Phil’s new red ride

Angelenos complain about traffic like urbanites back east complain about the weather. But with apologies to Mark Twain, we’ve found at least one Los Angeles resident with a novel way to actually do something about it.

Phil Hess is a New York transplant who’s lived and worked in L.A. for nearly two decades. For years, the Hancock Park lawyer navigated the city streets as conventionally as the rest of us – comfortably gliding around town encased in his Lexus, but increasingly sweating traffic that seemed to grow exponentially worse by the day.

Today, however, Hess has largely ditched the cushy sedan for a flashier ride: a “Ferrari red” Vespa GTS-250 250-cc motor scooter. And the way he tells it, it was practically love at first sight.

A former planning deputy for retired County Supervisor Ed Edelman, Hess has since built up a thriving private practice as a land-use attorney with cases ranging from Thousand Oaks to the South Bay. “My two most common meetings are meetings with clients or court dates, and the Vespa is essential to be able to do either of those.”

What finally gave him the idea to jump out of the car and onto the scooter?

“I didn’t ditch the car completely,” he admits. “I don’t take the scooter in the rain, and I use the car when I absolutely have to – when I have too much to carry, for example.” But Hess admits that his compulsive New Yorker’s nature can’t abide waiting in traffic – “there, at least it moves; here, it seems to just stop” – and he found LA’s increasingly round-the-clock traffic jams more and more difficult to tolerate.

“What finally snapped my patience,” he says, “was when I had a client in Pacific Palisades with a very complicated land-use issue. There came a time when he couldn’t meet with me until 3 p.m. That evening, I had tickets to a classical concert downtown, and though I left the client at 5:00 p.m., I didn’t get home [to Hancock Park] until 8:15p.”

Anecdotal evidence suggests he’s not alone; Philharmonic officials have long fretted about falling concert attendance among Westsiders due in part to increasingly unmanageable cross-town traffic.

Hess is clearly infatuated with his two-wheel paramour, and eager to show her off.

“The old Vespas were built cheaply and tended to fall apart. They had little two-cycle engines, where you had to mix the gas and oil, and they required a great deal of personal attention to keep running.” As a kid, Hess had plenty of experience with a two-cycle Lambretta, Vespa’s primary competitor. “And if you didn’t get the mix right, ensuring that the engine got enough lubrication, you’d be riding along and the engine would basically seize up into a solid block of metal.”

Subsequent technical advances have largely eliminated that hair-raising possibility while increasing the scooter’s power. What’s more, operating costs are very low. Hess says that, after his roughly $7,000 initial investment, “in three years, I’ve only spent about $300 and tripled my fuel economy.”

So how does a white-collar professional manage to dress for the road and for the board room?

“When I have to meet someone, I get dressed up in layers—I wear well-protective motorcycle boots and stash my dress shoes under the saddle. On a hot day, I’ll put my suit jacket under the saddle and wear a leather jacket. I tried leather chaps once, but they were too uncomfortable.”

Hess concedes that earning a motorcycle license may not be for everyone, with the DMV requiring rigorous testing and training. Then comes the actual practice drills on busy metropolitan streets. Hess shudders at the memory. “You go through six months of absolute terror – Long Beach, Norwalk, Downey, Thousand Oaks. Lomita, Lennox, Hawthorne.” Today, he rides strictly on surface streets: “Although the Vespa technically is freeway legal, it’s totally crazy. I did it once for about 100 yards and got off.”

Cycling safety calls for constant vigilance. “Any kind of spill can be extremely painful,” Hess notes. “The first time I went down, I ripped my suit, and had bruises that took about a month to heal.”

Still, the upsides are considerable, including being able to score great parking spots. “The funny thing is in Italy, where they’re made, nobody rides them anymore – they’re too expensive.”

Phil Hess on the go.