I love running. Or rather, I used to.

My broadcasting and film degrees brought me to my current home in L.A. along with my first job in the motion picture industry. It’s a business that can easily swallow your life whole, and at times, this was true for me. But one thing I always had – something that could take me far away from the all consuming hype and bluster of the industry – was running.

Los Angeles is many things to many people, good and bad. Though it’s not difficult to find the parts of town that can soothe the soul. My buddies and I, women and men, runners all, would get together after work two or three times a week and, well…run.

We’d run 4.5-mile circuits around UCLA, including the wooded ups and downs alongside Bel-Air on the Sunset Boulevard hills. We’d do quick 3-mile jaunts south, along the Ocean Avenue bluffs, down onto the weathered planks of the Santa Monica pier, and then head north along the wide beach until shooting through the cramped tunnel under the PCH, ending with a thigh-crushing climb up the Entrada stairs and looping back to our start on the windy bluffs. Sometimes, after the rains, we’d begin at the western plateaus in the Santa Monica Mountains and run the long trails high above the city, every turn giving us crystalline views of the jagged coastline’s northwest tilt toward Malibu and the bluest ocean I’ve ever known.

And almost every time we’d run, after about the second mile, the good stuff would kick in. Steeped in the buzz of a constant steady pace, one that outlasted the urge to stop and kept me in the Zen zone, my mind would wander and wonder, filled with exhilaration and contentment.

According to fossil remains, the Tongva and Chumash Indians predate the arrival of Europeans in this area by up to 10,000 years. But in 1542 AD, Spaniard Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, the first European to visit southern California, stopped into the bays of what we now call San Diego. He then sailed northward into the area off San Pedro and Santa Catalina island, and from there he could see the Los Angeles basin. Surprisingly, and presciently, he named it, ‘La Baia de los Fumos’, the Bay of Fumes (or smoke). It’s not clear if on that day the area was simply having one of its frequent temperature inversions, creating a smog-like appearance all on its own, or whether there were actually campfires from the Tongva or Chumash sending smoke and ash up over the basin and out to the Pacific on the desert winds.

It seems even the better part of a half millennium ago this area wasn’t well suited for industrialization and automobiles.

As of 1990, there were over 7 million vehicles on the roads in the Los Angeles basin. More current statistics are hard to come by, but it’s a safe bet there are quite a few more now. By the time I arrived, the air had been noticeably cleaned up by enforcement of various air pollution controls. Still, over time, running in Los Angeles took its toll on me. Even though I’d only run when the air quality was ‘in the safe zone’, the various pollutants caused by those many millions of internal combustion engines noticeably damaged my sinuses, airways and the membranes of my upper respiratory system. I developed chronic sinusitis and my first real problem symptom was allergy related exercise-induced asthma. But as the years went by, even walking into a dusty room could trigger an attack. And I’d never had asthma before.

To be fair, I should mention there are various kinds of asthma, and definitive causes for the condition itself aren’t known. There is however, a lot of new research and information available, if anyone’s interested. But suffice it to say, it became clear that running in Los Angeles was hurting me more than it was helping.

Now I don’t want to run marathon distances, and I don’t need to compete in races. I just want to run again. But as long as cars and trucks ply the roads alongside my streets, paths and trails, as long as ozone, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide and particulate matter from engines and diesels are daily thrown up by millions of tailpipes, choking out the sustenance of the air we breath, running is something I should not do. At least not here.

So yes, I have a hope. I’d even call it a dream. If realized, it’s something the word excited wouldn’t come close to describing. Is it too much to hope that one day, in the not too terribly distant future, all those Los Angeles tailpipes will emit nothing more than water vapor and heat?

Here in my city, a limited number of hydrogen fuel cell cars are now on the road in test leases. And in fact, water vapor and heat are the only by-products of driving them. That’s it. What would my city look like if every single one of the cars and trucks on the road were powered by hydrogen fuel cells? What would happen to our air?

There are other causes of air pollution, including power plants, factories, various industrial processes...and airports. We’ve got a doozy of an airport in town, LAX. But still: every car and truck. That’s a lot. It would make a huge difference. We have the capability to do this. The technology and infrastructure needs might one day be within our grasp. We just have to figure out how best to make it happen, the sooner the better.

And then maybe someday before I’m gone, when my sons are older, we can go for a run in my adopted city.