2026 Top Cities by Overall Score in Los Angeles County

Manhattan Beach neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Walk Streets, Veterans Parkway, The Strand

Manhattan Beach is the northernmost of the South Bay's three beach cities, a small Los Angeles County town squeezed between the El Segundo refinery and Hermosa Beach. People here talk in sections rather than neighborhoods, and Sepulveda Boulevard splits those sections into a beach side and an east s ... See Full Page

Palos Verdes Estates neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Coastal Bluffs, Lunada Bay, Spanish Revival Homes

Palos Verdes Estates is where the flat beach towns of the South Bay run out and the cliffs begin. Drive south out of Redondo Beach and the road climbs into this small Los Angeles County city on the peninsula's northwest shoulder, a place planned a century ago so that open hillsides and undeveloped s ... See Full Page

San Marino neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: El Molino Viejo, Huntington Drive, Period Revival Homes

San Marino is a small, almost entirely residential city in the western San Gabriel Valley, part of Los Angeles County and set between Pasadena and San Gabriel. Homes change as you move east. The western and central streets filled in first, during the 1920s and 1930s, with Spanish Colonial, Monterey ... See Full Page

Rolling Hills neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Equestrian City, Palos Verdes, Crest Road Views

Rolling Hills is what the Palos Verdes Peninsula looked like before the shopping centers arrived, a whole Los Angeles County city kept rural on purpose. Residents incorporated it in 1957, and the same developer, A.E. Hanson, later shaped Hidden Hills in the San Fernando Valley on a similar horse-cou ... See Full Page

Rolling Hills Estates neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Equestrian Suburb, Peninsula Shopping, Botanic Garden

Rolling Hills Estates sits in the green interior of the Palos Verdes Peninsula, one of the few cities up here with no stretch of coastline. That inland position made it the everyday Los Angeles County hub for the peninsula, where people from all four cities end up for groceries, a haircut or dinner. ... See Full Page

Hidden Hills neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Horse Properties, Gated Lanes, Simi Hills

In Hidden Hills the city limit and the front gate are the same line, and that single fact explains most of what daily life is like here. Once past the gate, Hidden Hills has nothing to buy. No store, office or restaurant operates in town, so the whole place is homes, horse paths and quiet lanes wit ... See Full Page

La Crescenta-Montrose neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Crescenta Valley, Korean Food, Le Mesnager Barn

La Crescenta-Montrose is a county-run foothill area in Los Angeles County, one that plenty of drivers pass through on the 210 without realizing it has a name of its own. The freeway works as the town's dividing line. North of it, La Crescenta's streets sit on a diagonal grid that keeps climbing unt ... See Full Page

Westfield/Academy Hills neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Unincorporated Peninsula, Crenshaw Boulevard, Hillside Homes

Crenshaw Boulevard runs south for miles out of central Los Angeles and finishes its trip by climbing into the hills through Westfield and Academy Hills. The area is mostly two things. A private school campus, Chadwick School, occupies the high ground and shapes the traffic around it. The rest is qu ... See Full Page

Westlake Village neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Planned Town, County Line, Boccaccio's

Westlake Village is a planned town at the far western tip of Los Angeles County, still running the way its designers drew it, with a lake at the center, business parks near the freeway and homes arranged around greenbelts and oaks. Around the lake and along Lindero Canyon Road, the houses are the o ... See Full Page

El Segundo neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Beach Town, Aerospace Hub, Marvin Braude Trail

El Segundo is a small beach town with a giant office district attached to its east side. Wedged into the Los Angeles County coast from the airport south to Manhattan Beach, it has the feel of a village on weekends and the energy of a major employment center on weekdays, when aerospace engineers and ... See Full Page

Hermosa Beach neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Beach City, Beach Volleyball, Walk Streets

Squeezed between Manhattan Beach and Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach is the smallest and most casual of the three South Bay beach cities, a surf and volleyball town that never fully dressed up. It covers barely more than a square mile of Los Angeles County coastline, so almost every home is within a bi ... See Full Page

La Canada Flintridge neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Foothill Boulevard, Lanterman House, Angeles Crest

La Canada Flintridge, a small hillside city, sits in Los Angeles County between Pasadena and Glendale at the point where the 210 and the 2 freeways meet. It is the last town before the Angeles Crest Highway climbs into the San Gabriels, and the mountains fill the view at the top of nearly every stre ... See Full Page

