I first discovered this hunger for wonder and beauty at Barnard College, in the heady spring of 1970. After agonizing through endless meetings on whether and how to shut down the entire university in the wake of the Kent State shootings, I was walking on Amsterdam Avenue in Morningside Heights, not too far from campus, and passed the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. I was a recovering Catholic, yet I found myself drawn inside, almost magnetically. After sitting fully still for a candle-lit hour, I felt my faith in the human capacity to change the world restored, and I felt fully charged to continue with the battles I was fighting. Over the coming months, I would return to St. John the Divine whenever I felt overflowing with frustrations or questions raised by an unsure young woman navigating a men’s world of too-sure activism.

I’ve been fortunate to lead and to work in social movements and grassroots activism for over 50 years, from fighting the Vietnam War and leading HIV and LGBT organizations to pursuing anti-poverty work.

At 65, I’ve developed a number of spiritual practices that help balance my life, such as meditation and occasional quiet retreats, but I still need a regular go-to place that restores my spirit in a deeper way, in an efficient hour or two. Every few years, I feel the need to change venues; it’s not a rational thing, but, rather, I just feel pulled to return over and over again to someplace different.

For a long time, I hiked the Backbone Trail in the Santa Monica Mountains, at the Tapia turnoff on Malibu Canyon road every month. A 50-or-so-minute steep initial incline discourages most hikers, so mostly it would be just me and the dipping hawks once I got up to the top, the misted ocean filling the western horizon, green canyon upon green canyon on the east. Profound silence leading out to infinity. Give me an hour at the top of the world, and I’m ready to return to the crazy work below trying to make it better.

After visiting the then-new Getty Museum in the late 1990s, my pilgrimage route began to bring me there. For me, it doesn’t matter what the exhibits are: It’s the sense of place that calls to me. Whether sunny or clouded over, after that winding drive and tram ride, usually crowded, I love just wandering the gardens and the white stone and marble plaza for a weekend morning hour or so. Although much more crowded than the Santa Monica Mountains, that glorious place is the closest I’ve felt in this country to the magnificence of Athens’ Acropolis: a restorative place of beauty and learning soaring high above daily life.

Last year, after a lifetime of social-change activism on the outside of government, I became “The Man”: top policy deputy for L.A. County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl. It’s a career-capper for me, and it’s unexpectedly thrilling to tackle from this perch what I consider the big issues of the day: economic inequality, environmental sanity, civic engagement, racial justice, criminal justice reform.

Still, I need my regular escape, and it had been some time since my last venue change. But a couple of Fridays ago, I found my new place. The Broad Museum is a profusion of beauty, if you like contemporary art as I do. I love that little-known artists are featured along with those who have become household names. From the outside, the building itself is strange to one not sophisticated in architectural review—that lone stone eye peering out from a ruffled bunker seems solemn and off-putting. But enter the bunker, and climb the stairs or escalator, and suddenly the innards of the edifice open up to reveal views of the storage rooms filled with art on the middle floors—an unexpected glimpse inside that fascinates. And the top floor destination with most of the art is light and bright like the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. You get lost wandering its huge expanse, roaming a room full of Ellsworth Kelly and then Andy Warhol and on and on and on. Usually one sees a collection of mixed modern art: a Rauschenberg next to a Keith Haring, maybe next to a Cindy Sherman. But, here, each artist gets a whole room, or much of one: The sheer magnitude of the collection astonishes. LA has received a great, great gift in this collection, free to the public.

But I found that pure magic restored my very being in a room created by the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, an immersive work titled “The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away.” For 45 seconds, you stand alone in infinity-mirrored darkness, black water below and myriad lights all around—or stars, or souls. I emerged dazzled and speechless, and somehow filled with wonder and hope for the world.

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Architect Thom Mayne cautioned against the hype. The notion of “downtown,” he said “is already a misnomer” for Los Angeles, a county of many different cities and over 10 million people. “‘Downtown’ as a word connotes a singular,” said Mayne, pointing to what the word means in cities like Kansas City, Cleveland, and Chicago. But in L.A., downtown is just one of a number of downtowns.

Los Angeles Times arts & entertainment editor Laurie Ochoa disagreed with Mayne. Yes, L.A. has a lot of neighborhoods and tribes; she recalled that when the L.A. Weekly’s offices moved from Hollywood to Culver City, her colleagues “were tearing their hair out” over the identity crisis of becoming Westsiders. “To me, it’s one city,” she said. L.A. is united by its theaters, its restaurants, its people. And downtown has long been a cultural hub, she said—before there was Disney Hall, there was the Music Center.

Mayne recalled that for a long time, he lived in Venice and never went downtown. Crossing the 405 was like getting through the DMZ in Korea.

Ochoa again disagreed: Downtown’s not “suddenly interesting,” she said. “It’s always been interesting.” For a long time, only a certain kind of person lived downtown.

