West Los Angeles (West L.A. in the short form) or the Westside is generally considered to be the portion of Los Angeles, California and its suburbs that lies east of the Pacific Ocean, west of La Cienega Boulevard (or, occasionally, Fairfax or even La Brea Avenue), south of the Santa Monica Mountains, and north of the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). (Compare to East Los Angeles or South Los Angeles. "North Los Angeles" is unknown to locals and would likely refer to the San Fernando Valley.) The City of Los Angeles (from Spanish; Los Ángeles) is the second-largest city in the United States in terms of population, as well as one of the worlds most important economic, cultural, and entertainment centers. ... Santa Monica Mountains The Santa Monica Mountains are a low transverse range in southern California in the United States. ... FAA diagram of Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) Los Angeles International Airport (IATA: LAX, ICAO: KLAX), is the primary airport serving Los Angeles, California. ... East Los Angeles (also East L.A., East Los, Los, or The Eastside) is a geographic and cultural term that refers to the predominantly Latino communities lying to the east and northeast of Downtown Los Angeles, for the most part east of the Los Angeles River. ... South Los Angeles is the official name for a large geographic and cultural area lying to the south and southeast of downtown Los Angeles, California. ... San Fernando Valley The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley in southern California, lying mostly within the city limits of Los Angeles. ...

The Westside as seen looking north from Loyola Marymount University . The San Diego Freeway is invisible on the far left side of the picture, and the large buildings in the distance are mostly along Wilshire Boulevard in the Westwood district. The tall buildings on the right side of the picture are in the Century City district. The Santa Monica Mountains are to the north.

Westside or West Los Angeles area, as photographed from Loyola Marymount University on January 3, 2003. ... Loyola Marymount University (LMU), is a private, co-educational Roman Catholic university in the United States. ... Interstate 405 is the designation of three different tertiary interstate routes of Interstate 5. ... High-rise buildings line Wilshire Boulevard through the Westwood area Another view of the Westwood skyline Westwood is a district in western Los Angeles, California. ... View of the Century City skyline from the Getty Center. ... Santa Monica Mountains The Santa Monica Mountains are a low transverse range in southern California in the United States. ...

Business and Transportation

Many of the major educational, retail, cultural, and recreational attractions of Greater Los Angeles are located in the area, as is a large portion of the entertainment industry. Century City is the major business hub of the Westside, containing many major production corporations, talent agencies, and entertainment law firms. Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, and new developments near LAX are also important entertainment industry centers. The Westside rivals downtown Los Angeles for the number of people commuting to it from other areas, particularly the San Fernando Valley to the north and the South Bay to the south. The Greater Los Angeles Area is the suburban area around the city of Los Angeles, California. ... The entertainment industry consists of a large number of sub-industries devoted to entertainment. ... San Fernando Valley The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley in southern California, lying mostly within the city limits of Los Angeles. ... The South Bay is a region in the southwest peninsula of Los Angeles County, California. ...

The Westside's traffic congestion is legendary. Although once served by the Pacific Electric Railroad's streetcars, it was the first region of Los Angeles to be developed largely around the automobile, and is notorious for its lack of significant public transportation. Its residents are also noted for their NIMBY attitude toward transportation projects such as the Exposition Boulevard light rail line and the Wilshire Boulevard extension of the Metro Red Line subway, although this has begun to change as traffic continues to attenuate the region's quality of life. The almost transcendently gridlocked San Diego Freeway is the primary transportation corridor in the region, and much of the area's commercial development is along it. The proposed Pacific Coast, Beverly Hills, and Laurel Canyon freeways undoubtedly would have sped up the region's traffic flow, but went unbuilt in the face of massive community opposition. Unfortunately, a great deal of high-density development took place in anticipation of these roadways' construction, resulting in significant congestion on the area's surface streets. Getting to Hollywood from the West Side is particularly difficult, with major east-west streets between the regions jammed during virtually all waking hours. Pacific Electric Railway company depot in downtown Los Angeles, circa 1910. ... A taxi serving as a bus Public transport comprises all transport systems in which the passengers do not travel in their own vehicles. ... NIMBY (an initialism for Not In My Back Yard) is a pejorative acronym for the phenomenon in which residents oppose a development as being inappropriate for their local area. ... The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (also known as Metro, MTA or LACMTA) is the regional transportation planning and public transportation operating agency for the county of Los Angeles. ... Interstate 405 is the designation of three different tertiary interstate routes of Interstate 5. ... The Beverly Hills Freeway was the name for a never-built freeway intended to link the Los Angeles districts of Westwood and Echo Park along the route of Santa Monica Boulevard. ... The Laurel Canyon Freeway was to have been a north-south freeway in Los Angeles, California and its suburbs. ... Greetings from Hollywood Hollywood is a district of the city of Los Angeles, California, U.S.A., that extends from Vermont Avenue on the east to just beyond Laurel Canyon Boulevard above Sunset and Crescent Heights Boulevards on the west; the north to south boundary east of La Brea Avenue...