La Verne neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Old Town, Antigua Bread, A Line Station

La Verne is a college town wrapped around an old railroad downtown, on Los Angeles County's east flank, with San Dimas on one side and Claremont on the other. Orange groves shaped the place before houses did, and two of them still grow at the Heritage Park off Via De Mansion. The middle of town is ... See Full Page

Rancho Palos Verdes neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Nature Preserve, Point Vicente Bluffs, Coastal Hillsides

Residents of the peninsula's southern slopes formed Rancho Palos Verdes in the early 1970s mostly to keep bulldozers off the hills, and the city still looks like the result. Eastview, along Western Avenue, sits close to San Pedro and shops there. Miraleste tucks houses into wooded canyons on the ea ... See Full Page

South Pasadena neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: 710 Freeway Fight, Arroyo Seco, Historic Homes

South Pasadena is a small city squeezed between Pasadena, Highland Park, Alhambra and San Marino, and it has spent decades defending that size. The Los Angeles County town famously fought off a plan to push the 710 Freeway through its neighborhoods, and the victory left its old houses and big street ... See Full Page

Redondo Beach neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: King Harbor, Riviera Village, North Redondo

Redondo Beach is the South Bay beach town with a harbor at its center, a Los Angeles County city running from the Palos Verdes cliffs north toward the airport side of the bay. King Harbor's marinas, yacht clubs and horseshoe-shaped pier give the waterfront the feel of a small port, with boats and re ... See Full Page

Arcadia neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Santa Anita Park, County Arboretum, Baldwin Avenue

Arcadia spreads south from the San Gabriel Mountains on the east side of Pasadena, its Los Angeles County streets laid over Lucky Baldwin's old Rancho Santa Anita. His land became the Santa Anita racetrack and the county Arboretum, and the peafowl he brought in the 1870s still walk the lawns and roo ... See Full Page

San Dimas neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Via Verde, San Dimas Station, Klatch Coffee

San Dimas is a town split by freeways, sitting where the 210 and the 57 come together below the San Gabriel Mountains in eastern Los Angeles County. Glendora borders it on the west and La Verne on the east, and the pieces of town on either side of the interchange feel noticeably different. North of ... See Full Page

Sierra Madre neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Foothill Village, Sierra Madre Playhouse, Baldwin Avenue

Sierra Madre calls itself the Village of the Foothills, and the name fits better than most civic slogans. Life in this small Los Angeles County town runs on a calendar of homegrown events, from a spring flower festival to a Fourth of July parade to a footrace up the old Mount Wilson Trail. Below th ... See Full Page

About North Hills

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Castaic neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Castaic Road, Castaic Lake, Takuma Ramen

Castaic is the last stop in the Santa Clarita Valley before Interstate 5 begins its long climb north over the mountains, and it grew up as a freeway town with a reservoir attached, up where Los Angeles County runs out to the northwest. East of I-5, planned subdivisions from the 1980s through the 20 ... See Full Page

Diamond Bar neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Diamond Bar Center, Grand View Trail, Mandarin Taste

Diamond Bar fills the hilly southeast corner of Los Angeles County's San Gabriel Valley, right where the county line meets Orange County to the south and San Bernardino County to the east. Brea and Chino Hills sit just over those lines, and Walnut and Rowland Heights border it on the north and west. ... See Full Page

Glendora neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Glendora Public Market, Citrus College, Kamden Coffee

Glendora lines up along the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains in eastern Los Angeles County, the foothill city between Azusa and San Dimas, with Covina and Charter Oak below it to the south. Route 66 and Arrow Highway cross it east to west, and each carries a different slice of the city's shopping. ... See Full Page

La Habra Heights neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Puente Hills Preserve, Equestrian Trails, Rural Hillside

Above the flat grid of La Habra, the road climbs into La Habra Heights, a rural hill city at the eastern end of the Puente Hills on the Los Angeles County side of the Orange County line. Houses sit on parcels of an acre or more, and the mix runs from mid-century ranch homes to large custom builds, ... See Full Page

La Mirada neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Orange County Border, Ranch Homes, Imperial Highway

