LITTLE TOKYO (just east of downtown) (Los Angeles, Long Beach: apartments, rent, lofts)

[sak9076]

Is little Tokyo (just east of downtown) a safe area to live?

Is anyone familiar enough with it to speak for its best and worst characteristics?

- Crime
- traffic
- available public transport
- nearby necessities (bank, supermarket)
- quality and availability of housing

If I moved there would it be necessary to have a car? inconvenient to have a car?


How would this area compare to New York City ? a certain area of NYC?

[UB50]

I've never lived there but I visit often enough. There is lots of public transportation, banks, etc.

There are several supermarkets/markets but they carry mostly Asian foods (lots of produce, meats, fish and that kind of thing but little in the lines of General Mills cereal or Campbells soup, if you know what I mean). If you need to buy American food items, the best place to get them is at Ralph's which is close to FIDM.

Little Tokyo is on the edge of skid row so you do see homeless wandering around occasionally however the crime rate downtown in general isn't very high considering this is a city. (Mostly petty theft and that kind of thing.)

You could get by without a car pretty easily if you work downtown.

Lots of new housing options in the area.

Let me put it to you this way: If I could afford to live there, I could live there easily. It's not a bad area.

[sak9076]

"If I could afford to live there, I could live there easily." ?

how much do you think i would pay for a small apartment? - just me. could be a loft , studio, or 1 bedroom.
500 per month?
800 per month?
1000 per month ?
i dont think i could pay more than that. might consider a roommate though.


Also - which do you think would be better - little Tokyo or the arts district just to the right of it?
Thanks for your help.

[UB50]

I don't know much about the arts district.

From what I have seen, apartments are considerably higher than that. More like $1800 for a 1 bedroom. There are more condos than apartments downtown.

[yamota]

I've never lived in Little Tokyo but I've been going there for 20 years and it's one of my favorite places in LA. It's a relatively safe neighborhood, even late at night, in fact many of the restaurants in Little Tokyo are open till the wee hours of the morning. But 1000 a month for even a loft? Come on, this is downtown LA wer'e talking here. For a grand a month you might be able to find something in nearby Koreatown where it's not as safe and not as nice.

[sak9076]

hmm. thats 2 votes saying 1000/month just wont cut it....
OK...

how far away from the arts district (right of little tokyo) would I have to move that I could live very safely on 1000/month rent? tiny apt ok. safe neighborhood priority.

[bhcompy]

Don't go out at night. Friend of mine lives in the Little Tokyo Lofts and I visit often, and he won't go out at night and he's a dedicated urbanite. He also chose a place with a 24/7 armed guard and a secure garage. I think he was paying around 1600/mo for a 600sqft studio.

[uptown_urbanist]

I love Little Tokyo, but doubt you could find anything for $1,000/month, at least not without a roommate.

It would be easy to live there without a car. There are good public transportation connections, there's a lot within walking distance, and it's fairly safe (although as others have said, is located near Skid Row and some other areas I would avoid at night).

When you safe "safe neighborhood priority" what do you consider safe? That's kind of subjective. For $1,000/month you're going to have to make some compromises. You say you want to live in or near Little Tokyo; when you say "near," you might also want to consider neighborhoods that aren't located within easy walking distance, but are just a quick train or bus ride away (along the Gold Line, for example). Otherwise the the roommate option is probably your best if you want to live somewhere safe anywhere near there for $1000/month.

Or, like yamota suggested, you could try somewhere like Koreatown (which is big and bustling and has a lot going on; it would be easy to live in that neighborhood without a car; if you do have a car, be prepared for tight street parking or to pay potentially quite a bit for a parking spot); there are studios there for your budget. It's not the safest neighborhood in town, but a lot of people are still happy living there. And to get a place of your own for $1,000 a month or under you're going to have to make some compromises.

Whatever you do, I wouldn't rent something sight-unseen. If you haven't spent much time in LA you should definitely check out the various neighborhoods for yourself before you make a decision as to which is right for you.

[SoCaliTrojan]

I've been working in the heart of Little Tokyo for nearly two years. The LAPD police headquarters is just a block away (I work for LAPD, but since there isn't any room for us in the building, we're located offsite). I sometimes start work at 5 AM, and sometimes end work at 8:30 to 10:00 PM (thus, I get to see the area for most of the day).

There isn't much crime in Little Tokyo (it's roughly comprised of 4 city blocks), and you will always see police vehicles in the area since there are alot of eateries there (Yogurtland, Pinkberry, Subway, Quiznos, Starbucks, and various restaurants). Alot of plainclothes individuals are also officers who are walking through the area for shopping, food, or heading to their car/train/bus.

However, there are sporadic crime reports in the area surrounding the city. Go to official website of THE LOS ANGELES POLICE DEPARTMENT and click on "crime maps."

Traffic is okay until maybe 5:00 PM through 7:00 PM. Around those times, alot of people are leaving work. Since the traffic lights take time to change, traffic builds up quickly. There are other streets that you can take to avoid the traffic (I think people either don't like to explore, or they like their usual routes).

Public transportation is great in the area. There are bus lines called Dash that take come by every 10 minutes (DASH Routes). Little Tokyo is served by the "A Dash", which heads over to downtown LA. If you walk a couple blocks over to the Court/Immigration building, you can take the "B Dash" which takes you around China Town (which is close enough that I just walk there). If you walk about 3 blocks away, you can reach Union Station which has the "D Dash", metrolink trains, and the metrorail subway lines. (If you take the subway down a couple of stops towards Downtown, there's another line that takes you to Long Beach). There's also a hotel in Little Tokyo, which means that there are taxi cabs waiting on the street.

There are several banks and supermarkets in the area, but the banks aren't the major banks you'd see elsewhere (Union bank, Bank of the East). As for the supermarkets, the nearby ones sell mostly asian foods. The one across the street from my work doesn't even sell soda.

There are alot of housing being developed in the area, but they are mostly condos. It's pretty expensive to live there. The last time I checked, it was about $1800/month for a 1-bedroom. (I don't know how my co-worker did it on his own.) The cost isn't that bad if you're splitting it with someone else, like a significant other. I doubt people are flooding in to live in the expensive buildings, so the availability should be good.

It's not necessary to have a car in the area. I used to take the train in and would walk or use public transportation to get around. (I finally got a monthly parking pass at my work, so I started driving in.) However, southern californians like to drive, so it's nice to have a car around. You might have an urge to head over to Disneyland, a beach, etc. I don't know how overnight parking would work for you since I'm only here in the day.