Cortez Hill, San Diego, CA

Cortez Hill takes its name from the old El Cortez Hotel and covers the northeast end of downtown San Diego, a raised grid of about thirty blocks between Ash Street and Interstate 5. Bankers Hill sits across the freeway, and Balboa Park lies just past State Route 163. It is one of the oldest residential parts of the city, and the hill itself rises east of Sixth Avenue while the flatter blocks to the west go by Cortez West. The El Cortez opened as a hotel in 1927 and stood as the tallest building in San Diego until the early 1960s. It now holds condos, and much of the hill follows the same pattern. Residential towers and mid-rise buildings fill the blocks, many of them added after a 1992 redevelopment plan pushed for new housing, with upper floors looking over the bay and Balboa Park. St. Joseph's, built as a church in 1875 and a cathedral since 1936, still stands on its original site, and California Western School of Law has kept its campus here since 1973. Tweet Street Park, which opened in 2008, runs along the freeway edge as a green buffer between the traffic and the homes behind it. Balboa Park is close enough for a morning run, and the waterfront is an easy downhill walk west along Ash Street. Dining on Cortez Hill is small and local. Osteria Cotto e Mangiato sits beside the El Cortez on Ash Street, cooking Sicilian-leaning pasta, wood-fired pizza and seafood every night of the week. Cocina 35 on Sixth Avenue built its name on chilaquiles, with several house salsas to choose from at breakfast and brunch. Quigley Fine Wines on Fourth Avenue runs a tasting room and bar pouring boutique bottles from Europe, Australia and New Zealand, Tuesday through Saturday evenings. Errands mostly mean walking downhill. Corner markets handle the basics, and the larger supermarkets are in the Marina and East Village, a short trip south. Little Italy's restaurants and the Gaslamp Quarter are both within walking range. Living on the freeway edge of Cortez Hill has a price, and the steady hum of I-5 and the 163 carries up to the northern blocks. Climb to a rooftop at dusk, though, and the view runs across the downtown towers to the bay.