La Mirada is the last Los Angeles County city many drivers pass on the 5 before Orange County begins, and its identity is tied to that edge. Buena Park, Fullerton and La Habra sit right across the line, so a trip to the grocery store or a restaurant can easily cross county borders without anyone not ... See Full Page

Monrovia neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Aztec Hotel, Jake's Roadhouse, Foothill Views

Monrovia climbs from the flat commercial blocks of Huntington Drive up to the canyon mouths of the San Gabriel Mountains, and the whole Los Angeles County city makes more sense once you follow that slope. Drive north from the old Route 66 and the housing ages as the ground rises. Midcentury ranch h ... See Full Page

Northeast San Gabriel neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Unincorporated Pocket, Fairview Avenue, Log Cabin Steakhouse

Ask someone from Northeast San Gabriel where they live and you'll probably hear the name of a neighboring town first. This unincorporated patch of Los Angeles County fills the spaces left between East Pasadena, Arcadia, Temple City and San Gabriel, and it has no city hall or downtown to call its own ... See Full Page

Santa Monica Mountains neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Topanga Library, Mulholland Highway, Canyon Hamlets

Topanga Canyon Boulevard in the east and Mulholland Highway winding west toward the Ventura County line do most of the work in the Santa Monica Mountains. Topanga is the busiest of them, with a small village center of cafes, shops and a county library in a canyon still known for artists and owner-b ... See Full Page

Saugus (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Unincorporated Saugus, Copper Hill Drive, Oak Woodland

Saugus is best known as a Santa Clarita neighborhood, but a narrow strip carrying the same name lies outside the city along the lower canyons to the north, under Los Angeles County rather than city government. A manufactured-home community fronts Bouquet Canyon Road, and around it are houses on big ... See Full Page

Saugus/Canyon Country neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Small Ranches, Private Open Space, Via Princessa

Most Santa Clarita drivers have looked up at the hills between Saugus and Canyon Country, the brown and green ridges visible from Bouquet Canyon Road on one side and Sierra Highway on the other. They form a block of Los Angeles County territory outside city limits that the city grew around rather th ... See Full Page

Walnut neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Mt. SAC Relays, Suzanne Park, Aroma Craft Coffee

Walnut shares borders with eight other communities in Los Angeles County, from West Covina and La Puente to Pomona and Diamond Bar, yet it keeps a lower profile than almost any of them. Mt. San Antonio College covers a wide campus off Grand Avenue and employs more people than anyone else in town. E ... See Full Page

Bradbury neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Rural Tranquility, Equestrian Trails, Angeles National Forest

Bradbury's city motto is Preserving Rural Tranquility, and the town takes it literally. This Los Angeles County city covers less than two square miles at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains, with the Angeles National Forest rising directly above its upper streets and Monrovia and Duarte wrapped ar ... See Full Page

East Whittier neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Leffingwell Road, Puente Hills, Whittier Greenway

East Whittier is small and unincorporated, a Los Angeles County patch east of Whittier proper, close to where the city gives way to La Mirada. It covers only about a square mile, and most people who live nearby would have trouble saying exactly where the county land stops and the city begins. The s ... See Full Page

La Verne (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: County Golf Course, Fourth Street Mill, Marshall Canyon

Nearly all of unincorporated La Verne is given over to recreation, a strip of Los Angeles County foothills above the city's northern tracts. It holds a regional park, a public golf course and trail access into the canyons, and very little else. Riders, hikers and mountain bikers all use the same ca ... See Full Page

Temple City neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Las Tunas Drive, Fika Fika Coffee, Small Lot Homes

Temple City is a flat, compact grid of small lots near the center of the San Gabriel Valley, and nearly everyone gives directions by one crossroads, Rosemead Boulevard at Las Tunas Drive. Arcadia, San Gabriel and Rosemead border it within Los Angeles County, and it has a smaller, more homespun scale ... See Full Page

Valencia (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Highway 126, Mentryville, New Construction

Highway 126 peels off Interstate 5 toward Ventura County right at the edge of unincorporated Valencia, a Los Angeles County strip along the freeway's west side across from the city of Santa Clarita. Up the slopes to the west, a large master-planned community is being built out in phases, so a new r ... See Full Page

Monterey Park neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Garvey Avenue, Garvey Ranch Observatory, Heritage Falls Park

