The Caretaker’s Cookbook
The Caretaker’s Cookbook An Architectural Future of Boyle Heights, Los Angeles, Year 2051 And Accompanying Samples of Experiences and Strategies to Inspire a Thriving Post-Dystopian Community of Your Own
Hailey Algoe & Ania Yee-Boguinskaia Water Futures: A Desert Imaginary Advanced Studio Fall 2021, UTSOA Professor Stephanie Choi
In the legends, they say the River was once green, teeming with life. It cared for us, giving people food, healing, and nourishment. And in turn, we took care of it.
But, as more and more settlers came to the land now known as Los Angeles, they didn’t understand that the River’s floods were life-giving. It washed away the structures they insisted should be permanent. So, they paved over the River’s course, confining its waters, and in turn, they paved over most of the rest of the city, too.
Boyle Heights
Arts District
Through Downtown LA, the River became an agent of division and displacement.
By 2021, the River all but forgotten in the backdrop, developers came to the Arts District and began pushing out the people who had made a home there among the neglected warehouses. Architects built massive projects atop sites that once held communities of artists, and communities of Native peoples in harmony with the River long before them. Proposed Major Development Major Development Under Construction Completed Major Development
2021
Abandoned by Development Company/Landlord
2031
But as society began collapsing in on itself, they were abandoned, one by one.
Climate collapse came to California faster than anyone expected, though in retrospect, we all should have seen the signs. First came the wildfires. Then, we ran out of water. By the dawn of the 2030s, Santa Monica was underwater, and life as we knew it was gone.
As fires and flooding decimated the hills and the coasts, those who could afford to fled north. Those who couldn’t came Downtown, where at least things weren’t underwater or up in flames. But, among the decaying structures and chaos of economic collapse, it was dangerous here, too. Central Valley farmers had slowed their production to a trickle. Food was scarce. Water was scarcer.
Polluted stormwa ter runoff collects across LA
Channelized concrete prevents flooding, but also groundwater inflitration
Impervious surfaces throughout LA prevent groundwater infiltration
Flow to Pacific Ocean
Desalinated water from plants off of the coast was prohibitively expensive. Meanwhile, as occasional torrential rains increased amidst the worsening climate disaster, the water held in the River’s concrete banks was far too polluted to drink. It flowed out to the ocean, as though slipping away between our fingers.
But, the people of my community had an idea. Boyle Heights banded together and began chipping away at the River’s concrete, finding ways to harvest the water through diversion and treatment technologies, but also allowing the floods to return.
Native ripa
rian planting
Floodwaters wash over riverfront land, absorb into soil
Permeable riverbed allows infiltration, replenishes groundwater Water diverted for treatment, community use
Now, with each flood, we can store the water, treat it, and save it for times of drought later. Everything we can’t contain goes back to the soil, enriching it for our own agriculture. We can produce our own food and water now. We have no need for the desalination plants.
In the decades since we first began tearing out the concrete, our community has been resilient in the face of climate collapse and urban decay around us. By utilizing models of collective governance, mutual aid, and environmental caretaking, we have all joined together with our existing skills to create a new heartbeat for our community along the River.
Twin Towers Correctional Facility
Union Pacific Rail Yard Park
Warehouse Produce & Water Collective
Mariachi Plaza
S Utah St. x E 3rd St.
Theodore Roosevelt High School
Wyvernwood
By showing you a few sites in Boyle Heights and the strategies we have used to form a self-sufficient, thriving community of care, I hope that you can utilize some of these tactics to create new societies of your own.
Twin Towers Correctional Facility
450 Bauchet St.
2029
In the earliest days of the chaos Downtown, as societal systems collapsed, there was a great victory. The Twin Towers Correctional Facility had always loomed over us just across the River, incarcerating our community members and forcing cruelty and abuses upon them. The prison was liberated, and we began working towards new models of community justice.
