244: Evan Lovett - LA in a Minute Interview

You know why the freeways drive through those are big big elements of the city. Yeah, yeah with the freeways and after mark here or what they

Plant all right. Okay. Good question. I know but this is what happens as soon as this goes on

I know you panic. Well, I'm good at goal for it. Yeah, then as soon as we think that's why we get

We start with good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. You're listening to the all talk up on cast

Special episode everyone as we're going to seem out to Vegas

But no one knows that we're doing our first interview in LA none other in studio city

Yeah, we're in the right place

We've got the unofficial ambassador of LA if you want to know anything about LA

We're got mr. Evan love it here from LA in a minute, mate. Thank you for joining us and coming on our little show from Australia

Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm very intrigued and dare I say excited. This is gonna be a fun time

Thanks for having me too as well because I've got to say up until two three

We had a Vegas every year for Seema and we need to do interviews there. We're quick. It's a car podcast

We're car nuts and we'd always fly in

LAX yeah clear customs go to the rental counter get the car and drive just head out

And because we've already done universal. We've already done Disneyland. We've already done the sign

We've already done a day. I drive and we've been a Santa Monica and thought fuck. We've seen it all

Let's get out of here right right and then I at least I bumped into your podcast a couple years back

Yeah, and I'm like man. This guy is my guy like it's not just LA downtown universal

Yes, 150 neighborhoods. There's

572

LA

I used to I grew up I met my wife actually while I was doing trivia at a bar out in a neighborhood called Porter Ranch

So I not all lose focus. Yeah, absolutely lost focus. I'm and you know what I've never gone to a trivia night since

Yeah, but I used to be a big trivia buff. I just always loved tidbits facts little nuggets of information

I was always the guy even the days before texts, you know now

I'm still I'll text somebody if I just find something interesting

But I used to I just couldn't wait to tell people they'd call me an information

Station one of my bosses actually used to call me an information station. He said you just love getting information

And then kind of like trafficking it out to other people. I don't know it's something that's always kind of excited me like is the modern Google

I know he's a

Google

What do you call the other thing the psychopedias

It's like a drill volume, but you know all into one walking one try I mean, but you know older age

I this fax don't stick as well as they did at one point, but 570 neighborhoods

I mean if you went through and named something

Struggling but I mean you're LA born and bred. I mean obviously you love this place. Absolutely

How can you I call it the greatest city on the globe?

Sydney the greatest country in the world

You know what I reckon Sydney's a good-looking city

It is Sydney's like a good-looking girl with no brains where LA is like

Sydney

That's why you love Cindy because there's always a fight between Sydney and Melbourne

Yeah, yeah because Melbourne's like the arty creatives and sport where Sydney's like we've got the bridge

We've got the opera house come and see it. Have you ever been to Australia? Yeah

We're officially invited. Yeah. Yeah, you're gonna come

Don't you know I could compare it to my brother-in-law lived there for a year when he was younger

So now he's married and he has a kid. They just went back last year. Oh, I loved it and what's funny is my nephew

Who's now 13?

Talks about he wants to move there and he wants

Yeah, they loved it. They love it. You should do a special Sydney in a minute. That'd be sweet

I mean what that is one of the greatest places in the world. Yeah, I mean that would work

That'd be like I said you know I travel I know you guys love Vegas mention Vegas go to Vegas

I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I've always considered Vegas LA's backyard. Yeah, because they have kind of a parallel

Growth as and development and both of them were actually very unlikely

Metropolis is the way that they develop but more importantly

everybody in LA if you grew up in LA you took road trips to Vegas like I mean it's and

My dad was a boxing manager prize-fighting and he used to manage fighters

So a lot of the fights Vegas was a fight capital world

So when I was growing up we were going back and forth to Vegas like every month

And so I saw Vegas develop from basically just the strip and also down into like yeah

And the 80s into the 90s back of the station wagon and then the you know my dad had a 300 Nissan 300 ZX

Yeah, and he had a he used to actually be ironically be a car guy

He had a 50 Chevy. I forget what kind he had a

Old Jeep. He had old Mercedes. I wish I had an MG my dad was six foot five

I don't know if that is the meters, but he's a tall guy

And so he had an MG that he had to get customized where they took the seat out essentially because he's too big

You know, I don't know if you guys remember the old MG

It's like I guess a mini now, but he was too big for it

So you had to get a customer, but he was a car guy, but we'd always go in his 300 ZX

On what was called pair blossom highway and

There were billboards along the highway that said be careful. This is death trap highway

Yeah, because there were big hills now. There's different ways to go. There's a freeway called the 15

Yeah, but that was like the shortcut and it's big hills, but you know driving at Valley people like to what was that through death?

No, no, they call dinner zero out elevation six thousand feet Mojave though

Yeah, so so similar and you know what you're kind of on the outskirts. So yeah, you can say that

But he used to open it up hundred plus miles an hour and that's how people would go

But a lot of accidents they call it death trap highway, but Vegas is LA's backyard and I love it

And I don't even know why I brought that why why I'm saying LA and Sydney were doing city comparisons

Right. What's I said earlier Sydney versus Melbourne that that robbery has a lake on a rival city. It's so funny

So there's um, I don't know much you guys watch American sports

But whenever an LA team in American sports is good the other teams crowds always chant beat LA

Beat LA and LA doesn't do that to any other cities

But San Francisco New York Boston specifically to name three are the ones that probably consider LA arrival

But we're always like, you know, the LA atmosphere the LA vibe and part of it is because we're also

Self-centered, you know a little bit of that's true

But we don't consider the other city our quote-unquote rival in the sense that LA is so unique

And it has everything and we don't have any of that jealousy or envy

San Francisco's a beautiful wonderful world city, but their weather sucks for ten months a year

You know, so it's like there's a little bit of that envy. New York is a great global