A tiled waterfall spills down a hillside off Atlantic Boulevard, the leftover of a 1920s plan to build an east side rival to Bel-Air, and it says a lot about Monterey Park. Ramona Acres, the first subdivision, and the blocks around Garfield and Garvey mix early houses, postwar builds and apartments ... See Full Page

About Canoga Park

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Stevenson Ranch neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Planned Community, Towsley Canyon, Yamato

Stevenson Ranch is a planned hillside suburb west of Interstate 5, unincorporated and governed by Los Angeles County, facing the city of Santa Clarita across the freeway. It was drawn up as a single community in the 1980s, so the whole place has a consistent look, and it feels a little more tucked a ... See Full Page

Burbank neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Magnolia Park, Chandler Bikeway, Verdugo Mountains

Burbank is the studio town at the east end of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles County. Griffith Park sits across the river and Glendale is next door, yet it runs as its own compact city, flat, orderly and busy on weekdays. Magnolia Park is the west side shopping street, full of vintage racks ... See Full Page

Bouquet Canyon neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Bouquet Falls, Spunky Canyon Road, Sierra Pelona

Bouquet Canyon is a long, narrow corridor of creek bottom and national forest that climbs from the top of Santa Clarita's northern suburbs into the Sierra Pelona. Living up here means choosing a stretch of it. The lower miles, closer to town, feel like the rural fringe of the valley. Higher up, hou ... See Full Page

Canyon Country (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Unincorporated Canyon Country, Tractor Supply, Vasquez Canyon Road

Canyon Country comes in two versions, and the unincorporated one is the ring of county land wrapped around the Santa Clarita neighborhood of the same name, in the northeast corner of the valley. Outside the Santa Clarita city limits, Los Angeles County itself governs the canyon mouths and hillsides ... See Full Page

Cerritos neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Performing Arts Center, Lunasia Dim Sum, Planned Suburb

On a Saturday, a good share of southeast Los Angeles County ends up in Cerritos for something, whether it is a car, a concert or a pair of shoes. The planning shows everywhere. Residential tracts went up quickly around 1970, when pastures were subdivided almost overnight, so most homes are one- and ... See Full Page

Glendora (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Big Dalton Canyon, Colby Trail, San Gabriel Foothills

Most of unincorporated Glendora is canyon, chaparral and steep ground in the San Gabriel foothills of Los Angeles County, with only a scattering of private homes along its lower edges. The city streets stop at its boundary, and above that line the land belongs mostly to the county and to federal for ... See Full Page

Val Verde neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Resort History, Valencia Town Center, Hill Town

Val Verde is a hill town with a long memory. The community sits on unincorporated Los Angeles County land in the northwest corner of the Santa Clarita Valley, a few miles west of the freeway and Six Flags Magic Mountain, and in the decades before civil rights law it was one of the few Southern Calif ... See Full Page

Culver City neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Ballona Creek, Sony Pictures, Downtown Dining

Culver City is a compact, oddly shaped town on the Westside of Los Angeles County, wedged between Palms, Mar Vista, Baldwin Hills and the 405. Unlike the Los Angeles neighborhoods around it, it runs its own buses, parks and pool, and its downtown pulls in diners from across the region. Downtown is ... See Full Page

About Sun Valley

Claremont (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Wilderness Park, California Botanic Garden, Palmer Canyon

Look north from almost any street in the college town and the brushy slopes on the skyline belong to unincorporated Claremont. Beyond the city limits, the Los Angeles County land here is steep, largely roadless foothill country climbing from the top of the city toward the San Gabriel peaks. Palmer ... See Full Page

East Pasadena neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: East Colorado Boulevard, Yang Chow, Chapman Woods

East Pasadena is a county-run stretch of Los Angeles County that most visitors assume belongs to its famous neighbor, since it shares the name and the same wall of San Gabriel Mountains on the horizon. Colorado Boulevard, Foothill Boulevard and Rosemead Boulevard, which doubles as State Route 19, a ... See Full Page

Placerita Canyon neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Movie Ranch, Canyon Road, Old Town Newhall

Film crews, hikers and horse owners all share the same two-lane road in Placerita Canyon. This rural canyon, unincorporated and under Los Angeles County rule, opens off the Antelope Valley Freeway just east of Newhall, and shortly past the on-ramp the stucco of Santa Clarita gives way to creekside o ... See Full Page

