “There were changes in terms of thinking about biking and walking, even the transportation agency started shifting, not enough yet, but they started shifting.”
According to Wesley Reutimann, special programs director for ActiveSGV, the planning for the revival spanned over five years due to COVID-19.
“The event is really focused on inviting residents of the adjacent communities to experience the [Arroyo] Parkway in a different light because they are the ones who live with it on a daily basis,” Reutimann said.
ArroyoFest will highlight environmental issues concerning pollution and conservation while making a space for the whole community to engage with each other.
Izzy Wang (junior) said she works as one of the student coordinators for the upcoming ArroyoFest and became involved with ActiveSGV through the UEP & UEPI Summer Internship Program. According to Wang, the Occidental community is once again supporting ArroyoFest.
“There has been a lot of pulling in from different campus partners. We have the BikeShare group on campus, we have the Sustainable Oxy Citizens Club (SOCC) and Associated Students of Occidental College (ASOC),” Wang said.
According to Gottlieb, the original ArroyoFest took two years of intensive planning, and there was lots of difficulty along the way.
“It was quite a struggle to make it happen,” Gottlieb said. “The California Department of Transportation really dismissed it as something that just was not going to happen and Oxy getting involved really changed that.”
Marcus Renner, former Occidental education outreach coordinator for the Urban Environmental Policy Institute (UEPI), said he worked as another lead organizer for the original ArroyoFest. According to Renner, his work focused on community organizing, fundraising, publicity and logistics for the event.
“It was a little bit of a minor miracle, but we ended up pulling it off, and Occidental was at the center of it,” Renner said. “The headquarters for this event was Occidental, and Occidental was wary at the time, but they stood behind us.”
Renner said that organizing the original ArroyoFest was important because it made people more aware of local history.
“We need to pay attention to our geography. We need to remember our history. We need to honor all the different cultures that have lived here. We took a stand for those things, and it mattered,” Renner said. “It really captured people’s imagination, and so it’s very gratifying that 20 years later, it still resonates with people, people still remember it enough that they want to do it again.”
Renner said the impact of the event stretches beyond a local level.
“I think it speaks to the potential when you open up a space like a freeway for public engagement,” Renner said. “You also open up a social space for creativity and imagination, and then a lot of wonderful things can happen.”
Contact Karen Echeverria at palacioseche@oxy.edu