Culture

The Westside is generally thought of as the white part of the city of Los Angeles, in contrast to Latino-dominated East Side, the Latino and Asian areas such as Pico-Union and Koreatown in and around downtown, and the black and Latino neighborhoods of South Los Angeles. This article does not cite its references or sources. ... // Etymology Latino, feminine Latina derives from Latin (the adjectives latinus, latina), originally referring to Latium, the area of Rome, by aitiology derived from a king of the name Latinus. ... East Los Angeles (also East L.A., East Los, Los, or The Eastside) is a geographic and cultural term that refers to the predominantly Latino communities lying to the east and northeast of Downtown Los Angeles, for the most part east of the Los Angeles River. ... An Asian American is a person of Asian ancestry or origin who was born in or is an immigrant to the United States. ... The intersection of Pico and Union Pico-Union is a district in central Los Angeles, California. ... Koreatown, also known as Wilshire Center, is a district in the city of Los Angeles, California. ... African Americans, also known as Afro-Americans or black Americans, are an ethnic group in the United States of America whose ancestors, usually in predominant part, were indigenous to Sub-Saharan and West Africa. ... South Los Angeles is the official name for a large geographic and cultural area lying to the south and southeast of downtown Los Angeles, California. ...

Those less inclined to view the Westside in racially reductive terms find the community to be quite culturally diverse, with most non-European ethnicities represented in an enclave or small business district somewhere in the region.

A typical street scene in the southern Westside: the 3700 block of Westwood Boulevard in the Palms district.

ImageMetadata File history File links Westwood_south_001. ... ImageMetadata File history File links Westwood_south_001. ...

Ethnic and Cultural Groups

African-American

The "Westside" was often mentioned in West Coast rap and gangsta rap music, especially during the mid-to-late 1990s. However, this refers to the black-dominated areas of South Los Angeles (such as Crenshaw and Jefferson Park) located west of the Harbor Freeway. While Palms, Culver City, and parts of Venice and Santa Monica have significant black populations, they have always been considered distinct from the traditionally black neighborhoods of South Los Angeles. Culver City's Fox Hills area, which adjoins traditionally upper-class black areas such as Ladera Heights and Baldwin Hills, is similarly black and wealthy, although deal-hungry white, Asian, and Latino families are an increasing presence in the neighborhood. In the 1980s, hip hop music began to break into the mainstream of the United States. ... Gangsta rap is a subgenre of hip hop music which involves a lyrical focus on the lifestyles of inner-city thugs, criminals and gangsters. ... The 1990s refers to the years 1990 to 1999; the last decade of the 20th Century, but in an economical sense The Nineties is often considered to span from the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 to the September 11 attacks in 2001. ... Crenshaw (also known as the Crenshaw District) is a district in southwestern Los Angeles, California. ... Jefferson Park is a district in southwestern Los Angeles, California. ... The Harbor Freeway goes under many bridges as it passes through downtown Los Angeles The Harbor Freeway is one of the principal north-south freeways in Los Angeles County, California. ... Ladera Heights is a census-designated place and unincorporated area in southwestern Los Angeles County, California. ... Baldwin Hills is a neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA, located on the central hills overlooking the Los Angeles Basin. ...

East Asian

Sawtelle Boulevard between Pico and Santa Monica boulevards became a center of Japanese business and culture in the first half of the 20th century, when restrictive covenants and laws made it impossible to purchase property in adjoining incorporated areas. As a particular profession of Japanese in Los Angeles was gardening, the street was filled with plant nurseries and related stores. Today, many of the nurseries have been replaced by shops and offices that still cater to Japanese and Japanese-Americans, including two Giant Robot stores that feature all kinds of Japanese pop culture collectibles. A nursery is a place where plants are propagated, usually for sale as a business, though some gardeners and farmers keep private nurseries. ... Giant Robot can mean one of three things: Giant Robot (magazine) Giant Robot (band) Giant Robot (genre) This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists pages that might otherwise share the same title. ...

