Why is Hollywood not gentrified by 2015 but freaking Echo Park is? (Los Angeles: apartments, rentals)

[JeffSanDimas]

i've always been curious about that……

Rarely when I'm in Los Angeles proper do I have a reason to go south of Nordhoff or east of Balboa, let alone out of the Valley but I found out at 11:30 that my 12:45-3:30 class was cancelled, so that meant I had a full tank of gas and over 6 hours until I had to be back by school and I was starving so I picked up a buddy and went to Canters on Fairfax. Afterwards we wanted to go drive around in Hollywood and see the touristy junk that natives never actually go and see. When I was 15 and my friends started getting cars and going places my parents told me that if I was hanging out in that area and walking around/not in a car to not walk down the side streets between Hollywood and Melrose (which are the boundaries of cool Hollywood stuff) once I got east past La Brea aka in the city of LA vs WeHo.

But I figured that since according to this website even freakin' South Central is safe (still don't believe that) then Hollywood would be fine for two grown men to walk around in on a weekday afternoon.

Whoa. Is all I have to say. It wasn't scary or like something out of Doctor Dre song or anything, but I just wasn't expecting it to be so seedy! I mean this is Hollywood, by far the most famous neighborhood in the world with a name so recognized I bet that if you went into some village in the tribal frontier lands of Afghanistan where they have to haul water from the river and nobody can read...folks would know where and what Hollywood is!

We paid for parking and walked around not even one block away from all the tourist junk on Hollywood blvd, you see junkies, obviously mentally ill homeless people, decrepit 100 year old buildings reminiscent of some tenement in New York, scary men with face tattoos hanging out, and on Western a couple of blocks south of Santa Monica (I think the cross street was Sierra Vista) we got offered "Chiva" which is apparently a slang term for Mexican black tar heroin..real nice. Did I mentioned I saw what I am almost 100% sure was a transvestite (transgendered? transsexual? I don't know the PC term) prostitute wear a leather mini skirt and fishnets...

My question is, why hasn't Hollywood gentrified? It is a central neighborhood right in the center of LA with subway access and is pretty close to most cool city stuff in Los Angeles. And that's beside the fact that there is no one neighborhood on the entire earth beside maybe "Broadway" or something in New York which isn't even an actual area and more like a long street has better name recognition. It's nothing less than jaw dropping that I actually think it's less sketchy in Van Nuys or Reseda than it is in Hollywood. Of course the sketchiness is in a gradient once you go past La Brea and then it gets even worse past Cahuenga or Vine (especially below Sunset) and by the time you hit Western or God forbid by the train stations on Vermont where the crazy homeless quotient goes up twentyfold..that's especially surprising since LA City College is literally right there.


Does anyone know why Hollywood has gentrified even less than Echo Park? Does the city do the same thing with Hollywood that SF does with Tenderloin, aka try to centralize all the nasty into one area so it doesn't spread and make everywhere bad?(if so, note to Mayor Garcetti...its not working!)

I know you all are going to say that it's not that bad (compared to even bad areas in the Valley like Reseda, yes it is) and that it was worse back in the 70s/80s/90s (I am sure it was and I loathe to even think about it)


Why is Hollywood so sketchy?

[909er]

I smell a troll but I'll throw a crumb. Hollywood and "gentrified" are two terms that don't coinside with one another. Hollywood is what it is, but it's not necessarily a bad neighborhood either. I lived off Edgemont and Fountian for a few years, and was never in danger or even remotely close. Now, the farther south you go the worse it gets, and I'm sure there are some gangs there, I've seen the graffiti. So don't go there. But the Sunset, tourist, and northern areas you speak of? I've never seen it.

Franklin, Los Feliz, and the Strip areas are safe and even weatlhy. Yes, celebrities live in the hills around the sign, but the streets are not oozing with them walking around, nor is it even the premier place for the wealthy to live. I've always said that Los Feliz is the "beginning of I've got some money" and the wealth increases the farther west you go, all the way through Palisades and Malibu and up the coast.

Hollywood is also more of a place people work and make gobs of money, not necessiarily spend it. Look at Downtown LA, full of corporations. But few hang out there outside of work hours except for L.A. Live.

It's hard to tell what you're getting at here. And Echo Park, while full of hipsters and gentrifiing, is far from safe. A lot of gang bangers moveed to San Bernardino but still go down there to do dirt on the weekends. Look at Eastsider LA.com and look at all the crime stats and robberies in Echo, Highland Park, etc. These hipsters live there but still run home to mommy and daddy to "decompress in the Bu" when it gets a little too hot in the hood

[Voyageuse]

I don't think that this is a troll post at all. I used to volunteer at Dress for Success (Hollywood and Vine) and often wondered the same thing. The area was too skeevey and dangerous for me, so I quit. DFS recently changed locations, so I might consider volunteering again.