World metropolis, but again their weather sucks and you don't have the nature unless you're like leaving town and all this kind of stuff

So there there's a lot of weaknesses their concrete jungle all that kind of stuff. Nothing's like LA

But what I was gonna say is a lot of people in LA are from other

Absolutely, if I'm from New York

Piss on New York when I'm living in LA

Enjoying the fruits of LA. Yeah, as well as thinking about home or where I used to grow up

So, you know, wait, it's hard to put shit on other cities when you're really it

What do you call it transient? What do you call transplants and LA is the city of transplants in 1920

81% of the residents of Los Angeles were from somewhere else today. It's still 51%

So still more transplants than natives in Los Angeles. So when you see somebody that's like a third-generation

Los Angeles resident, you're like, wow that your family's been here forever, even though it's only like 50 years

So it's a relatively new city, but

You know, it's now it's entrenched globally and just just a great dynamic. The ones that have been here three generations

Do you consider them the ones that have done well?

Because in Sydney, you know, I don't know about your generation my generation think if you've been here for three generations in the same city

You must be you've either done well or yes fucked it all up

At the whole place. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like you've done well

You've taken your family to great sorry heights or you've got to the stage and then you just go like just down the wood spiral

It's a funny question. Both of those can apply and there's a look see

I think that's a thing and then at some point like

For a lot of people it's where would you rather be and I don't want to keep coming back to the weather because it's so cliche and so

Obvious, but the truth is and this is yesterday. I was driving. I was in Malibu yesterday of all places

Very very high profile cliche, but obviously the beach is one most famous coastline

You guys know beaches as well as anybody, but Malibu's were now at least in LA. Oh, we only know one Bondi

So it's not just the beaches in Malibu it's that you're also on the Santa Monica Mountains

So right behind the beach you have these cliffs you have these bluffs

You have these mountains that lead to these beautiful

Canyons and the canyons take you into the valleys which take you back into the mountains with snow and they always say in LA

You can snow and you can surf in the same day and that keeps a lot of people here

And everything in between of course, but people that love LA love LA, but you know, so so it's it's a great

It's a great place and the first thing you know

So you know bring it to cars when you fly over LA the planes always come in the same way

Yeah, and the first feature you see are the freeways the vein. I caught the veins of LA

Yeah, that's it. Well said the blood going up and down the red lights

It's the way and you see the arteries is what

Yeah, and it's like you just everything is fucking three times bigger. Remember what my question was last time

Word and you said to me best save it for today. What were they an afterthought here?

Yeah

Because to me it looks like they were an afterthought. Yeah, so we're gonna have up through in Australia

We're gonna our what is it? What do you call camera our the capital?

Capital nation's capital of camera. Everything was planned down to a T again

Because Sydney Melbourne were fighting who's gonna be the capital and so they picked a city in the middle

Close to the city and it's been designed since 1927. Yeah, and everything's designed with big roundabouts

You guys don't have roundabouts. Oh and I see them up confused and we're confused. They're very few

We're all stopping

Well, you go

And then you see someone up you got it. Well, it's not your turn. Why are you going then then you got to go

He goes to go and then there's an argument, but you told me to be you told me to go me

So this is the absolute truth by the way different stages so the designer for tramway

So if it reached a certain population, yeah, the roads are wide enough to put in a tram line or so it's been designed

From a hundred years ago, even the lake is fake

That's the biggest like man-made like in the southern hemisphere like Billy Griffin. Is it really? Yeah, that's impressive

But but I'll touch the camera in a minute. Yeah, so I'll tell you this is LA you guys a great question

So first and foremost LA's

Mass transit is improving, but it's something of a laughing stock, okay?

Like first it has been it's it's improving now the subways the metro the buses

But it's because she LA's geographically so vast

But the thing that people don't realize is LA was actually the mass transit capital of the world until the 1920s

1930s and if you've seen the movie who framed Roger Rabbit

It all kind of came falling apart

It wasn't because of the car companies and the tire companies and Goodyear and Ford and all that stuff which

Did have a part in it because obviously they had skin in the game

And you know they wanted their investments to work out

But LA was based around mass transit in the train and we have more miles of tracks more

Railroad depots more stations than New York does today

You see these old maps in the 1920s and 30s. You're like LA was a rail town

But what happened is once people got behind the wheel of cars and because cars were manufactured here

Tires were manufactured here and became the industry and you had the drive-thru restaurants

You had the car hops you had the freedom and the autonomy to drive

People loved it man and nothing against mass transit

But when you can get behind the wheel of your own car and your own timeline and sure traffic sucks

And there could be accidents and you know sometime frustrating

I got to get gas and pay for insurance

But there's nothing like having that autonomy. You must have a car manufacturing company because it's really pushing cars

What you're saying you're saying those are like we had

We had Holden and Ford which is GM. Yeah, yeah, and we had Ford and what you're saying

Yeah, is how they advertise it to Australians because remember we we we got more

Picnic points if you want to call it like

Recreational parks. Oh, wow

The same thing yeah, you're like and that's how the way you just said it

You had to go around the floor throw the family in the back of the car and you know

Advertising and think about what I just said even before this question in the sense that when you if you want to go see

Mount Whitney if you want to go to

San Diego if you want to go to Vegas like sure you can get your plane ticket

You can get your train ticket you could take a bus

But you can also hop in the car pack a bag and hop in the car and because LA is so

Geographically first of all it has all these things in the city and in the huge geographic area

But it's so close to all that the Grand Canyon Santa Barbara

All within not just a road trip, but a pretty quick drive

So people LA people embraced the car and the real ways and the real roads and the electric cars all got phased out

And then they had to play on the freeways then they had the bright idea they copied

Germany I believe was the first country with like a real like

Infrastructure for freeways, but they suck and correct and they saw that you know that that gives you the freedom and the ability to travel and

There's a company called. I don't know if it's a company or an organization really called triple a automobile club

It's like an army. Yeah. Yeah, so they really like we're pushing the narrative, you know

Go explore go travel people are getting more disposable income society was a little bit to break down

So they go and get fix them so they get paid. Well, none of that. Yeah, but they still have roadmaps and

Restaurants and that common points of interest and all that and it's so fun to travel like that. Yeah

Have you just noted like are you okay? I've got trackers and all my stuff at home and yeah, and I threw some in my bags

Yeah sitting on the well, I do a lot of things on the tour course, right?