West Chatsworth neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Oat Mountain, Chatsworth Reservoir, Hillside Parcels

Few people live in West Chatsworth, and the land makes the reason obvious. This unincorporated band of Los Angeles County covers the steep sandstone country between the Chatsworth city streets and the Ventura County line, where the Santa Susana Pass carries the 118 freeway over to Simi Valley. Home ... See Full Page

About Westmont

Glendale neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Brand Park, Verdugo Mountains, Honolulu Avenue

Glendale wraps around the Verdugo Mountains between Burbank, Pasadena and the Los Angeles River, and its Los Angeles County ground runs from flat grid to steep canyon. A dense downtown of towers and shopping sits a few miles from canyon roads where deer cross the pavement, and it feels more self-con ... See Full Page

Agua Dulce neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Reyes Winery, High Desert, Maria Bonita

Agua Dulce is a high-desert wine and horse town in the northern hills of Los Angeles County, strung along Sierra Highway where the drive from Santa Clarita to Palmdale leaves the suburbs behind. Canyon Country lies to the south and Acton to the north, and this community keeps a looser, more open lay ... See Full Page

Artesia neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Little India, Vegetarian Thali, South Street

Artesia can be crossed by car in a few minutes, yet this small southeast Los Angeles County city pulls in diners from Orange County, the South Bay and the San Gabriel Valley every weekend. Rather than distinct neighborhoods, the variety comes street by street. Pioneer Boulevard around 186th Street ... See Full Page

Covina (Charter Oak) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Charter Oak Unified, Taqueria Poncitlan, Arrow Highway

Charter Oak is defined as much by its school district as by any map line, an unincorporated place that Los Angeles County governs, set between Covina, Glendora and San Dimas. Most homes in Charter Oak are single-story houses on flat, regular blocks, broken up by apartment buildings and a couple of ... See Full Page

Covina (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Hillside Streets, Bonelli Regional Park, Raging Waters

Drivers on the 10 pass unincorporated Covina without knowing it, though plenty of them notice the giant mosaic on the hillside at Forest Lawn Covina Hills. Homes carry Covina mailing addresses, but roads, parks and permits run through the county. The residential part is compact, a few hillside stre ... See Full Page

East Covina neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Ranch Tracts, Sunkist Park, Suburban Streets

Most of what people call East Covina is ranch-house country, block after block of postwar homes spreading from Covina's old downtown toward the Glendora and San Dimas lines. The blocks nearest Citrus Avenue feel like an extension of the older city, with smaller lots and a few earlier houses. Moving ... See Full Page

Leona Valley neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Cherry Orchards, Bouquet Canyon Road, Horse Property

Leona Valley is the quiet back way between Palmdale and the Santa Clarita side of Los Angeles County, a long slot of orchards and horse pasture where Elizabeth Lake Road and Bouquet Canyon Road meet. The valley changes as you drive through it. Orchards and small vineyard blocks share the flats with ... See Full Page

Marina del Rey neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Harbor Town, Admiralty Way, Paddleboarding

Marina del Rey is Los Angeles County's own harbor town, a waterfront the county dug, still owns and still runs. Venice borders it on one side and Playa del Rey on the other, and while the addresses and the pace feel like the Westside, the landlord behind nearly every building is the county itself. ... See Full Page

San Francisquito Canyon/Bouquet Canyon neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: San Francisquito Canyon, Bouquet Reservoir, Pacific Crest Trail

San Francisquito Canyon and its eastern neighbor, Bouquet Canyon, form the backcountry wedge of Los Angeles County between Saugus and the Antelope Valley. Both roads leave the last cul-de-sacs of Santa Clarita behind and climb into the Sierra Pelona, coming out near Green Valley, Elizabeth Lake and ... See Full Page

South San Gabriel neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Montebello Hills, Japanese Grocery, Del Mar Avenue

South San Gabriel ranks among the smaller unincorporated pieces of Los Angeles County, under a square mile of homes where the valley floor begins climbing into the Montebello Hills. Housing is almost all single-family, and most of it is owner-occupied. The northern blocks sit on flatter ground, whi ... See Full Page

