echo park / highland park / eagle rock gentrification? (Cypress, Brea: middle-class, apartments)

[violet42]

hello,

so I currently live on the westside, but I recently visited pasadena and thought it was really cute and am considering an eventual move to that side of town. I like that pasadena is also close to the cool bars/restaurants/scene in silverlake/los feliz.

i don't know that much about that part of town otherwise, but I have seen that echo park and eagle rock have started to become more gentrified/white/artsy, etc. from the people who know those neighborhoods, do you think this gentrification has the potential to potentially spill over into highland park? it seems like highland park is the one real festering sore of a neighborhood left in that general area - would be really nice to see it cleaned up a bit. are there any nice houses there or reasons for a white/artsy/up and coming population to move in there?

[BRinSM]

from what i've heard, highland park was on its way down the gentrification path, but the process slowed drastically due to the burst of the housing bubble. I also understand that the same is true for echo park although it may have been a bit further down the path than highland park.

[LASam]

I visited Eagle Rock a couple weeks ago, and I can vouch that it not only has started to become gentrified... but it's already all the way there. Atwater Village may be another good place to check out.

[the one]

very true. in echo the gent started in the 90's. in HLP it started this decade and mostly right before the housing boom.

but it has slowed down. those areas are very nice. and becoming more and more diverse.

they have their rough spots, but the housing stock in HLP is pretty charming.

Originally Posted by BRinSM

from what i've heard, highland park was on its way down the gentrification path, but the process slowed drastically due to the burst of the housing bubble. I also understand that the same is true for echo park although it may have been a bit further down the path than highland park.

[LABornandRaised]

You are correct to wonder if it has completely gentrified because it has not. There are still sections of highland park with apartments/homes with too many families living in one dwelling. Typically, that does not equal a gentrified area. That's usually one of the stages of gentrification though. When the poorer people cannot afford an area, they move in with friends/relatives, etc.

I have an acquaintance who lives in Highland Park and I periodically drive her home so she doesn't have to take the bus with her daughter. There are nice parts and dirty parts to the area, like many areas. I think if you want consistent "soft" spots, then move to the areas surrounding highland park, but not directly in it.

[happ]

Moving from the Westside to Northeast LA means you will likely need air conditioning & smog is, of-course, worse than the beach cities. But Eagle Rock has always been a good mix of middle-class Anglos\ Asians\ Latinos. Highland Pk & Echo Pk are more hispanic w/ some gang activity [esp HP] & some neighborhoods are worn down houses. I have lived in the area for many years & have never had problems day or night.

[avseahawks]

The Northeast neighborhoods actually fall into one of two categories: established middle-class areas with a limited history of seediness/gang activity (i don't mean bohemian seedy like Silverlake was in the 60's I mean dangerous seedy) or none at all (Eagle Rock, Mt. Washington, Silverlake) and areas that were and partly still are gang infested (Highland Park, Glassell Park, Cypress Park [by far the most dangerous of all of these areas], Echo Park, Elysian Park, and Elysian Valley). Atwater Village as a long and thin community falls into both. The northern half closest to Los Feliz has always had a completely different feel from the southern half closer to Fletcher which has always been run-down.

The point is that the latter group of neighborhoods plus Atwater are the areas that have been undergoing varying degrees of gentrification (a lot in Echo Park, hardly any in Cypress Park), the southern portion of Silverlake that overlaps with the Echo Park gangs having already done so in the 90's and the southern portion of Eagle Rock in the early 2000s with the Highland park gangs so those neighborhoods could be considered fully gentrified while MW and the majority of those two neighborhoods, and far north Atwater Village were always established

[King0fthehill]

Highland Park sure as hell doesn't seem gentrified. Other than a few hipsters at Antigua Bread/Ave.50 loft space and a few homes and here and there that've been fixed up, it's your average NELA nabe. That makes me wonder, why did HP get all hyped up anyways? It definitely has some charm (abundant riverstone walls and facades, awesome murals, California Craftsman architecture, small groceries and low-scale character, etc), but its removed distance from the "cool areas" and established gang presence might outweight that. HP seemed to be more hype than tangible, visible progress.

Though, with everybody knowing how much I love taking photos, if somebody can prove to me otherwise (i.e show me these spots where gentrification is visible), I'll gladly take up that offer.

Edit: EP is far, far more along the gentrification road, if you can call it that, than HP. HP (and Koreatown, Mid-City, Near-South LA, amongst other areas) was fairly late to the gentrification game - coming in at the tail end of the boom, a fact that one is certainly made felt to. EP is also, IMO anyways, a much more desirable neighborhood with alot more to do, and also not so out of the way; HP, on the other hand, feels very desolate and barren, and decidedly un-trendy. As mentioned earlier, it certainly doesn't help that it is, uh, rather far. I wouldn't even bother lumping EP with the NELA locales; different vibes, character, feel, look, etc. Oh, and it might be just me, but that whole area (NELA, along with the Valley) is WAY TOO HOT during the summer for my personal liking.

La Estralla taco's, however, is totally worth it! Highland Park might just be the capital of our fair city when it comes to taco truck culture.

[timelesschild]

I totally agree with you, King. I'm in Highland Park almost every day of my life and have yet to see the gentrification. Well, there is a cute coffee shop on York. A. cute. coffee. shop. In 22 blocks. So gentrified.

But La Estrella taco truck - yummmm!

[DADDY00]

**** that check out drew street THE AVENUES TOWN