Yeah, last last night. I start my app

You know if you look at this from up there, this looks more tree and green very green

If you go to Australia Sydney and all that, you know, it looks like we must cut down a lot more trees than you did

Because it does

Yeah, yeah, we'll use look greener

Than us and we're any what over a hundred plus years old. Yeah, no, it's 200 years old

But if you look at it it LA looks greener

It's it's so this is a great observation because LA is actually

Maligned for its lack of parks, right? And there's Griffith Park and there's some big parks

What's ET Park called technically, but there's some big parks, but LA

Doesn't have a lot of green space, but to your point it has trees

Everywhere of all the I mean for the 32 Olympics, they planted 75,000 palm trees

That's a lot of palm trees live longer still everywhere in the city whether you're in Compton

Silmar bellflower

Woodland Hills

I always say you can walk outside right now and you could see a palm tree somewhere and it's not just the palm trees

There are a lot of people, you know from John Muir on down a lot of environmentalist trees Pilates

But there was also we came through a neighborhood last night ways took us from the airport through to go to the 10

Yeah, and

There was like pine trees was enabled with trees in the middle of study there

I first I started with the palm trees and I went so then they'd be green black. I think we don't make it looks or something

I don't know what he's called. We don't know so Oaks are native to LA to the LA area

There's a community called Encino, which which means oak, but anyway, but Oaks are native, but there's everything sycamores

Willows

Deodar trees, but here's the funny one redwoods you guys know what redwoods are the giant redwood

There's even redwoods in LA because here's the thing LA is not just a city for transplant people, but ideas

Cultures foods plants everything can thrive in LA which is funny where when it was first developed

It was just this blank tablet and like let's see if this works and it's some of the most fertile ground in the world

LA used to be the agricultural capital of the United States which is so funny to think about we used to be the cattle capital of the

United States Los Angeles County, which is crazy thing that it's gone through all these evolutions, but it's cutting because

It's just a fertile place where ideas thrive people thrive plants thrive and look there's some crazy and there's some

Bad ideas and you know things that happen

But the trees every neighborhood has has greenery and just a variety of the different

Trees and plants and this is a reason why I love driving and why the autonomy of having a car

Is because you could go neighborhood to neighborhood and they're all different and they all have their qualities

And they all have just things to look at people look at food to eat

So so it's incredible. Yeah, we notice and then going back on the tourism thing

I mean they started building interstates and route 66. I mean everyone knows route 66. And where does that finish Santa Monica?

Santa Monica absolutely and still today right you go to the pier and that's that's where you last night

Yeah, where are you really? Oh, man?

And as we were leaving all the guests were turning up for Halloween parties. They're supposed to I was just gonna say

I got off a call this morning where somebody was like, I'm so tired. I was at the Santa Monica pier for some costume slash concert

Something like that. I had a great place. How was Santa Monica?

It was nice. We've got 10 o'clock last night and then we've arrived along sunset. We walk too much

Yeah, because you want to park on the street

Parking is

I'm on the phone. I gotta look this parking in goes our

So we get out of the car. I know we're gonna go further it goes, but we passed the pier bloody 10 blocks back

Yeah, but you were talking to your wife about business. Yeah. Yeah. That's why you drive all the walk all the way back

I didn't hear and I love you or miss you

It was only 24 hours over there

But yeah, no in the freeways they've got their own characters. Oh the

Yeah

So we came to studio city to along the 101

Why like

We don't call it the paramount of road like why have they got their eyes?

That's funny

So this the freeways used to be named after their their destination. They didn't have numbers so it was like

You know, San Diego freeway, Santa Monica freeway

Ventura freeway

And then they tried to codify everything

Nationally right under like eisenhower with the freeway plan

And they wanted numbers so it was just easier for people didn't know the destination

so like the uh, golden state freeway became the five the ventura freeway the 101 and

in the translation of people some people called the

Ventura freeway some people call it the 101 it just

The vernacular was adopted where where you it's it's the because it's not i'm driving ventura freeway

I'm driving 101 like the ventura freeway. So the place name took the prominence and you don't speak

I mean at least in la

You know, that's just the way that it was like adopted where you say the and it's definitely like an la california thing

Ours are numbered just like theirs are but

We don't call it the Liverpool freeway. It hasn't got a name. It's not like a character

But

Yeah, but how would you name it to the destination at the end of the day, but just say you're gonna get off of that

You're getting off it. Um, whatever some some of the parameter rides are saying and then you know, it's funny now

They name stretch is a freeway after people, you know, there's barack obama memorial. I'm not reagan

But so now some freeways have three different

I don't know. You just say that it's kind of a sponsor with the litter

It's a sponsor a mile for the pick up the litter. Okay. Yeah

Yeah, which is cool. It's how they keep the freeways

But but back to your question because I didn't answer it

So the freeways were sort of mapped out after the old railroad and the railway lines

And technically both of those were mapped out over indigenous trade routes la it's like a big and so do you guys right?

