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November 17, 2007
Where the Heck is Arleta?
Since it's the last day of geography week and we've been all about the neighborhoods, here is a fantastic map of Los Angeles neighborhoods from LA Almanac. As we have previously discussed, it is pretty hard to get accurate, official neighborhood boundaries. This "unofficial" map is one of the most comprehensive and comprehensible sources I've seen thus far, offering an excellent overview of the city. For a large version that is much more readable, click here.
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looks like it's between Panorama City & Pacoima. :)
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Ok, then, now where are my keys?
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Arleta...the good part of Pacoima. It's right where it should be. :)
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There are a ton of the blue sign neighborhoods that aren't on here:
Holmby Hills, Franklin Village, West LA Civic Center, Brentwood Village etc. and Toluca Lake actually has like 4 diff Toluca signs with slight variations on the name.
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I'm sort of amused that people are so shocked to discover that the city neighborhood signage doesn't conform with known civic zoning. Signage is about identity politics and parochial nationalism, not urban planning. That the urban planning departments are avoiding the highly contested political issue of giving a definite boundary to every neighborhood with a sign shouldn't be surprising at all. The neighborhood signs reflect more than practical zoning for the purposes of providing public services and representation. The neighborhood signs are about identity.
Westside Village, for example, is technically part of Palms (although Mar Vista has laid claim on that area too) as far as the neighborhood councils are concerned, but because residents of this particular part of Palms feel that they are a distinct community with a separate identity, they wanted signs to label them "Westside Village". Even the boundaries between areas with neighborhood councils are disputed: look at the dispute between Palms and Mar Vista over signage on Overland.
Furthermore, civic zoning is established through a completely different process than the process by which neighborhood signs are placed. Neighborhood councils were created by fusing communities with different pre-existing signage, while re-districting of the city occurs without regard to the placement of (largely symbolic) blue signs.
My advice: find a doctoral student in urban sociology desperate for a dissertation topic and willing to be exploited for the good of the blogosphere. Just don't expect a nice, clean map that everyone agrees on...
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It's not a very recent map, so it omits some of the newer "breakaway" neighborhoods (like "Toluca Terrace" and "West Toluca Lake", both of which used to be part of North Hollywood).
Hmm. Maybe that's why no one has found a "North Hollywood" sign - it's been chipped away at for so long that all the orignal borders are now something else - Toluca Terrace, Valley Village, etc.
Still, it's a better map than the one Wendy Greuel's office produced, at least when it comes to matching the displayed borders to the posted blue signs and where the locals think the borders are.
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Thank you, Coreyander. Please, may we copy and paste that at the beginning of every neighborhood project?
...and thanks to everyone for helping out with missing spots.
I am very tempted to find a graphic art grad student, a welder and cement mixer and start posting random blue signs ALL OVER THE PLACE - Little Luxemborg, Wellville, Munchkinland, Funky Town, Little Sicily, Hell A, East Jipip, Nowheresville, Tonka Town, Togoville, Oompa Hills, Sump View, Hipsville, Funky Junction...
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Elise: graphic arts grad students are a dime a dozen. Take an afternoon off, go to Art Center in Pasadizzle, and you'll leave with 30 blue sign making MACHINES.
Personally, I'm thinking Rangoon Canyon, Tikrit Town, Little Vatican City, New Rhodesia, or maybe Whitehaven (just put it on the edge of the USC campus)
Oh, I could crack myself up all night...
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oh, and copy and paste to your heart's desire
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I love this map. I've had a copy I keep in my car for a few years. I drive a Prius so it helps me figure out if I'm in LA city and can get free metered parking or if I'm in LA County and have to pony up the quarters.
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what happened to the map link? I could really use this!