West LA neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: VA Campus, Jackie Robinson Stadium, Wadsworth Chapel

The West LA on this page is a very different place from the West LA most Angelenos mean. The campus reads in sections. One part holds the medical center and the old soldiers home grounds, where a long-range plan is adding housing for veterans among buildings that date back generations. Another is g ... See Full Page

Arcadia (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: East Arcadia, Shady Brady's, Postwar Tract Homes

South of the city limits, the ground flattens out and the streets of unincorporated Arcadia turn practical. Its neighborhoods, chiefly East Arcadia and Mayflower Village, are Los Angeles County territory tucked among Temple City, Monrovia and El Monte, and they have a lower, plainer profile than the ... See Full Page

Azusa (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: County Streets, Vincent And Citrus, Mountain Views

The flat grid of county streets known as unincorporated Azusa runs between three cities at once, with Azusa to the north, Covina to the south and Glendora to the east. The two main pieces feel a little different. The Vincent side, west toward Azusa Avenue, is a dense stretch of single-story homes o ... See Full Page

Del Aire neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Dockweiler Beach, Air Force Base, El Segundo Boulevard

Aviation shaped Del Aire in more than name. Del Aire, a small unincorporated pocket of Los Angeles County, shares a fence line with Los Angeles Air Force Base, sits a few minutes south of LAX, and borders the office towers of El Segundo. The community comes in two pieces, one on each side of El Seg ... See Full Page

Duarte (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: County Islands, Santa Fe Dam, Postwar Tract Homes

Near the spot where the 605 runs north into the 210, a scattering of county-run blocks carries a Duarte address without being part of the city of Duarte. Locals call it unincorporated Duarte, one of several small Los Angeles County islands in this corner of the San Gabriel Valley, surrounded by Monr ... See Full Page

Elizabeth Lake neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: San Francisquito Canyon, Aqueduct Tunnel, Mountain Road

Elizabeth Lake sits on a thin line between two worlds, with the high desert of the Antelope Valley on one side and the Sierra Pelona on the other. This unincorporated Los Angeles County settlement strings along a two-lane mountain road between Lake Hughes and Leona Valley, and the fault that shaped ... See Full Page

Hacienda Heights neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Colima Road, Taiwanese Breakfast, Hillside Streets

Colima Road works as the main street of Hacienda Heights, a long boulevard of shopping plazas where bakeries, noodle houses and grocery stores run for miles along the base of the hills. Near the freeway and along Hacienda Boulevard the ground is flat and the blocks are regular, filled with postwar ... See Full Page

Kinneloa Mesa neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Landscape Recovery Center, Hastings Ranch, Hillside Rebuild

Kinneloa Mesa, a hillside enclave too small for a city government, belongs to Los Angeles County and is reached from Pasadena by Kinneloa Mesa Road and Kinneloa Canyon Road, which climb until the national forest takes over. The founder, Abbot Kinney, gave the streets their Hawaiian-style names. Fir ... See Full Page

Ladera Heights neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Park To Playa, La Cienega, Old Ladera

Ladera Heights is the hinge between the Westside and South LA. This unincorporated hillside community in Los Angeles County looks one way toward Culver City and Westchester and the other toward Inglewood and View Park, and La Cienega Boulevard runs straight through the middle on its way to LAX. Two ... See Full Page

Newhall (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Newhall Pass, Old Town Newhall, Mentryville

The Newhall Pass is where Interstate 5 and Highway 14 squeeze through the hills into the Santa Clarita Valley, and unincorporated Newhall, a thin Los Angeles County band, lines the frontage road on the valley side of that gap. A mobile home community along The Old Road holds most of the households, ... See Full Page

South Whittier neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Telegraph Road, Postwar Tracts, South Whittier Library

South Whittier is one of the larger unincorporated communities in Los Angeles County, a broad stretch of homes spread south of the Whittier city limit toward Norwalk, with Santa Fe Springs to the west and La Mirada to the east. Most houses are single-story and date from the 1950s onward, on lots th ... See Full Page

Twin Lakes/Oat Mountain neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Santa Susana Mountains, Stoney Point, Mountain Lions

Browns Canyon Road runs north out of Chatsworth and keeps going after the valley houses end, and that is the way into Twin Lakes. Homes cluster along a few winding lanes near the bottom, where the houses vary widely in age and size, and they spread out as the road climbs toward open ranch land. Not ... See Full Page