I remember learning about the aborigines

Growing up, which is a big I don't know why they taught us that which I'm glad they did

Yeah, I don't know which is weird because our education system's a little spotty little spotty over here

So I don't know why I learned about that

But um, there's a big indigenous culture

And look the natives figure out the best trade routes those turned into to the roads turned into the railroad lines

And those turned into the freeways

But you mentioned that it's mapped out somewhat haphazardly

This is an interesting fact of all the freeways in la

And there's over 500 miles of freeways just in la which is a lot of miles

It is a big city, but that's a lot of freeway miles

That's less than 20 of the amount of freeways that were initially planned to be built

This was supposed to be like a it is a freeway city

But I mean imagine five times as many freeway miles

But because the city developed so fast they'd use what's called eminent domain if you guys heard that concept

So where the government pays you your value for your land or your home

And then they're going to take it and it's kind of like it's not a negotiation

You know what I mean? They tell you what it's worth. They tell you when they're going to take so that caused a lot of

Problems and displacement. We have this like problem. So they couldn't you know, they won certain fights

That's where the freeways went. They didn't win others

That's where the freeways stopped and there are certain freeways like the 7 10

I don't know did you I think you guys might have mentioned the 7 10

But the 7 10 was supposed to run from long beach to pasadena

But it stops in south pasadena because just for whatever reason the politics of the time

Those homeowners won that fight and the freeway just stops

But then they end up building other freeways around it wherever they find rights of way or land

So it is a little bit haphazard, but I love it because it enables you to

To see all the different things in the city and truthfully when I'm driving

I love seeing the different neighborhoods. We have our natural features. There's mountains everywhere

Like you said the trees the greenery, but

You get a little haphazard a little confusing because a lot of times you're taking six different freeways to go like 12 miles

So so kind of funny kind of interesting and the merge is a flaw. It's almost like a tense story of

It's almost like layer by layer. It's crazy. There's only one place. It's crazy. I was uh, houston

Where that's almost like a roller coaster ramp you go up and

I I have not been to houston my wife's scared of heights

But I hear that houston is the only major city in the united states

That is geographically that as as vast as los angeles and the freeways are the other comparison

They do they're more circular. Yeah, because I mean houston's like in the middle where la is on the coast

Yeah, so a lot of their freeways are ring roads

Yeah, but they've got instead of having the cruiser of the crisscrosses here. They sort of go up

Like the um interchange at lax, you know when they go sort of go up and they're left and right

It looks like a roller coaster heading up. Look, there's one the 105 freeway near el sagundo near lax

So this might be the exact one you're talking about

I used to have to commute every day from valley village

Which is san fernando valley to el sagundo, which is near lax and that

Interchange at the one of from the 405 freeway, which is the main artery in la if you ask me to the 105

um

Is so steep and also narrow and i'm not i'm not exactly afraid of heights

But this is the land of earthquakes

Uh, and so every single time I was on there. I was like, man, you never wonder

But I was like, please let me let me get off this interchange. Yeah, so but they they can be a little bit scary, man

But the the huge ones I can't speak to going back to what you said about unfinished freeways

We've got a similar problem in sydney. They built them 30 40 50 years ago, but land prices are so expensive

We're now tunnel and like I know we don't have earthquakes like la

I I reckon we're the best city in the world to tunnel for built on sandstone on sandstone

Really so a lot of our freeways are connected. Does it make it easier?

Hold on. What why is that better to to build because they can't quite the land up above

No, but why is sandstone make it easier to tunnel?

It's easy to drill through and it's a strong but it's it's you could drill, but it's strong. That is interesting

Okay, but but they've got problems on the m6. They're tunneling. It's sand based. It's near the coast

And I told the cutting corners of the depth that you want to go to these which were

One of the sinkholes the ones they're building through bride. Oh, oh, yeah, I heard that too

So they're meant to do tests and go a bit deeper. Yeah, but they're cutting corners

Everything's subcontracted man and a sinkhole got developments delayed at three years and now they're not sure what to do

Um, yeah, there's there's big right now. Yeah, they stopped it

So there's big issues in LA again with the mass transit with the freeways traffic if you build it

They used to think, you know, more lanes equals less traffic

But they found that expanding the freeways somehow leads to more traffic more people want to drive

So that's why this mass transit debate is huge because you can't keep building freeways

But we had talked about double decker freeways, which they have in san francisco

We had talked about tunnels, but again the homeowners now have so much, uh

Power if you will because money equals power your resistance everywhere

So they're focusing on the mass transit, but tunnels was a big big issue and and uh, uh, it'd be scary

I don't think you can use that earthquakes, but I know it'd be

Imagine being in a tunnel. I mean, they've got the metro. That's what my wife says, but yeah, I don't I don't love it, man

I don't love it. Obviously you just haven't seen, uh, sharkano, whatever it is

Sharknado, sharkano, whatever, when the sharks get in the tunnels, you know

I'll be scared. You know, that's not a documentary. Yeah, sure. Yeah, it's not a documentary. I'm still scared

A lot of our roads are heavily told. Yeah, but I noticed the tollways here is based on, um

The peak hour like they'll call express lanes express like all the freeways are free literally

But there's certain lanes where you wouldn't come that way from the airport where during peak

It's like four or five bucks and you've got almost like a guarantee all our freeways are told

So they're not freeways

They changed them to motorways

$100 over a hundred dollars. Well, I've spent 60 bucks, which is about 40 one way

Going somewhere. I like I do a lot of driving during the day. Yeah

It rolls around a hundred dollars. You guys. Yeah, you guys. You have to be kidding me to go how far I

Yeah

From yeah, well from where we are peakers to say paramata. Yeah, it depends on which freeway you take

Yeah, it's like 45 dollars

How is that possible because you go through the new tunnel different tunnel?

No, I okay. Let me rephrase that. How do they expect people to

They're gonna use cap limits. Yeah, you can do 60 dollars a week

Yeah, it's a private registered vehicle. So if your business registers, they suck you

But you know what our freeways. Yeah, I think we should have like a lot of no

They should do it here if you stop on a freeway. Yeah, if it's peak you shouldn't have to pay

Like if there's traffic, yeah

But if you come to a dead stop, you shouldn't have to pay and and everyone. Oh, how can they work that way?

