Jordan Downs Residents Building, Creating Their Future (watch video) 

Jordan Downs residents, Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles (HACLA) staff, Master Planning Consultants, Jordan Downs Advisory Committee Members and other stakeholders gathered at the Jordan Downs Recreation center on April 18 for the second community meeting to review the master planning progress.

After a brief overview from the consultant team, the residents broke into groups to “build their communities” in a model building capacity game. Each group of 4-6 people came up with different plans and ideas as to how they would like the new urban village to look.  The eight groups presented their models to the attendees.  Residents’ plans while varied, included similar elements for the mixed-use, mixed-income redevelopment of Jordan Downs and the adjacent areas. Their models included a track & football field, at least 1 park, community garden and at least 1800 homes. Home models varied from townhomes, stacked flats apartments to low-rise and mid-high rise apartments. Some chose to add a new elementary school on the ground, retail use areas, multiple parks and community services areas.  A few of the groups chose to rename their new community as well.

HALCA President & CEO Rudolf C. Montiel was pleased to see the active participation of the residents and hear their ideas on the redevelopment. He thanked the community for their input and noted “You are building, creating your future.  And for that we are very thankful for your efforts.  We ask you to continue working with us.   And know that your community Advisory Committee keeps working on your behalf to come up with best plans for Jordan Downs.  The team will be in Atlanta at the beginning of next month so that we continue to see the best that this country has to offer and bring it here to Los Angeles.  Again, thank you for all your efforts."

Children also had a chance to play architect for a day, having fun building their community as they had their own floor plan model to work with.