Member-only story
Overpasses Host the Signs of the Times in LA
The next time you find yourself sitting in interminable Los Angeles traffic, look up at the many bridges and overpasses as you inch under them. They tell you the story of the people who live in the places you’re just passing through.
When you’re barely moving for minute upon agonizing minute, you have a lot of time to look around at the other cars, the towering buildings, the beautiful sunsets, the graffiti, and the bright billboards that line the periphery.
Until recently, I spent several hours of my day in rush hour traffic, passing through downtown Los Angeles and the various veins that branch out from it. After I moved to LA a few years ago and my commute changed, I happened to look up at an overpass in South LA to see a handmade sign in white with stark, black capital letters “NO ICE.”
I didn’t understand it at first. I thought maybe it was supposed to be pronounced as a single word, like a heavily affected “NOICE” like saying “NICE” but drawn out to sound like the word “noise.” But more of these signs began cropping up on other overpasses and fenced-in footbridges with more distinction between NO and ICE, and ICE occasionally spelled out as an acronym I.C.E. With a quick Google search at work, I found out what you already knew, that this was about Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