Well in the eat and do you just have eat tags? Yeah, they've got tags there. Yeah

Okay in those tags, obviously you can make them say if they don't have motion

After you go for a toll they register. Yeah, it's not that difficult. We can fly man to the moon, apparently

You know what I mean? There's we could do things. Yeah, that should be

I'd love that to happen. Did you think about this last night in the in the think box? No, I'm just no, I'm just

Definitely, um, that's a good point. No because the reason why I'm bringing this up

I went picked up a car from paramount. A customer's car from a car yard. They have a car yard zero

Yeah, and big ones

I drove back to work, but one of the freeways was blocked off. Yeah

So we took another route which is like four different freeways. Yeah across the tunnel. Yeah

And on the way back there was one straight freeway, which only had to say two tolls

Okay, the customer who had the car on his statement wants to know did we take his car for a joyride?

Because there's 40

48 dollars in tolls one way and only I think it said 15 dollars coming back

So the dealership I got I got sent email saying oh, we're gonna take this off the price of your thing

But why did this happen? But I I still can't wrap my head around the fact that you're paying 45 dollars to drive

The cross city tunnel. There's one tunnel that goes under downtown. Yeah, and that's uh, eight dollars. I think we went up

Yeah, so let's take 10 bucks

Seven us but you got to be another freeway to get to that anyway, but you're gonna pay to get to that. That's crazy. Are they beautiful?

I mean beautiful

The tunnels man, they built a ground. Where's the money going? It's a government. Oh, no, they're privatized

They're privatized. We're in Australia. We're great. We're building things. We built things. They're they're privatized

No, okay. Yeah, they are. How is that? Is that good? No. No, we're paying

Like the the harbour bridge was supposed to be for free. Yeah

But what they do the contract says with these private companies is

You can't close surrounding roads to funnel traffic in you're meant to have alternate routes

Yeah, but then they make them into one lanes to the three

So they bottleneck the roads up

Yeah, so they're still forcing you to go. Yeah

Are they trying to discourage people to drive? Is that ultimately the

Oh, they're building metros, spending a lot of money on metros, but wow

We're building a new airport like that over here. Really? The metro might be ready for another year

What do you guys hold on? What do you guys think of lax?

It works

Confusing? Yeah, but then again, I'm coming off from being trying to sleep all night

But you seem to know exactly where to go. I mean we come here. I come here twice a year once a year, right?

No one cares about what you bring into the country. We're in Australia. Yeah

Getting your passport stamps easy. Yeah, but getting your luggage through the customs

Like if you've got seeds like because we're an island nation. Yeah anything that comes in is going to kill our livestock and

So we're here. I think it's like no one really cares about protecting and this trip. Yeah

It was the first time we met someone who you could joke with. Yeah customs. I said to my wife

You're not allowed to joke and he's got us paranoid too. Like paranoid heart and then all of a sudden

He's talking to someone. We're back at the line. Yeah

And I'm stuck call him to prove I can't walk over now

Walk over and this guy's cracking jokes about backgrounds greek and he saw our names

He goes you're greek and he had obviously had two shirts off because his name was really long

Yeah, and we started laughing at customs. I think I felt bad laughing because everyone's like

Told him that my dad had that he goes your name short and it's Ronas. It was margarona's

Okay. Oh, yeah, because my dad opened his first shop because it was narrow. He couldn't fit his name on the sideboard

That's the joke and he started laughing. We're carrying on. I'm like, oh

And then what else if you look the other already gloves ready the first time ever you met the one guy

So coming to the states

Customs is hard. Um

Passport controls hard. Yeah picking up luggage and getting out because that's

When sitting you're waiting for your luggage because you clear the passport

Straight away

Yeah, and if they sit next to you don't pat them

That is funny. So the passport is a tough one. Yeah, but lex has uh, it is very uh

Polarizing as well because uh, it was never meant to be a a major airport as it is one busiest airports in the world too

But uh, they're doing a huge renovation because the olympics are coming. Yeah, that's for the monorail

Yeah, you saw that

Because they're gonna put all the car endals you want to be building now finally. Yeah, that'll make sense

Yeah, the lot a lot of improvements needed there, but but they're working out. They're working. So you were saying they're building a new airport

Yeah, it's a western sydney badgerie crew. Yeah, but no metro

They've got a freeway going there. No, no metro. Are we ready?

Year after year the building stages the modeling based on la

Um, they've got stage one and each stage when it opens up the amount of people then they've got to create

More things so they've got stage one, but they've got no fuel there. They've got to

Truck the fuel in smart right because the pipeline was going to cost two billion

Wow to wow the petrol from curnel

I think I'm gonna take that 200 trucks a day. I'm gonna go to the airport forever for stage one then once it gets to stage three

Yeah, man, it's all bullshit

It's gonna be like a backshed. Well, I'm glad to know it's not just the us because Australia has this great reputation

right as at least here is a

Gleaming example of what what the first world can should be. Yeah, you know how we're talking about piping, you know piping for fuel in

Sydney there was uh

What do you call it a fuel depot massive fuel depot on the refinery on the heart not on the heart

Yeah, yeah, and when they got knocked down eventually and they're ripping out of the pipes out

There was a a house that this guy at some stage must have ran a pipe from his backyard

To the oil to the refinery

Yeah

They only found it when everything was getting knocked down

So could you imagine how much fuel this guy's got siphon?

Was he running a taxi company? I was gonna say was he selling should be selling that

Like imagine the middle of the night, you know back

80 years ago run a pipe through to your house, you know for

That's pretty ingenious though. I'll tell you something interesting about la speaking of fuel

Do you know la used to be the oil capital of the world as well?

