Really?! Leave Van Nuys (ban nice) alone!

it's not all bad

There are some nice parts of bad towns and bad parts of nice ones. I agree that Van Nuys should be “made better” – and by that making the traffic flow better, improving public transit, inverting some of the miles and miles of either ugly apartment buildings and turning parking lots inside out, to have the buildings come up closer to the street, with wide sidewalks to windowshop and mingle and bump into each other.

http://la.curbed.com/archives/2009/06/neighborhood_wants_out_of_van_nuys.php