Hispanic/Latino

Further south on Sawtelle, in the Mar Vista and Del Rey districts, is the traditional barrio of the allegedly defunct Sotel gang, which drew its members from descendants of the Latino farmhands who worked the orchards and bean fields that once covered the area. Today, much of the population immediately to the southwest of the 10-405 junction is now young white and Asian professionals and UCLA students drawn to the area's cheap rents and large UCLA housing complex, but enormous Latino communities are still found in Culver City and Palms. In particular, large numbers of Latino families reside at Mar Vista Gardens, a Del Rey housing project operated by the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles. Palms also plays host to a small, closely-knit Brazilian community, with several restaurants and shops catering to it. Barrio is a Spanish word meaning district. ... Mar Vista Gardens is a housing project in the Del Rey district of southwestern Los Angeles, California, bordering Ballona Creek and situated near Culver City, California. ... Public housing describes a form of housing tenure in which the property is owned by a government authority, which may be central or local. ... The Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles is the public housing agency for Los Angeles, California. ...

Middle Eastern/South Asian

Persians

Brentwood, Rancho Park, and Westwood host a large Iranian/Persian exile community that is apparent by the numerous bookstores and restaurants on Westwood Boulevard with signage in both Persian and English. Beverly Hills, Santa Monica and West Hollywood have also become major destinations for upwardly mobile Persians, with ethnic Iranians comprising perhaps as much as a fifth of the population of Beverly Hills. Persians are also a significant presence in Palms, with the Iranian Muslim Association of North America maintaining its headquarters in the district. Ironically, most Persians in Los Angeles belong to the Jewish faith, while Orange County has a Muslim (mostly secular) majority among its Persian population. The Iranian Jewish Federation maintains its headquarters in West LA. Persian (فارسی = Fârsi . ... // Judaism is the religion of the Jewish people. ... Orange County is the name of several counties in the United States of America: Orange County, California: probably named for the city of Orange, California, which in turn may have been named after the orange groves that used to exist there. ...

Arriviste Persians on the West Side have often built enormous, ornately decorated two- or three-story pink or white stucco mansions on parcels that previously contained Spanish Colonial bungalows or villas. The proliferation of these "Persian palaces" has generated considerable friction with the area's established European-descended population. The Spanish Colonial Revival Style was an architectural form that dominated in the early Spanish colonies of both North and South America. ... Persian palace is a derisive term used by Los Angeles residents for a large mansion that occupies a disproportionately large area of the parcel on which it is built. ...

Pakistanis

Further south, Palms is considered one of the major centers of Pakistani life in Los Angeles. Venice Boulevard is lined with numerous Pakistani restaurants and groceries. Hijab-clad Pakistani women are a frequent sight in Palms, particularly in the western blocks of the district.

"The 310"

Area code 310 covers most of West Los Angeles and is commonly synonymous with it: young people often refer to the region as "the 310." Ironically, area code 310 also covers some of the poorer communities in the Los Angeles area, such as Gardena and Compton. In April 2005, local telecommunications providers petitioned the California Public Utilities Commission to overlay area code 424 onto 310, due to a projected shortfall of telephone numbers; this move has drawn considerable resistance from many affluent Westsiders, who consider a 310 telephone number as a sign of prestige. Area code 310 is a telephone area code which is roughly coterminous with West Los Angeles and the South Bay area of Los Angeles County. ... Gardena is a city located in Los Angeles County, California. ... Compton is a city located in southern Los Angeles County, California, USA. It is often considered to be the heart of the South Los Angeles area, formerly known as a part of South Central Los Angeles. ... 424 is the new area code for the west side of the Los Angeles Metropolitan area. ...

West Side communities

• Northern West Los Angeles
  • Bel-Air
    • Holmby Hills
    • Roscomare Valley
  • Beverly Glen
    • Benedict Canyon
    • Beverly Crest
  • Beverly Hills
    • Trousdale Estates
  • Beverlywood
  • Brentwood
    • Brentwood Circle
    • Brentwood Glen
    • Brentwood Hills
    • Brentwood Park
    • Bundy Canyon
    • Kenter Canyon
      • Crestwood Hills
    • Mandeville Canyon
      • Westridge Heights
    • South Brentwood
    • Westgate
  • Cheviot Hills
  • Century City
  • Crestview
  • Malibu
  • Pacific Palisades
    • Castellammare
    • Huntington Palisades
    • Palisades Highlands
    • Rustic Canyon
  • Rancho Park
    • Home Junction
  • Santa Monica
    • Ocean Park
  • Sawtelle
  • South Robertson
  • Topanga Canyon
    • Topanga
  • West Los Angeles
  • Westwood

• South West Los Angeles
  • Baldwin Hills
  • Culver City
  • Del Rey
  • Ladera Heights
  • Mar Vista
    • Westdale
  • Marina Del Rey
  • Palms
  • Playa del Rey
  • Venice
    • Oakwood
  • Westchester
    • Los Angeles International Airport
    • Manchester Square
    • Playa Vista
  • Westside Village