Universal City neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Cahuenga Pass, Studio City, NBC Sports Grill

Universal City occupies the hilltop at the top of the Cahuenga Pass, where Hollywood gives way to the San Fernando Valley. The area splits into a few distinct zones. The upper hill is the public side, with Universal Studios Hollywood and its rides, the hotels and the CityWalk promenade. Down at the ... See Full Page

Wiseburn neighborhoods ranked

Lakewood neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Postwar Ranch Homes, Lakewood Center, River Trail

Lakewood is southeast Los Angeles County's planned postwar suburb, a flat city of ranch houses wedged between Long Beach, Bellflower and Cerritos. Most of it was built in a rush after 1950, with model-home tours drawing lines around the block and whole tracts rising within a couple of years. Look c ... See Full Page

Santa Monica neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Palisades Park, Main Street, Farmers Market

Santa Monica is a beach city of its own where Los Angeles County meets the Pacific, wrapped by the city of Los Angeles on three sides and the ocean on the fourth. Downtown mixes new apartment buildings with the Third Street Promenade and a steady flow of visitors. Ocean Park keeps its older cottage ... See Full Page

Altadena neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Sam Merrill Trail, Lake Avenue, Fire Recovery

Most of the big streets in Altadena, Lake, Lincoln and Fair Oaks among them, start in Pasadena and simply keep going uphill, so the line between the two is easy to miss. Los Angeles County runs Altadena directly, without a city hall, yet it has always had its own main streets, its own trailheads and ... See Full Page

Bell Gardens neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Rio Hondo, Depression Era, Eastern Avenue

Bell Gardens is a small city squeezed between two river channels in the southeast part of Los Angeles County, with the Los Angeles River and the 710 along its western side and the Rio Hondo curving past its eastern parkland. The housing tells the story of how the city filled in. Much of the city gr ... See Full Page

Duarte neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Foothill City, Gene's Grinders, Huntington Drive

Duarte is a compact foothill city where the mountains, a major medical campus and a stop on the Metro A Line all sit within about two miles of each other. The city changes as the ground rises. South of Huntington Drive, flat blocks of postwar ranch houses and several mobile home parks fill the grid ... See Full Page

El Camino Village neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Crenshaw Boulevard, Lake Loop, South Bay

Four South Bay cities surround El Camino Village, and none of them owns it. This unincorporated square of Los Angeles County, listed on some maps as Alondra Park, sits between Lawndale, Gardena, Hawthorne and Torrance, and Crenshaw and Manhattan Beach Boulevards cross near its middle. The community ... See Full Page

Kagel/Lopez Canyons neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Lopez Canyon, Little Tujunga, Horse Trails

Two canyons, two moods. Kagel and Lopez Canyons climb side by side out of the northeast San Fernando Valley into the San Gabriel foothills, and together they make up a stretch of horse country in unincorporated Los Angeles County between Sylmar, Lake View Terrace and the national forest. Lopez Cany ... See Full Page

Lake Manor neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Valley Circle Boulevard, Sandstone Boulders, Iverson Movie Ranch

Nearly every trip to or from Lake Manor begins on Valley Circle Boulevard, the road that curls around the western rim of Chatsworth before the Simi Hills take over. Near the bottom, homes sit on hillside lots of every shape, fitted around boulders and old oaks, with long driveways and views east ov ... See Full Page

Lomita neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: South Bay Dining, Postwar Bungalows, Pacific Coast Highway

When people up in the Palos Verdes hills want ramen, a haircut or a hardware run, they often drive down into Lomita. This small, flat Los Angeles County city sits where Torrance, Harbor City and the peninsula meet, and it has spent six decades insisting on being its own place. The feel is a working ... See Full Page

Norwalk neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Registrar-Recorder, Cerritos College, Norwalk Station

Plenty of people across the region have been to Norwalk without living anywhere near it, because Los Angeles County keeps its Registrar-Recorder and County Clerk headquarters here. Marriage licenses, property records and, every election season, the counting of ballots all run through offices on Impe ... See Full Page

Rowland Heights neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Puente Hills, Taiwanese Food, 99 Ranch Market

