I always get this funny feeling when I see oil drilling around Los Angeles.
It’s right in the heart of the bloody city and it seems incongruous. There’s a big operation on Pico Blvd and Cardiff and one right by Beverly Hills High School. I pass a bunch of rigs on the way to and from LAX.
I know nothing about oil drilling but I always think of it as taking place in remote areas. And here in Los Angeles it is all around me and I wonder who’s getting rich from it?
The Los Angeles Times reports:
You don’t need to set foot on the campus of Beverly Hills High School (241 S. Moreno Drive, Beverly Hills; [310] 229-3685, http://www.bhhs.bhusd.org) to see its oil derrick. In fact, you shouldn’t. Instead, park nearby or just drive past to check out the derrick, which is clad in flowery slipcovers that serve as soundproofing. For decades, on-campus operations have included more than a dozen wells. For the year ending June 30, interim Assistant Supt. Mary Anne McCabe said, the wells yielded $550,000 for the district. Lawsuits blaming the wells for illnesses among students have been dismissed.
For two more variations on oil extraction in disguise, head east a few blocks to Pico Boulevard and Cardiff Avenue (we’re in the city of Los Angeles now), where machinery is sheathed by a mysterious beige tower that reaches 10 stories above neighboring storefronts and offices. Or head to nearby Pico and South Genessee Avenue, where another drilling operation is hidden inside an ersatz office building. (Peek into the locked building’s atrium and you realize there’s no roof.) Then head south on the 405 Freeway. In Carson, about 25 miles from Beverly Hills, you’ll see an enormous American flag at an industrial site to the south. That’s the BP Carson refinery (1801 E. Sepulveda Blvd., Carson).
