Neighborhood

The district is bordered by Santa Monica on the west, Brentwood on the northwest, the unincorporated Sawtelle Veterans Administration grounds on the north, Westwood on the northeast, Rancho Park on the east and southeast, and Mar Vista on the south and southeast. Its generally accepted boundaries are the San Diego Freeway on the east, the Santa Monica Freeway on the south, the city limits of Santa Monica on the west, and Wilshire Boulevard on the north.

Its major thoroughfares are Olympic, Santa Monica, Pico, Wilshire, and Sawtelle Boulevards, and Barrington and Bundy Drives.
Because the Big Blue Bus (Santa Monica’s municipal bus network) uses UCLA as one of its terminals, it provides good public transit within the region, especially along east-west routes, as does the LACMTA.This district contains an area of Japanese-American culture along Sawtelle Boulevard which is sometimes called Sawtelle.

History

After the area’s colonization by the Spanish, most of what is now West Los Angeles became part of the Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica. With the arrival of Anglo settlers after the Mexican-American War, the original Californio landowners sold out, or were forced from their holdings, and by the beginning of the 20th century the area was mostly bean and wheat fields. Many Japanese immigrants settled in the district, establishing orchards and nurseries in the process. Some of these nurseries are still in business today, along the stretch of Sawtelle Boulevard between Olympic and Santa Monica Boulevards.

The core of what is now West Los Angeles, including the West Los Angeles government center at Santa Monica and Purdue, was incorporated as the City of Sawtelle. In the 1920s, the area was annexed by the City of Los Angeles.

Demographics

In 2009, the Los Angeles Times’s “Mapping L.A.” project supplied these “West Los Angeles” neighborhood statistics: population: 12,659; median household income: $86,403.[1]

Police service

Los Angeles Police Department operates the West Los Angeles Community Police Station at 1663 Butler Avenue, 90025, serving the neighborhood[5].

The neighborhood today

As with most parts of the Westside, West Los Angeles is an affluent neighborhood. Its central location has made it a locus of commercial development, with several high-rise office buildings along Olympic, Santa Monica, and Wilshire Boulevards. It also contains a large number of Japanese-owned businesses. A satellite congregation of the Wilshire Boulevard Temple, one of the most prominent Reform Jewish congregations in Southern California, occupies the northeast corner of Olympic and Barrington.

Housing in West Los Angeles is a mixture of low-rise apartment buildings, mostly inhabited by young professionals and working-class families, and single-story tract house developments built between late 1920 and 1960. Two of Los Angeles’s tallest residential towers are at the neighborhood’s northern edge, at the intersection of Wilshire and Barrington.

Schools in the area, such as Wildwood School, are well-respected and of generally high quality. University High School, a secondary school named for nearby UCLA, is in the district. “Uni” is one of very few older high schools in Los Angeles that have not had to be completely rebuilt following earthquakes over the years, and still has a traditional look to it featuring weathered brick walls and arched entries. As a result, it is a popular with film producers as a shooting location, even when school is in session, much to the chagrin of the students and faculty. The campus also contains within its bounds an artesian well (claimed by the Tongva people as their ancestral home) which has never failed, even in the driest years. Junipero Serra’s party is said to have camped there in the course of their journey up and down the state.

Colleges

The University of California, Los Angeles (generally known as UCLA) is a research university located in nearby Westwood, Los Angeles, California, United States. It was founded in 1919 and is the second-oldest general-purpose campus in the University of California system.

UCLA is comprised of the College of Letters and Science (the primary undergraduate college) as well as undergraduate colleges Arts and Architecture, Herb Alpert School of Music, Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, Nursing, and Theater, Film, and Television, seven professional schools, and five professional Health Science schools. Since 2001, UCLA has enrolled over 33,000 total students annually.[5][8]

Founded as an independent private institution in 1928, Pacific States University, is a private university in nearby Harvard Heights, Los Angeles California, U.S. and member of ACICS.

Primary and secondary schools

Public schools

West Los Angeles is part of the Los Angeles Unified School District.[6] Neighborhood elementary schools are Brockton Avenue, Nora Sterry Elementary School, and Warner Avenue. Middle schools are Emerson and Webster. High schools are University and Indian Springs Continuation, both on the same site.

Private schools

St. Sebastian School, Notre Dame Academy, West Los Angeles Baptist School and First Lutheran School of Venice are nearby private schools.

References

1. ^ “West Los Angeles” entry on the Los Angeles Times “Mapping L.A.” website
2. ^ Prescription Information
3. ^ Hanson, Barbard, “The Oaxaca Connection,” Los Angeles Times1 May 2002: K1.
4. ^ LAPD Crime information
5. ^ LAPD West LA Station
5. ^ a b c d e “Campus Profile”. Official site. Current. Retrieved on 2007-05-20.
6. ^ West LA neighborhood Council Schools
8. ^ a b Enrollment data: Fall 2001–03 Fall 2002–04 Fall 2003–05. University of California System CSS Third Week Enrollment File (current). Retrieved May 30, 2007