Rowland Heights climbs the north face of the Puente Hills, and this unincorporated Los Angeles County community runs without a city hall. Hacienda Heights sits to the west, Diamond Bar to the east, and the ridge above the last houses is where Orange County begins. Down near the Pomona Freeway the g ... See Full Page

Santa Fe Springs neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Job Center, Green Olive, Swap Meet

On a weekday morning, far more people drive into Santa Fe Springs than live there. Home to roughly 19,000 residents, this Los Angeles County town is a regional job center, with distribution hubs, manufacturers and company headquarters spread across most of its land, and the residential side of town ... See Full Page

Valinda neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Caramelo Cafe, County Community, Remodeled Homes

Weekend mornings in Valinda often start with crepes, waffles and a cup of cafe de olla at Caramelo Cafe on Valinda Avenue. Unincorporated, with Los Angeles County in place of a city hall, the community is a flat, fully built-out square of the San Gabriel Valley wedged between the La Puente and West ... See Full Page

West Whittier/Los Nietos neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Washington Boulevard, Los Nietos Library, Norwalk Boulevard

West Whittier-Los Nietos has no city hall, no mayor and no city limits sign of its own. Los Angeles County governs this unincorporated area directly, and it sits in the triangle between Whittier, Pico Rivera and Santa Fe Springs, with the 605 and the San Gabriel River running along its western side. ... See Full Page

Whittier (unincorporated) neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Puente Hills Preserve, Hellman Park, Skyline Drive

The Puente Hills rise sharply behind the city of Whittier, and most of that ridge is unincorporated Whittier, a county-run stretch of Los Angeles County where open space far outnumbers houses. It divides the Whittier flats from the San Gabriel Valley, and from the top the view runs across both. A c ... See Full Page

Beverly Hills neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Rodeo Drive, Beverly Gardens Park, Trousdale Estates

Beverly Hills is a small, self-governing city surrounded on nearly every side by Los Angeles, sitting on the Westside of Los Angeles County between West Hollywood, Century City and the Santa Monica Mountains. Down low, the Golden Triangle packs the shops, hotels and offices around Rodeo Drive. The ... See Full Page

West Hollywood neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Santa Monica Boulevard, Design District, Apartment Living

West Hollywood is its own city within Los Angeles County, bordered by Beverly Hills to the west, and its personality changes with each of the long boulevards that cross it. Walk a few blocks north or south and the whole tone of the place shifts. Santa Monica Boulevard, in the middle, is the everyda ... See Full Page

Azusa neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Foothill City, Downtown Dining, Metro Stations

Two Metro A Line stations bracket Azusa, one at the downtown core and one beside the college campuses on the east side, and between them sits a foothill city that has grown up around both the trains and the students. The northern streets climb toward the foothills with ranch houses and bungalows on ... See Full Page

Bassett neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Unincorporated Pocket, Soccer Park, Vineland Corridor

Ask for directions to Bassett and you will probably be pointed toward La Puente, since the two share a ZIP code and plenty of maps never print the smaller name. Vineland Avenue runs up the middle as the everyday route, carrying the park, the nursery and a handful of storefronts. Off it, the side st ... See Full Page

Bell neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Florence Avenue, Birria Tacos, Prewar Bungalows

Bell is a compact, walkable city in southeast Los Angeles County where three avenues do almost all the work. Gage, Florence and Atlantic carry the shops, taquerias and bus lines, and the houses spread out in the grid between them, with the river marking the eastern edge. Stucco bungalows from the 1 ... See Full Page

Downey neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Apollo Program, Regional Mall, Wood Fire BBQ

Downey is the kind of Los Angeles County suburb that still feels like the 1950s put it together on purpose. Wide boulevards, ranch houses with backyard pools, drive-in era signs and a regional mall set the pattern, and the city sits between South Gate and Norwalk with Bellflower and Pico Rivera on i ... See Full Page

San Fernando neighborhoods ranked

Keywords: Independent City, Shadow Grove Brewing, Walkable Downtown

Walk the length of Maclay Avenue and you pass most of what makes San Fernando work: a public library, tamale and mariscos counters, bakeries and a long run of storefronts. The city is a compact, independent Los Angeles County town, with Los Angeles pressing in on all four sides, and it has kept its ... See Full Page