1930 la was producing 25 of the world's oil

This is those to this day the largest urban oil field right under los angeles

They pump oil inglewood oil field

Los yanniga

They're pictures of long beach of venice. Did you guys end up going to venice by the way in any attorneys to los angeles?

Venice boardwalk crazy place fun place famous place. That's why you have earthquakes

But they sucked everything out of the ground. I wonder honestly. I don't know that that's why but I do

Should puff it up with that food pipe afterwards, you know that expand the foam suck the world out

Expand it with expand the foam. Well, you know what they did so long beach was sinking

When they were pumping so much so much oil and then they didn't know what to do because long beach is a great city in its

Home right and they were wondering what they were going to do because it's sinking and this 1930s 1940s

Somebody had the idea to pump sea water

In to replace the oil that they're pumped and they didn't know if it was going to work

But but it works they felt but la was okay. And to this day. There's still a hundred thousand

barrels of oil pumped per day in los angeles

So oil even though gas prices are higher here in los in california anywhere in the united states

LA is still one of the major oil and fuel sources

But but politics are coming into play. They want to shut down the drill and all this kind of stuff

And what's funny because of our regulations here in california

Even though we pump all the oil we have to ship it out to get it treated properly and refine

Even though we have refineries here in the Chevrolet refineries

But they're for different types of fuel and other types

We pull out gas out of the country. Yeah, we send it away and then buy it back. Yes

Like what's going on there? Someone's making money. Who owns the oil refinery here and like if it's on your land

Do you own the oil underneath?

Wow, I can't I do not

In Australia you own

Oh own so much of your dirt underneath the crown. That's why we can dig tunnels

But in overseas china, I think it is or wherever. Yeah, you don't they own the dirt all the way down. You know, you don't know anything

Sydney's on a coal belt

So we've got coal mines in newcastle. It's about 200 kilometers north of Sydney and 100 kilometers south is woollenung

It's coal and the belt sort of goes under

Under sydney safe. They wanted to mine coal under city. They could yeah, we're sitting on it

But coal's like a swear word. No, what's coal anymore? It's not environmentally friendly. What's our um

What do you think called around the world?

What's that?

Too much thinking

What's that ultraviolet light? What's it called? UV?

Yeah, so it destroys our UV and you burn coal. So we'll keep it for ourselves then

Yes

No, well, it's even we've got that much gas. Yeah, and now we're trying to every new house it gets built

Yeah, you're not allowed to put gas appliances in there. Yeah, we're banning gas gas connections

How's that because california is going to start that too? What are the what are these? What's going on? I like it

No, that's not what's going on. That's bullshit. Wait. So wait. Is that already implemented in australia? Yeah, what do people say about it?

Bullshit. That's what they're saying

Because people there's a little bit of an outcry in california, but again, it's almost one of those things where there was an outcry and then people like

Yeah, that's right. You have your say and that's you'd like the

Stop I have to pay tolls if you stop. Yeah, you know, you say

I'll tell you something that like uh with this, um

What's it called environmentally friendly? Look, we all care about the environment, obviously

But the push for electric vehicles is a little bit, um

Halting you guys can probably speak on this. I mean, I'm not like pro anti-tessa. I don't care about any of that

But what I wonder is they're like, oh, it's so much better for the environment

But all I hear about is how the mining for lithium and all this stuff for the batteries is so destructive

And then you can't even dispose of all the batteries all and then I'm always wondering well all the people charging

Now you need chargers and a charging station and then you're still using energy and all this

So I'm like ultimately is this better for the environment or is it worse for I don't

I mean, it's a it's a debate. Yeah, you can be foreign against and bring up your points versus my points

And both of you are winners and losers like in anything that we move forward

He doesn't like anything new

Okay, because you're just talking about fuel and all of that. Yeah. Yeah, it's just like, um, how

The what's the other technology got now tiota hydrogen hydrogen

La is big on that you're putting a bomb in the car this now if you go back

100 years or whatever you're putting petrol in the carnival all the same the same thing

It's just revolution. It's just it's going around. You know what I mean the same negativity. But it's just like remember when uh gas

When they started putting, uh

Gas cylinders full of gas in the car. Yeah, did you ever do that here? Oh LPG. LPG. Taxi used to run LPG

I mean, oh, thanks because we had a lot of gas. Okay, we had a lot of gas so we gave it away

We actually put gas cylinders in the back of cars and you can run on gas. Yeah, and it was like

10% yeah, it was 10% of the price of fuel. Yeah, and then all of a sudden you worked it out. Oh, it'll take

You know two years to pay that off. I'm gonna go gas

But now gas is the same price as petrol and then and they're stopping and no one does it

Yeah, that's always wins. Yeah, but with EVs

It's a world refinery supply and demand at the moment governments are putting money and rebates and that

But supply and demand wins at the end of the day. Of course. Of course. I had a tesla and I got rid of it

I loved it. We just started with a self driving Tesla's last week. Oh, yeah in melbourne. They just started and

I don't know. We don't know how they got it. They showed a video in melbourne. They got a thing called a hook turn

Yeah, so they got trams. Yeah, and if you're gonna turn

Say you're left. Yeah, so when you're gonna cross the other road

You go say it's stupid. It's say you're turning left here to keep the american

Skip your mind you go to the right side of the road

And block the intersection and when the lights go red you then turn left stupid. Why that's called a hook turn

Because if you were turning left in the middle of the road the tram will hit you

Yeah, so there's trams in the middle of the road

And our city side is don't like melbourne tesla tesla couldn't figure that out. Well, have you guys heard of wemo?