[bmwguydc]

One reason when comparing Echo Park and Hollywood is the predominant housing type. Echo Park has many more cottages and single-family homes, structures that attract more home owners. Hollywood is largely an area of rentals, and while newer construction and revitalized buildings are generally well kept, there are many substandard apartments that are rented at the low end of the market's price spectrum.

Because of the large numbers of older apartments, many fall under the guise of rent stabilization, so owners tend to do the minimum required, and do not significantly upgrade the units because the ability to increase the rent is limited. Luxury tier and newer properties are exempt from rent stabilization, but development of such is limited in Hollywood because of the market forces imposed by the regulated units, as in some of the side streets are not prime to attract new, non-regulated, non-affordable housing stock because of the current conditions on said streets. Many areas have rent controlled/stabilized residences, but not the same concentrations and limits to attracting new development. Beverly Hills, for example, has stabilized units, but the city has other attractions, which do not limit new development potential. And, because it is an independent city, Beverly Hills has different rent stabilization rules and guidelines than Los Angeles as a whole.

[cynsis]

Originally Posted by Voyageuse

I don't think that this is a troll post at all. I used to volunteer at Dress for Success (Hollywood and Vine) and often wondered the same thing. The area was too skeevey and dangerous for me, so I quit. DFS recently changed locations, so I might consider volunteering again.

Read his past posts, they are all pretty trolly.

Parts of Hollywood are extremely nice, the tourist strip tends to be the area that looks dirty, but ultimately really isn't that bad.

[Ceece]

I've wondered about this myself. With rents getting ridiculous in the surrounding neighborhoods I totally expect things to change in Hollywood too. I didn't figure how much homeownership would come into play but that's right, it is mostly older rental buildings. I think it's going to be business that brings change, possibly new studio or office spaces. Slowww going though.

[jm1982]

I'd say it's all pretty relative though . Hollywood I would say has gentrified quite a bit from the 80s and 90s before the Hollywood highland center and the hotels like the W. I would say the Hollywood economy is much stronger now . Hollywood I would say is much more transient than echo park though . You likely have more people hanging out there from other parts of the city and people trying to make a buck off the buzz of tourists that constantly are in the area .

In that sense Hollywood likely has more hustlers . I don't feel that Echo park has really gentrified in the traditonal sense of the word . Much of this is because of rent control and the anti development stance in LA

If echo park where in Florida or Texas it would be full of new builds and much cleaner .

Hollywood being shady or rundown in parts is really nothing new though . Again this would change if it was easier to develop . There is a huge project in Hollywood that got scaled back massively . Lots of people moving into an area with money at the same time pretty much always cleans up an area and lowers crime .

If you got rid of rent control and allowed property owners to do what they want with their properties the whole city would look different , very quickly .

[JeffSanDimas]

Not a troll post, I just hate seeing seeing all of these trashy and undesirable people in what should be a pristine area filled with pristine people...it's freakin' Hollywood.

[disgruntled la native]

Hollywood is a magnet for ne'er-do-wells because it's Hollywood. The name alone attracts people from across the country, even the world, who are trouble.

[HyperionGap]

Originally Posted by cynsis

Read his past posts, they are all pretty trolly.

He's not a troll. He's just very young and pretty sheltered.


This is the best explanation as to why Echo Park and Hollywood have differed so greatly with regards to redevelopment.

Originally Posted by bmwguydc

One reason when comparing Echo Park and Hollywood is the predominant housing type. Echo Park has many more cottages and single-family homes, structures that attract more home owners. Hollywood is largely an area of rentals, and while newer construction and revitalized buildings are generally well kept, there are many substandard apartments that are rented at the low end of the market's price spectrum.

Because of the large numbers of older apartments, many fall under the guise of rent stabilization, so owners tend to do the minimum required, and do not significantly upgrade the units because the ability to increase the rent is limited. Luxury tier and newer properties are exempt from rent stabilization, but development of such is limited in Hollywood because of the market forces imposed by the regulated units, as in some of the side streets are not prime to attract new, non-regulated, non-affordable housing stock because of the current conditions on said streets. Many areas have rent controlled/stabilized residences, but not the same concentrations and limits to attracting new development. Beverly Hills, for example, has stabilized units, but the city has other attractions, which do not limit new development potential. And, because it is an independent city, Beverly Hills has different rent stabilization rules and guidelines than Los Angeles as a whole.