L.A. 2013

WHAT’S IT going to be like to live in the year 2013? The people who think about such things, futurists and other visionaries, are working overtime trying to figure it out. As we rush toward the next millennium, predictions of things to come speed at us, faster and faster. From Hollywood’s film makers, the scenes are fantastic, mostly of worlds gone mad or to seed. From government studies and academic research come “projections based on current trends,” presented in softer, dryer voices. Most of the accounts assume that Los Angeles is going to be a smoggy, overcrowded, expensive place to be caught in freeway gridlock on the way to a home besieged by crime.

Certainly, these problems will exist. But, questions remain: How much worse will these urban ills become during the next 25 years? What will routine, day-to-day life be like and how will these problems affect the lives of the citizens of future Los Angeles?

More than 30 experts were interviewed for L.A. 2013, the special report that follows. Many of the studies on the future of Southern California and Los Angeles were also used as sources. The central story--a scenario constructed around a day in the life of a family of four--provides a glimpse into a world made comfortable by technology, yet buffeted by the urban stresses that are becoming only too familiar to everyone who lives here now.

Is the picture too fantastic? Compare today with L.A. in 1963. In the year President Kennedy was assassinated, the population of Los Angeles County was 3,100,258. In just 25 years, it has hit 8,484,500. Back then, there were 3,702,570 vehicles registered in the county; this year there are 5,570,3182. Twenty-five years ago, the tallest building in the city of Los Angeles was the 26-story City Hall; the tallest now is the First Interstate Bank building at 62 stories. L.A. classrooms a quarter century ago were 56% white, 18.6% Latino. Today, they’re 56.9% Latino and 16% white. Crime? In 1963, 200 people were murdered in Los Angeles. Last year 811 homicides were committed in the city.

A time traveller from the early ‘60s to the late ‘80s would be stunned by the technological advances. Just a few items that didn’t exist in 1963: VCRs, personal computers, compact disc players, video games, nine cities in L.A. County, push-button phones, Nautilus exercise machines, hand-held hair dryers and home satellite dishes.

And the cost of living. A family of four spent an average of $28.65 for food each week in 1962 and $132 per month for rent; in 1986 the food bill jumped to $76 and the average monthly rent check was $700. Full-coverage auto insurance for a Pasadena family of four with two cars cost about $200 in 1963. It’s $1,800 now.

With that perspective on the last quarter of a century, step ahead 25 years. Welcome to Los Angeles, April 3, 2013.