Noticed how environmental issues have really pervaded mainstream media now? From the latest issues of mags I read:

>> Los Angeles: Answering the question “What is the one challenge the mayor should take on in his second term,” many local leaders ask for sustainable transportation solutions:

– President of Community Arts Resources Aaron Paley wants to close Wilshire and other big roads on Sundays to create miles and miles of car-free zones. “We need solutions that go beyond the zero-sum game of wider streets, syncronized lights, and left-turn signals. Let’s create projects that allow the city to be knitted together in a new and novel way.”

– USC Professor of History William Deverell wants a “redesign of our love affair with the car” … “to embrace new (and even plenty of old) ideas about transit and transport,”

– Author D.J. Waldie says “Public transit and the city’s inevitable development are a tangle of related problems. Shouldn’t untangling some of them be the mayor’s job in the next four years?”

- Julie A. Su, litigation director at Asian Pacific American Legal Center, says “the mayor should combine his commitment to low-wage workers with a bold transportation plan, including buses, rail, and taxi.”

Also on a green note, Treepeople president Andy Lipkis wants a focus on water, creating smart green infrastructure “that engages nature and nature-based technologies on every parcel of land to capture, cleanse, and store rainwater.” Earlier: How to get free water

>> Travel + Leisure: Did you know Hotel Bel-Air serves a mocktail called Garden of Eden, made with organic honey, cucumber, and lime juice? Or that Anadaz West Hollywood’s guest freebies include pencils made from recycled CD cases?

>> The Atlantic: The best sushi chefs care about sustainable seafood, and the war in Congo’s making an ecoystem collapse.

>> Body + Soul: This mag’s all green all year, but a blurb about the New York Botanical Gardens’ The Edible Garden event caught my eye. Starting June 27, the summer-long event will show you to grow heirloom veggies, teach you cooking tips from eco-chefs, or just let you stare at tomato porn (a.k.a. Victor Schrager’s photographs). Book a flight plus offsets or visit virtually.

>> The New Yorker: Ironworkers in the Big Apple are into green building.

Photo of Wilshire Blvd., closed to traffic for a few hours on April 22, 2008 for an Earth Day celebration

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