THE rusting oil derricks that once pumped crude from beneath the streets of Los Angeles are being brought back to life almost 50 years after being abandoned.

The derricks — black, hammer-like contraptions that squat over oil wells — were long ago rendered uneconomic by falling petroleum prices and the soaring value of property in Southern California.

But now, with the price of crude oil near a record high and the property market rapidly cooling, Tinseltown has rediscovered its less glamorous economic roots. As one oil industry lawyer once said: “They ruined a perfectly good oilfield by building a city on top of it.”