Soon I’ll be spending a long weekend in Los Angeles, my first visit to that city.
Friends have recommended plenty of tourist attractions, so I don’t think I need that kind of advice. But I would like some advice on enjoying LA in the way I usually like to enjoy cities: by walking in dense, mixed-use neighborhoods (cafes, small ethnic restaurants, little shops & parks, etc. all in a place where people live and work) and by riding transit from place to place. If that kind of daily life exists there, I’d like to get a feel for it.
So, which parts of the city do you think I should visit?
I don’t know how possible that is - LA is really, really, really sprawling. I mean really. Huge. And varied - it’s quite literally dozens of small sub-cities even within the city of LA, each with its own feel, and that’s not even counting the suburbs that are individual cities, again each with its own feel.
Most of the white and/or well-off folks live in the various suburbs and commute - the ones who live, work, and shop all in the same areas tend to be the ethnic and poor. Those neighborhoods can be hella awesome (I LOVE East LA!) but also a little scarier.
Also, taking public transit around LA takes forever due to the aforementioned sprawliness, and a lot of it isn’t very good.
What tourist attractions are you looking to go to? Will you have a rental car at all, or will you be relying on public transportation entirely?
If you want to use public transportation, I would try starting at Union station, which is the meeting point for the various subways in Los Angeles.
You can walk around in the “downtown” areas of several of the cities making the greater LA area, like Pasadena or Santa Monica or Los Angeles or the Venice Beach boardwalk. But, as Maggie the Ocelot said, LA is very spread out.
Keep in mind that some of the inner city neighborhoods are experiencing gentrification, which is either good or bad depending on one’s perspective. It isn’t necessarily true that those in the walkable districts are all working poor. Housing prices being what they are, even now, a lot of professional people say to hell with the suburbs and fifty-mile commutes, and decide either to rent or to buy a condo in town.
Most of the city is safe by big city standards. Obviously a quiet farming community in Nebraska would be safer, but that’s also true of San Francisco, New York, or anywhere else.
If you want to stay in the pedestrian oriented zones, you could consider anywhere between Hollywood and downtown, because that’s where the subway is. You can use that to reach Olvera Street (great Mexican food and margaritas at La Golondrina) as well as Universal Studios near North Hollywood. From downtown, you can use the Gold Line (LRT) to reach Pasadena and the Norton Simon Museum. I also generally recommend that visitors consider a day trip to the San Diego via Amtrak. With a dozen or so trains to SD every day, it’s quite easy.
On the other hand, if you want to visit the beaches, mountains, and other outlying areas, you’re going to need a car. Public transit on the West Side is limited to buses only; while the area is covered quite comprehensively, travel is extremely slow. If you do rent a car, try to avoid being within two miles of the 405–either side–between 3PM and 7PM on weekdays.
I’ll have a rental car, and I haven’t chosen all my tourist attractions yet, apart from the Getty and LACMA.
I don’t mean to walk around the whole city; I just want to find a few of those hella awesome neighborhoods you mention and explore them. In my experience, poorer neighborhoods feel scary only if they’re deserted, not if they’re densely populated and active. This has been my experience in SF, Chicago, NY, Paris, and a few other places. Maybe LA doesn’t fit that model, though.
Walking locations: Westwood. Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. Sunset strip, Hollywood and west (you can walk, but it’s more car than walk). West Hollywood, if you’re into that sort of thing. Universal City Walk. Downtown Hollywood (freak show).
Driving: Mulholland Drive, see both valleys from the highest points between them. Griffith Park Observatory. Santa Monica Pier. Venice Beach. Tujunga Canyon. A little farther out, Rim of the World Highway on the way to Lake Arrowhead. Any freeway.
Downtown Culver City has got a pretty nice, but relatively small and very walkable area. We live there and my girlfriend has a better walkscore here than she did in Boston. You could do the Sony Studios tour and then browse the recently revitalized downtown area. The only downside is that it’s got so many great dining options and there are only a few meals to fit into a single day. And I actually insist that you ignore them all for lunch in favor of the little, tucked away Jackson Market deli (5-minute walk from Sony Studios) for lunch and enjoy your sandwich in their rear courtyard. It is a hidden gem that not a lot of people know about and very a different experience than what people normally think of when they do L.A.
I gotta put Venice Beach in the walking category (or better yet, biking). Oh, and E. Thorp: if you’re in Venice, don’t miss the canals. They’re not as expansive as they were in their heyday, but the homes are beautiful!