2051
We couldn’t just leave the buildings there, a shadow of so much cruelty and ugliness cast over the new community we were trying to build. So, the structure was dismantled, its materials salvaged to create new structures from the ruins of the old, and a memorial was left in its place: a memorial to all of the victims of police brutality and the prison industrial complex. A memorial to all of the lives that were destroyed by the building which once stood here.
Salvaged Materials for Reuse
1500x stainless steel bunks
0.5 mi metal pipes, plumbing
100x industrial shelving units
2000x intact cinder blocks
Industrial kitchen equipment 10x industrial stove units 15x industrial refrigerators 15x industrial freezers Assorted cooking implements, utensils
100x metal tables
Medical equipment 100x inpatient beds Assorted medical monitoring devices Assorted antibiotics, medications
15x computers
100x interior windows, various sizes
300x iron railing modules, assorted sizes
500x steel doors
3 tons concrete, to be reused in rubble masonry
Industrial laundry equipment, 50 units
Warehouse Produce & Water Collective
340 N Meyers St.
The warehouses lining the banks of the LA River hold tremendous importance in our community: they are the starting point of the water purification process which supplies our whole community with much needed irrigation and potable drinking water. The torrential rains that fall occasionally throughout the year cause the River to surge with polluted stormwater runoff from all over Los Angeles. We divert this excess water using detention ponds and diversion pipes lining the river, purifying it in the warehouses along the banks. Some of the water is then stored in cisterns or used to irrigate agriculture incorporated into the warehouse agricultural and water co-ops, and the rest is distributed to the remainder of Boyle Heights.
The residents of the Boyle Heights Produce and Water Collective are engaged in a cooperative living structure. Several of their warehouses serve as water treatment, which they maintain for the rest of the city. Additionally, agriculture is incorporated both in and on top of the existing warehouse structures. Outside of their water and agricultural caretaking responsibilities, residents inhabit cooperative studio units where they create art in fellowship programs with local organizations.
Drip-irrigated crops Polluted storwater runoff
Detention Pond
LA River Diversion Pipe Permeable riverbed (Encourages groundwater infiltration)
(Diverts floodwater to treatment plant)
(Protects crops from polluted floodwater in periods of extreme rainfall)
Decontamination
Filtration
Water Tower
Sedimentation
Coagulation and flocculation
Drip irrigation pump
Warehouse Program Distribution
Cisterns
Distribution to Boyle Heights (Riverfront warehouses used for water treatment)
(Storage of excess purified floodwater for periods of drought)
Solar-powered water pumping
Floodwater Processing from LA River
Union Pacific Rail Yard Park Food storage and distribution
Shipping container (S.C.) apartments
750 Lamar St. Markets
Outdoor performance space Outdoor movie theater Parking lot
S.C. aquaponic farm
Multipurpose Pavilions Drag racetrack
S.C. bridges
S.C. sound barrier + bleachers
Restored riparian habitat + trail Runoff biofilter
Car + S.C. sculpture and native plant park
Tire sculpture
Tensile structure shaded S.C. food park
Mushroom and algae bioremediation detention ponds
Vehicle-accessible paths Water treatment facility
Water storage tanks
With Los Angeles’ drought-flood cycles growing more extreme due to the increasing effects of climate change, our newly liberated society needed to take immediate action to ensure water security during times of drought. We rehabilitated The Union Pacific Railyard— previously an expansive site polluted by shipping containers, railroad tracks, and contaminated soil— and turned it into a key infrastructural, ecological, and cultural site with caretaking of water as the principal objective. We restored riparian habitat along the riverfront, employed bioremediation techniques, and built detention ponds to store excess water.
Bioremediation Techniques
Mycoremediation Species
Theodore Roosevelt High School
456 S Mathews St.
After the LA Unified School District disbanded in the early years of society’s collapse, we joined together to create the New Boyle Heights School District. The curriculum is based on principles of caretaking across all levels of society, educating kids to carry on the work of maintaining our community for years to come. Here at Roosevelt High School, housing is provided for teachers and their families on campus. Pictured here is a structure of repurposed freight containers.