Now, downtown is a destination for all sorts of people. New York Times national correspondent Jennifer Medina, the evening’s moderator, asked the panelists for their definition of success for downtown.

UCLA urban planner Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris said that success is having people live, work, and play downtown—transforming it into a place with life on the weekends and after work hours. Great cities have great downtowns, she said—and symbolically, downtown is the heart of Los Angeles, which is why its success is so meaningful.

Downtown is just one of the hearts of L.A., countered Mayne. “I think it can be absolutely successful without being dominant.”

Who exactly are the people living and playing downtown? Medina asked restaurateur Bill Chait, who owns business across the city, if he notices a difference between customers at his downtown restaurants versus his Westside restaurants.

His downtown audience is “incredibly eclectic,” said Chait—they’re younger and more urban and mobile. Chait grew up on the Westside, and recalled that he resisted opening restaurants downtown for years. It was a strictly daytime environment, he said; there wasn’t enough of a residential population to sustain a restaurant. In 2009, however, he opened up Rivera near the new L.A. Live complex, and other restaurants followed.

Over the past five years, downtown has become a center for people across the eastern part of Los Angeles, said Chait.

Yet for all its architectural glory, noted Mayne, there was not a soul on foot on Grand Avenue at 7 p.m.

Loukaitou-Sideris said that architecture remains a hurdle for downtown. There’s been an emphasis on creating architectural masterpieces, but not on what’s happening on the street; the buildings and streets “don’t talk to one another” or link to one another, she said.

One of Medina’s favorite places downtown is Grand Central Market—which also epitomizes downtown’s current transition. At Grand Central, she said, you can pay $6 for a latte—or $6 for a dinner, including a beer. How can downtown deal with the tension between preservation and creation?

Chait said that a lot of downtown development is going in the right direction because more people and builders are reclaiming rather than knocking down and rebuilding.

The challenge also lies in preserving downtown’s social diversity, said Loukaitou-Sideris—making sure it doesn’t turn into another Westside.

However, Mayne said that changing the perception of downtown has to start on the upper end. If wealthy people come into the area, everyone else will follow. Building low-income housing is the last thing you do—not the starting point, he said.

Ochoa disagreed, championing the expensive coffee and $2 gorditas at Grand Central Market, and the skateboarders at the Caltrans building Mayne designed on Main Street. “I think you need the flow” between high and low, she said.

Chait said that downtown’s evolution is being driven by renters rather than by super-wealthy buyers. You’re never going to gentrify all of downtown, he said. The challenge is to create housing for the people who already live there instead of relocating them.

At what point, asked Medina, will downtown start attracting people over age 45?

It already is, said Chait—at least to eat. On a Saturday night at his restaurant Bestia in the Arts District, there’s a moment when you’ll see people from the Westside: right before dark.

Does this all mean the balance of political power is going to shift?

Yes, said the panelists, pointing to Los Angeles City Councilman Jose Huizar, who represents downtown and has a great deal of clout, particularly when it comes to urban planning.

In the question-and-answer session, an audience member asked the panel what can be done to make downtown feel safer.

Loukaitou-Sideris said that vibrant, more populated streets mean fewer opportunities for crime. She did a study of bus stops around L.A. and found that the 10 most dangerous stops were downtown—and they were often just a few feet from stops on the same line with no crime. An open storefront adjacent to the stop versus an empty lot made all the difference.

Another audience member asked the panelists to weigh in on downtown’s Grand Park. It feels “kind of one-dimensional,” she said. Is it going to be a truly great, central public space?

It’s not finished yet, said Ochoa, who was echoed by Loukaitou-Sideris.

“Give it a few years,” said Loukaitou-Sideris. It’s still quite sterile, but people—rather than design and planning—may change it.

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A year later, I moved downtown–to the Pegasus Apartments on Flower Street and Wilshire Boulevard–and started working for the Downtown Center Business Improvement District. It was my dream job: focusing on bringing businesses and residents to downtown. And I was so excited to live there, even though there wasn’t a grocery store downtown until Ralphs Fresh Fare opened in July 2007.

I’ve always loved cities. I think my love of urbanism is genetic, a trait that my father, who lives in Taipei, passed down to me. (He also named me after the school in Utah where he was getting his Ph.D. when I was born–Brigham Young University–though we’re not Mormon!)

I grew up in Monterey Park, so downtown L.A. was practically in my backyard. On a school field trip to Little Tokyo in seventh grade, I had my friend take a picture of me with the downtown skyline in the background. I just loved skyscrapers. When I was a student at UC Berkeley, I went to San Francisco every chance I got. In 2003, I took a trip to New York City that cemented my love for all things urban. I knew I wanted to live somewhere with that energy and vibrant city life.

The revitalization of New York City is an example of “urban done right”–and how a city can be an amazing place to live, work, and play. A decade ago, the future of downtown L.A. seemed so unknown. We wanted it to become a center where Angelenos could gather, shop, play, work, and live. But most people couldn’t have imagined the downtown that exists today.

