My heart usually sinks a bit when the plane begins its descent to LAX or Burbank airport, at that moment when a blue sky becomes hazy brown. Sometimes I see a distinct line across the atmosphere, with puffy white clouds in a clear sky above, thick smoky air, and a concrete landscape below.

When I catch sight of the Los Angeles River, my heart sinks again. It’s sad to see at the macro scale what has been done to this great river in the name of progress and flood control. It’s an ugly thing. Seeing it from the air is even scarier than looking at it while standing on a levee. That straight line of concrete, cutting through the San Fernando Valley and down from Griffith Park to Long Beach, looks like one of the many freeways crisscrossing Los Angeles, except that this freeway has water in it.

How do you “restore” a river encased almost completely in concrete, with houses, factories, and golf courses built right up to the levees, allowing no room for the river to move? From this aerial perspective, I find it hard to be optimistic.

Back on the ground, I am able to turn my gloom around quickly. Twenty minutes by car from Burbank Airport, my mood brightens as I walk along the banks of the river in Elysian Valley, past the sycamores and the benches and beautiful stone walls of the pocket parks built by North East Trees. In the background is the ever-present roar of the Golden State Freeway (I-5), but below me, in the river channel, is the sound of water rushing over beautiful cobbles brought down from the San Gabriel Mountains, and the sight of thick stands of vegetation and dabbling ducks.

These pocket parks remind me of not only the possibilities but also the new realities of the Los Angeles River. Beauty and a sense of place are being brought back to the river. People talk of the creation of a Los Angeles River Greenway, to weave the river back into the fabric of the neighboring communities. Sitting on a simple metal bench in the shade of a sycamore, I am once again instilled with a sense of optimism about the future.

I have been working on projects related to the Los Angeles River for most of the last decade, as a project manager with the Coastal Conservancy. Among the coastal watersheds with which the Conservancy is involved, this one is in many ways unique. Most of the watersheds my office deals with are far less damaged, though they are certainly changing rapidly or are threatened by development pressures. Saving what’s left of these natural landscapes is a major focus for the Conservancy and its partners.

In an odd way, it is a bit of a relief to work in the Los Angeles River watershed, where the worst has already happened. After all, how much worse could it get? Although several years ago a state senator proposed that the river be converted into a truck freeway to relieve traffic congestion—which would certainly be worse—the Department of Public Works nixed the idea, reminding everyone that when a storm hits, this concrete channel fills with floodwaters rushing at freeway speeds to the ocean. I feel lucky to be working in a watershed that can only be improved.

An engineer once told me that the channelization of the Los Angeles River is used throughout the world as a model for flood control efforts. Knowing that provides extra incentive for creating another model for urban rivers: one that focuses on restoring natural values.

In spite of all that has been done to this river, it still lives. It is a river. Birds come, willows grow, fish swim. The Los Angeles Times recently reported that it remains very important as a stopover site for birds on the Pacific Flyway; indeed, in sheer numbers of birds the Los Angeles River may rival more intact habitats such as the Bolsa Chica wetlands in Huntington Beach.

The Los Angeles River proves the resiliency of nature. It encourages hope.

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