Yeah, okay, so there's wemo's in in many parts of the city now

Oh, yeah, so it's a it's a self driving taxi if you will

Nice or their jaguar jaguar manufacturers them

And I was a little leery of it until I rode in one and then I was like, you know what this could be

Because everybody takes uber I I am a big fan of like uber and the rideshare and all this kind of stuff

But you never know what kind of driver you're getting

Sometimes they want to go their own route some to you know, like if your wife's riding alone uber it gets a little questionable

I wouldn't send my kid in a fucking uber

But the wemo's they're self driving. I was wondering about the technology

But man, look and there's flaws because you see some of these stories where they'll stop

They'll put bins around them and they yeah, and there's certain way

But I was like, you know, I was pretty impressed at least in my ride again

Did you see yourself at any stage? No, did you grab the handles and no it was comfortable and to be on it?

This was crazy because I was not expecting this. I was like, I feel safer than a human driver

I just I don't know when I was in there

It just it feels like it's like following the laws and the rules of the road

And it's not necessarily like a defensive driver in a bad way, but there are no risks, you know

Like so I just felt like if anything happens, it's going to be because the

Did you notice what how you're trying to trick it? I'm trying to

I'll say the funny thing is the human element

Yeah, this is what's trying to stuff it up. It's a machine. No, no, but I'm just saying it's the human element that's trying to trick it

Yeah, we're joking. These in front of it or we we we've got a wise section where they haven't actually or a hook turn fixed it properly

And you know what it's the human element. We fuck it up. Yeah. I know the car's driving fine

Yeah, because we worry. I was in LA

Six months ago to get married just stuff it all up

We're in a day of drive and a waymo pulled up

Yeah, a lady got out and we stopped her and said how is it and one of my mates asked

Did you feel safe in it? Yeah, she didn't get the question. She goes

Yeah, there's no one in here that to touch me like and she walked away

I mean like no, no, no the driving aspect, you know, which but that's a big deal. I don't know if that happens with you guys

But the but for famous uber uber does not want to talk about it. It's a big story is like the sexual

So

We have it. But yeah, so but that's funny. That's where her mind went. That's where her mind went on the safety

Yeah, that's where her mind on safety. There you go valid answer

Question was

Yeah, she fell kick gloves on no, but we were having dinner last night at in downtown

Yeah, and there was a waymo part for 20 minutes just sitting there and he goes

I want to see it leave and it

But I didn't call it a lot. It did just wake up and leave. Did it really have you been having a break?

Have you guys seen those self-driving that self-driving but the little food delivery?

Yeah, that's funny. That's fucking cool. Have you and you know to speak of the human element

I was with my son and we saw one we're like what happens if you

You know walk in front of it or like it gets so nervous and then we shut one down one just like

Stopped and I'm sure they're programmed, you know, like but it just shut down. I was like, I don't know. Did we break?

I mean, I think this great say fuck off. No, and I was it went it shut down

And I was like, is it programmed like when humans start to

What was this because my noodles were cold that night?

Those but it was it was crazy. But yeah, it's the human element like you were saying always

Hey, there is terrific ideas. Everything's a great idea. Yeah, but it's the human element that usually fucks it off

Yeah, it's a good point. It's a good point. Well, Evan mate. Thank you for your time. Thank you for having us in your studio

Tuesday, this is great. This is awesome

Um, just but remember come to Sydney, Australia. I want to and and I'll try and remember how many freeways

We've got and and everything as much knowledge as you know about LA. We could be the researchers for Sydney in a minute

Let me ask you this. Is Sydney a good place for an anniversary trip?

What anniversary 20th significant? No, it's wedding

Wedding anniversary

No, but I'm saying we're planning our anniversary trip now. We don't have a destination

Stay in a hotel in the city. You will tell you where to stay. Yeah

You'll kill it. Our dollar is shit. Yeah, so we won Aussie dollars 65 us cents

So if you you're you're gonna look at the price of your winter is our summer, right?

It's our anniversaries in january. Yeah. Yeah come for christmas. Yeah. Yeah, man. We'll have a great

You will enjoy it. Yeah money guys a lot longer. You're bringing your little one with you bring what your son? No, no

Not for the anniversary trip. No, okay. So you don't have to worry about like, you know, luna parks and

And we're a jumper on the plane because I didn't and I'm frozen like I'm getting

Are you used to play now? How long is the play?

14 going there 12 back coming back into the rotation of the earth. Yeah, we went to dubai

That was a rough one. Uh, I've been to china. That was a terrible. I mean china was great

If you've done those flights, okay, but stay in the city and like in downtown

If just asking we want a room overlooking the harbour. Yeah, just a ring

Yeah, you want you want to do some place you want to look at the bridge the opera house. Yeah, you know if it's anniversary

Yeah, yeah, you want those things and the food's great, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, but but

Food's good. Yeah, not as the food's better here. The food's awesome here. Well, LA. Come on

Our food is not as big. Yeah, but it's where we're there. Can you tell me what is australian cuisine?

Is there like an australian?

Like you want the do you have meat pies? Okay, we've got a gift for you. Oh, dude

Okay, so we brought you a gift. Whoa, they're called tim tams

Whoa, all right. What is this? So

They're like dessert cookie wafer kind of situation biscuit. You guys. That's right. You guys call them biscuits. There you go

So, thank you. You want to try ozzie biscuits? Yeah, that's that's a gift for you and not the one for glory

Absolutely. So we've got mad chocolate

Uh meat pies you can make have you ever had a meat pie? Yes, and I love meat pies

And they're there's something called chicken pot pie here, which I know is different

And I've but I've had me pies and they're fucking I just discovered

In the top 10 best pies in australia. Yeah, I was at a race. We've raced a race car

And we're talking about pies in the middle of the bush and someone bring up this pie shop at botany. Was it a mascot?

