This December another South Bay landmark will go the way of Marineland, Torrance and Vermont Dirve Ins and the infamous Ascot Raceway. El Camino’s Murdock Stadium is scheduled to be demolished. This local stadium opened on Thanksgiving Day in 1949.
The new facility with a price tag of $37.2 mil will be completed by 2014. The project is paid for by your school bond money.
Holly Glen is a somewhat hidden jewel within the city of Hawthorne. Holly Glen is located east of Aviation Blvd. and north of Rosecrans. It has it’s own school district (Wiseburn School District) and is almost a little town all to itself.
There are some beautiful single family homes here, many have been remodeled and renovated in recent years. Property here is highly sought after and few of the original single family homes are ever for sale.
The beautiful new Fusion Town Homes near 149th street, east of Aviation, has several plans available and are formidably priced. The location is just minutes away from the famous South Bay beaches, great shopping, entertainment, employment centers and close to all freeways.
Here are some surprising ways to save energy around your South Bay home:
1 If you place lamps in the corners of your rooms, the walls help to reflect light out into the room.
2 Use a laptop computer instead of a desktop. A laptop uses 1/3 less energy.
3 Dont switch to a plasma flat screen it uses much more energy than an LCD.
4 Put a blanket on your water heater and turn down the temperature a little. A water heater blanket can save anywhere from 4% to almost 10% on the average water heating bill.
5 Using an electric stove? Turn off the burner before your finished cooking as the burner stays hot for awhile after you shut it off.
6 Spin laundry more. Let your washer spin the water out of the laundry, even if you have to spin it twice, it will save energy use in the dryer. Some new washers can cut energy in half by eliminating the time required for the dryer to run.
7 Shut off your refrigerators ice maker and use an ice tray or two. A refrigerator ice maker increases your energy consumption up to 20%. When you use ice trays, there is no increase in energy use or costs.
8 Use your dishwasher, it uses 1/3 of the hot water that you would use if you washed your dishes by hand.
TREE SAFETY
Does the severe weather of the past several years have you looking up at your trees in fear? It’s an understandable concern. A big storm could destroy the plants’ majesty in a flash — and send a quarter-ton branch crashing down onto your roof. Still, before you preemptively chip a favorite tree into mulch, consider this: It may be contributing 8% to 10% to your home’s value, according to Scott Cullen of the Council of Tree and Landscape Appraisers.
Here’s how to keep your leafy assets from becoming a liability.
Schedule regular upkeep
Have your trees inspected every five years or so — a free service offered by tree-care companies. An arborist will look for branches that are weak or hanging within 10 feet of a building, and send workers to remove them.
If necessary, they’ll also buttress the tree against high winds by cabling limbs together. All this work costs about $200 to $400 a tree and is typically needed only once a decade.
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In many cases the tree will more than cover the cost of its maintenance over a few years; a big shade tree will knock nearly $70 off annual air conditioning bills, says David Nowak of the U.S. Forest Service, and a large evergreen that blocks winter winds will reduce heating costs by around $60 a year.
Bonus: Trees also provide protection from road noise and basement flooding.
Get removal right
When a tree becomes diseased or dangerously overgrown given its proximity to a house, your arborist will recommend taking it down.
Removing a substantial tree could cost $2,000 to $5,000, depending on its size and whether it is accessible by truck or requires climbing — and what’s underneath that the crew must protect.
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You can have the stump ground down to just below grass or mulch height for $50 to $200 more. Or carve a trough in the top, drill some drainage holes, and use it as a planter.
Invest in new growth
To replace an unsafe tree or propagate a bare lot, look for varieties that grow quickly and have compact spreads to minimize pruning headaches, says Charlotte, N.C., landscape architect J’Nell Bryson.
A local nursery can suggest good options and plant eight-footers for $250 to $500 each. In about a decade they could add tens of thousands to your property value, probably the best investment return you’ll ever make.
Emotions were running wild when, after traveling almost 125 million miles in space, with 25 completed missions, our now retired shuttle ‘Endeavour’ touched down at LAX for the very last time the last week of September. Endeavour landed at LAX just before 1 p.m. on top of the massive Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.
Before touching down at LAX, thousands of people gathered around Southern California to witness Endeavour as it flew atop the 747 at low altitude over California’s most famous places and landmarks. On October 12th, Endeavor will be towed up to the California Science Center, its final home. The shuttle is expected to go on public display on Oct. 30th.