This reminds me: I forgot to mention I’m also interested in plain ol’ people-watching, especially since I have the impression that there are a lot of beautiful people in LA, and I wouldn’t mind visiting where they congregate.
Thanks for all the great suggestions so far! I’ve got my planning work cut out for me.
Don’t listen to people who tell you that L.A. isn’t walkable. It’s not Boston or San Fransisco, but if you can get point to point by car or have access to the Metro Rail system (which is an excellent, if necessarily limited public transit system) then there are plenty of places you can go and walk.
Curiously, no one has yet mentioned Silver Lake and Los Feliz, which are right off the Red Line at Vermont/Sunset station to the north and east. There are a bunch of little stores and clothes shops, some nice older houses, good restaurant and local bars, and several other entertainments. (Check out Fred 62 on Vermont for some good food, The Good Luck Bar for ambiance, and Everything’s Jake on Hollywood for men’s vintage clothing.) There is even Griffith Park within reach if you don’t mind a bit of a hike.
There are some good places downtown as well like the Toy District and Diamond District, but there are some sketchy areas if that bothers you. (I’ve never had a problem, but then I get mistaken for being police a lot.) Others have mentioned Pasadena, off the Gold Line, which is good, too, although Old Town has become somewhat disneyfied and is mostly just a shopping district, but there are some great houses on Orange Grove and you can walk to the Arroyo Bridge and down to the Rose Bowl from there, which is a pleasant and mostly beautiful walk. I’d actually stop in South Pasadena at Mission Station, which is a more walkable urban area with shops and eateries.
I would minimize your expectations about Hollywood; it is not only less scenic than you’d think, but also pretty trashy. Get off the Red Line at Hollywood/Vine, walk the stars, take in a movie at the Arclight, have a drink at the Frolic Room, and call it good on your Hollywood experience. (You can also go to Psychiatry: The Museum of Death, but make certain to take your anti-Scientology inoculation first.) U-City walk is just a big shopping plaza in my opinion. Not worth the trouble. One or two of the beaches is worth taking in; I’d recommend Venice or Santa Monica pier.
Studio City is a very walkable neighborhood, full of stores and restaurants, that is also not at all poor, but instead upper middle class. It always seems to be forgotten in articles about Los Angeles – probably because it doesn’t contain any tourist attractions per se, although it is close to Universal Studios.
I agree with the Hollywood and Venice/Venice Beach suggestions. Main Street in Venice, just south of Santa Monica, is filled on both sides of the streets with little shops, cafes, restaurants, and in general interesting things and people to look at.
Hollywood & Vine down to Sunset & Vine, Hollywood & Highland.
Melrose Avenue between Fairfax and Highland, especially Sunday morning since there’s a flea market at Fairfax High.
Venice Beach, duh.
But it depends on what you want most to enjoy. If you want to get a seriously Hollywood experience, with the full experience of artsy-ethnic-flashy-freaky, then be at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market held on Sunday mornings on Ivar and Selma, which is right near Hollywood and Vine.
You will see everything from the crazies to the too cool for school, the creatives and the starlets. Plus great food, art and street musicians.
Hollywood’s not that glamorous, but it’s well worth it if you are into the old Hollywood thing–for instance, if you’re a fan of Turner Classic Movies. In that case Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Roosevelt Hotel, Musso & Frank’s are well worth visiting, and all within an easy walk. The boulevard may be a bit tawdry at times, but it’s mostly people expressing themselves, as opposed to being dangerous or woebegone. Depending on how much you want to spend for the hotel, the Roosevelt could be a good place for you to stay. You’d have what rail transit there is, right next door, but it’s also fairly centrally located for when you want to use the car.
Important note: IIRC, the trains stop running around midnight. Hollywood is one of the few areas that stays up all the way to legal closing in California, so that’s another good reason to pick a hotel around there.
I’m surprised no one has mentioned downtown Santa Monica yet. Working west to east, there’s also Venice Beach, Westwood, Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Melrose, Hollywood, Silverlake, and some interesting parts of Wilshire in the Miracle Mile area.
The Westside is eminently doable by bus if you think of the long boulevards as cross-sections, instead of rushing from tourist site to tourist site on a checklist. So one day ride the Wilshire bus all the way from downtown to Santa Monica, getting off every half-hour or so wherever the shops look interesting. The buses come every 90 seconds, so hop back on the conveyor belt and rest your feet for a mile or two while looking out the window. Another day, do the same thing for Santa Monica Blvd. When you get to Santa Monica, use an express bus to return downtown via freeway.