A great example, and one of the most memorable projects I worked on with the Downtown Center Business Improvement District, is L.A. Live, the sports and entertainment district completed in 2007. The spot where it now stands was once a huge, lifeless surface parking lot across from Staples Center. Now it’s an amazing piece of the downtown puzzle: a place where people go to see music or sports, to eat, to go bowling, or to watch a movie.

In the years that I’ve been working and living downtown, there has been so much revitalization, from Grand Park to Grand Central Market. The next big projects I am excited about are the Bloc and the Broadway Trade Center, which are both game changers for in their respective downtown neighborhoods, bringing new retail, restaurants, and jobs back to the center of Los Angeles. I think people were tired of living in the suburbs and being stuck in in their cars in traffic. I also think Angelenos were tired of people in other cities picking on L.A. as not being a “real city” but a huge sprawling suburban wasteland.

We still have problems downtown, including homelessness. It is inhumane for people to live the way they do on our streets, especially on Skid Row. Downtown L.A. is full of homeless people with serious mental health issues and the situation cannot continue indefinitely. The city of L.A has started looking at this issue and finally taking it more head-on with the proposal of hiring a “homeless czar.” My view is that we need to decentralize Skid Row by not concentrating all of the homeless facilities into one small area; this is a problem for all of L.A. County to address, not just downtown.

If urban revitalization can happen in downtown L.A., it can happen almost anywhere. We have faced and overcome tremendous challenges. Downtown L.A. was completely forgotten, but now Angelenos are coming back to the city. Downtown is in fierce competition for people and money with so many other smaller centers in the city, yet it continues to grow and become more vibrant. It really proves the old cliché: “If you build it they will come!”

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All that sounds great for the occasional shoppers and diners who visit downtown and for its growing young, urban professional population. But what about the rest of L.A.? In advance of the Zócalo/UCLA event “Will Downtown L.A. Rival the Westside?”, we asked people who study, work, and live downtown the following question: How will downtown L.A.’s emergence change life in Southern California?

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Many of the Huntington’s images were first produced to promote Southern California as a place to visit and settle. Tourists purchased images mounted on cards as souvenirs for friends back home. Taken with a camera that had two lenses positioned eye-distance apart, some photos allowed for 3-D views when seen through a special stereoscope. Stereographs were a popular form of entertainment in American parlors from the 1860s through the 1900s.

The landscapes depicted in these photos have been “utterly transformed,” said Jennifer Watts, curator of photographs at the Huntington. “In these photographs, you can see the template that was built upon. They’re sedimentary looks at the evolution of a city.”

The photographs came from Ernest Marquez, a collector whose family owned the Rancho Boca de Santa Monica, a 6,000-acre expanse that included present-day Rustic and Santa Monica canyons, Pacific Palisades, and portions of the city of Santa Monica. Unable to find evidence of his ancestors in the written record of Santa Monica, Marquez began searching for photographic evidence, Watts said. He visited antique fairs, antiquarian book shows, paper shows, and flea markets and, over 50 years, amassed a photo collection of early Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Santa Barbara, San Diego, and Orange County.

Marquez was a sharp, methodical curator, Watts said. His collection features many views of the same place and vantage point, taken over several decades. The collection, for instance, has several photographs looking north from 9th Street at the intersection of Spring and Main streets in downtown Los Angeles. In 1875, there is only a modest building in a wide expanse of dirt crisscrossed by wagon wheel tracks. By 1906, the trappings of a city have sprung up—stores packed next to each other, street lights, curbs, and a street sign marking “S. Spring.” In 1926, an aerial view features tall buildings, parallel-parked automobiles, Pacific Electric Red Car streetcars, billboards for beer and Coca-Cola—a hive of industry eclipsing the placid mountains in the far background. And while you may or may not see the ghosts of L.A. past at that very same intersection today, these photos give you the sense that in two or three more decades the view will be entirely different.

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But so far there’s been little but delay, squabble, and more delay. Here’s a quick rundown of the key developments: In 2007, the developer of the project, Related Cos., put forward the first architectural vision for the project, drawn up by star architect Frank Gehry. Then the economy went into free-fall. The plan got shelved, the project got delayed, and the Gehry plans eventually got tossed. This year, Related put forward a new set of plans, drawn up by the architecture firm Gensler. But that didn’t fly, either. The Grand Avenue Authority, a three-person governing panel of county and city representatives, voted down the Gensler plan. Critics said it lacked enticing public space, failed to promote pedestrian and street activity, and perpetuated what L.A. County Supervisor Gloria Molina called “the fort-like conditions down Grand Avenue.” So now Related is going back to the drawing board—once again, with Frank Gehry.

So what should they do? We went to four people with experience in urban development and planning and asked: What would you advise for developing Grand Avenue and Parcel Q—which is supposed to combine hotels rooms, condos, apartments, restaurants, and retail space—to bring more life and public space to this area?

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