In addition to a core curriculum, numerous trades are taught across the school in pavilions and outbuildings scattered around campus. Welding, carpentry, construction, childcare, arts, and more are all integrated in strong programs. Pictured here is a geodesic greenhouse from salvaged glass, used to grow produce for student meals and traded with the rest of the community.
School Documents & Artifacts
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RHS 2051 Summer fest
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Produce grown by RHS Agriculture students
Local craft and food vendors Games + fun ...and more! School Commons saturday + sunday August 12-13 10-5
Single Family Housing Block
S Utah St. & E 1st St.
4 repeated models constructed by developers
Impervious cover
Homogenous Color Palette
Car-dominant paths
Fences divide individual properties
The banal, repetitive, and spatially wasteful suburban housing models constructed by developers on S Utah St & E 3rd St were making their residents miserable. There was too much space allotted to cars and not enough for quality community space, farming, and resource collection. Families longed to be able to house multiple generations under one roof to reincorporate traditional means of cohabitation.
Some families in the neighborhood fled the city, which gave residents the opportunity to demolish their houses to create a shared central green space and community garden. The leftover materials, along with those brought from other sites, were reused to build a much more dense and self-sufficient generational community. The demolition of private fences and the maintenance of a shared perimeter fence serves as a symbol of mutual care and protection for the block.
Pedestrian friendly paths
Native plants + xeriscape
Dense,Generational housing Colorful palette Fence only around community Community garden
Pervious cover
Community maker space
Shared linear green space + sculpture garden
Community kitchen + greenhouse
Community recreation center
Community office space
Accessible elevator Collapsible tarp water collector
Greenhouse with water collecting roof
Solar panels
ADUs
Substinence farming
Aquaponics
Integrated balcony space
Water storage tank
Wyvernwood
2901 E Olympic Blvd.
The residents of Wyvernwood. a historic garden apartment complex, have begun creating new structures in addition to adapting their existing buildings to a new, self-sufficient mode of living. “Garden apartments” take on a new definition in various subsistence farming towers constructed from salvaged materials and lumber sourced from trade routes with Northern California.
Community kitchens complete with central barbacoa pits accent the model of cooperative living among the residents of this densified community, its previously open grassy fields now stippled with new structures for the climate refugees arriving in Boyle Heights.
Samples of Adaptive Strategies & Typologies
Mariachi Plaza
1831 E 1st St.
Mariachi Plaza has always been the heart of Boyle Heights. The sounds of mariachis playing, advertising their services for all who might wish to hire them, held fast against the tide of gentrification in the years leading up to society’s collapse. As less and less people could afford cars and gas, we had less need for the parking lots surrounding the plaza, so we converted them into expansions of the public space. One lot became a park with playgrounds and pavilions for hosting quinceñeras, connected to the plaza across 1st street by a series of arches hung with banners of handmade papel picado. Another lot hosts a large market hall for hosting swap meets, another a community garden and orchard... And of course, loncheras and fruit carts carrying food grown and prepared in our own community still line the street. Here, the heart of Boyle Heights beats on for a new generation.
Against all odds, we have managed to build a thriving community here among the wreckage that capitalism and climate change wrought on our world. And now, there are promising signs of other communities across the city doing the same thing. Principles of care have a real chance to build a better society for everyone. I hope that in reading about Boyle Heights, you have drawn some inspiration for techniques you can apply in your neighborhood.
Aquaculture Center Rose Bowl, Pasadena
Golf Course Agriculture Wilson Harding Golf Course, Griffith Park
Cruise Ship Floating City Carnival Cruise Terminal, Long Beach
And through it all, the connecting force is the River. I imagine it one day flowing through all of Los Angeles restored to its former self, providing us with food, water, and healing. Taking care of us— as long as we take care of it in turn.