Root Wireless and CNET are teaming up to make a crowd-sourced map of cellphone signal quality with data available in Los Angeles and several other cities.
The map displays data collected from an app you can load onto a Blackberry or Android phone, with apps for other phones coming soon. Read Write Web reports:
"The map lets us choose between what type of reported info we would like to see, whether ‘Signal,’ ‘Data’ or ‘Network,’ but there is no device category. We can also see the number of zones reporting ‘No Bars,’ ‘Access Failure’ and ‘Hot Zones’ (such as dropped calls), but no information on how many people have reported these issues."
Some other interesting L.A.-area items around the Web:
Angels Flight boosts business: Eateries at downtown’s Grand Central Market reported a surge in customers who rode the reopened Angels Flight to their stalls. Downtown News reports:
The discovery seems to go both ways. While Grand Central Market has seen more business from the corporate crowd up the hill, those who patronize shops on Broadway are also going in a different direction.
Sand dune rally: Manhattan Beach locals staged a rally protesting the closing of Sand Dune Park. The Daily Breeze reports:
Some who attended the rally wondered whether those who want to see the dune closed permanently — it was shut last summer while the city struggled to find the right balance to operate the park — were exaggerating the extent of the issues.
East L.A. church gets a facelift: The Eastsider LA is reporting that Our Lady of Solitude church is getting painted, but there isn’t enough money yet to fix the bell tower. Here is an excerpt:
It has been [some time] since the tower was demolished and the bells removed, according to some church employees. I myself can’t remember the last time I heard the bells ring. The silent bells, meanwhile, sit down near the sidewalk behind a cage under a sign that reads La Plaza Soledad.
— Anthony Pesce
Have some news for Linking L.A.? Contact Times staff writer Anthony Pesce.