Roseberry roseberry. Yeah, so I went there of course as I got back and I'll be gone every single day

Okay, and I get to know the people in every shop. I go there. Yes. Yeah, and these are

Fucking sensational. Okay. That's the pie father

Pie father. It's made up like the godfather. You know, it's actually called the pie father. Okay, and they and I'm plugging them

That's all right. That's all right. I gotta remember every shop I go into I overkill it

We'll send them the link I go and kill it kill it kill it to the point where if I don't go for a week and I come

The business is down

I'll tell you they're pies. I said they've got lasagna pies, uh

All these and they see they're so you're speaking my language. Yeah, that's what we do a lot of hybrid stuff

We do not have that. We do hybrid stuff. So you can go to an asian fusion place. Yeah. Yeah, so it's Italian and uh

Chinese. Yeah, so you've got fusion restaurants in australia too. That's what I want to try. I'm gonna tell my wife today

I want to leave you guys with a fact though before I leave because you mentioned Beverly Hills and rodeo drive

Race car race all this kind of stuff

Beverly Hills was actually founded the reason Beverly Hills became Beverly Hills

Was because of the Beverly Hills Speedway the early

Uh auto racing industry one of the most prominent tracks in the united states and in the world was the Beverly Hills Speedway

Which was the equivalent to three quarters of the size of Beverly Hills today

And it wasn't the Beverly Hills hotel. It wasn't rodeo drive. Beverly Hills was uh, it was uh, uh, lima bean farms, uh

Not arugula alfalfa all it was agriculture because LA was agriculture

But they built this speedway because they had this land and you know it's controversial

Oh, you can't tear down the farms, but they built the speedway well racing got big and popular

And it drew tourists from all over LA southern california the west coast

And it was the most popular speedway in the united states for a while

And that's what initially brought people into Beverly Hills and the Beverly Hills hotel

Which is now legendary and beautiful and you know all this kind of polo lounge all this kind of stuff

Well, that was just like an out of the way stop

But people started staying there and then the Beverly Hills hotel started building up

Then uh, mary pickford and douglas fairbanks built their house pick fair

And then Beverly Hills became Beverly Hills, but it was because of the Beverly Hills speedway and auto racing

Which is the furthest thing from the minds of of when you're in Beverly Hills now

But that's the reason why Beverly Hills first became

Yeah, and that's why because I I mean long beach gone pretty that's any that's any

Race I know of in LA. Yeah, and they've tried to do nascar in in coliseum, haven't they?

I want yes, they didn't my son's big into f1 now

And he wants somehow because they did vegas they do vegas on the f1

And he's like is there any way that they could bring f1 to la and I was like

But that's what we said about sydney

Yeah, we thought they'll set up because we lost

F1 used to be in adelaide. Yeah, and then it's in melbourne melbourne the bastards

See we hate melbourne and we thought at one such I can lose a contract was going to come to sydney

And they're going to race over the harbour bridge. I want to race over the harbour bridge

It'll never happen. They can't they can't close that bridge down

And that's but you would think the thing that blew my mind was vegas because how can you close down the strip?

They were like, there's no way they closed the fountain. No, but they reopened it during the day

No, not all of it

No, the main strip is open during the day and that that's why they race at two in the morning in vegas at midnight

Because they shut it down. Is that yeah, it's open during the day

And if you look where the stands where I remember last year the fountains empty the belagio fountain

There's a stand stands in there and there's hold on that races at two in the morning

It's at midnight 11 o'clock midnight vegas time. I don't know if it aligns with europe for

Incredible. No, I know it's a night because I see it and it's saturday race because it's sunday in europe

So they do line it up for tv. Listen with the money prior to the conversation

You got enough money you can make if they want to you got the resources you can make during the day

They open the road and then at night they shut it down

Okay, and if we go like we're there for two weeks before the grand prix the tracks set up the lighting

And then they put a the the sphere the way they do it like a helmet and like that sphere's another

I haven't been inside this. Ah

I was gonna see you too. They want to see f1 f1

Yeah, f1 because we got knocked once we don't mention enough f1 stuff

I mentioned f1 for two years before you get media passes. So we keep saying f1 every episode

And we mention our best sponsor mr. Licka mr. Licka because he sponsors me with cartons of uh cruisers

Shout out mr. Licka. So we'll get mr. Licka bring champagne

So for your anniversary

You're gonna reach out to us. We're gonna tell you where to go to stay

We're gonna tell you where to go to eat. Yeah, and you tell me what you want to eat and where to go to romance

I'll figure that one out. Yeah, so no no so um

And in in in the tradition and in the tradition of la in a minute if you've got one thing to do

auto

Accentury type thing in la. Where would you go? Well?

I'm telling you right now and people are gonna give me

people are like

I don't want to be in traffic, but driving around los angeles get on the freeway

Drive any direction and get off at any exit because you there you are going to be in a neighborhood

There's so many neighborhoods and they are all unique and they all have

Like great places to eat great people and get out and just explore any neighborhood because driving around la

Whether it's honestly, but you know where to go go over the sixth street bridge

Which is our new big infrastructure project takes you from Boyle Heights to downtown

It's a beautiful bridge and coming into downtown los angeles from the side that most people don't see

Is gorgeous and it's a piece of infrastructure. It's going to be here for centuries and it's the pride of los angeles

Both going on the same side of the car

So happy to meet you and and and I think if you're going to come down under one two now

I'm gonna um, we'll hook you up and we'll catch up again and

We'll point you in the right direction

Have to get your wife to try some of those and then all of a sudden you're booking your tickets

Don't get the little one to try because you'll want to come

so

Hey

Raiders review us. Yes five stars. Send us your questions and all talk at outlook.com.au

And bye for now. Bye. Bye guys. Thank you

244: Evan Lovett - LA in a Minute Interview

Nissan 300 ZX

Chevrolet Malibus

BMW M6

hydrogen technology

LPG

EVs

self-driving

hook turn

Tesla

Waymo

Jaguar

Beverly Hills Speedway

NASCAR

Formula 1

F1

About this episode

Original notes