Houghton Park, Long Beach, CA

Houghton Park takes its name from the 26-acre park at its center, and in this corner of North Long Beach the park really is the town square. Ball diamonds, soccer fields, tennis and basketball courts and a skate park built in 2004 fill the grounds, and a memorial to local Vietnam veterans stands near the community center. The history is simple. The Houghton family donated the first piece of the park in 1924 in honor of Sherman Otis Houghton, a former congressman who had a ranch on the land. The streets around it filled in later with modest single-story houses, most of them stucco with small front yards, plus apartments near Atlantic Avenue. DeForest Park, on the west side of the neighborhood, adds 34 acres of restored wetlands that opened in 2018, with trails, native plants and good bird watching along the Los Angeles River. The DeForest Park Neighborhood Association is active and organizes cleanups and meetings at the park clubhouse. Atlantic Avenue is the main street. The Michelle Obama Neighborhood Library opened here as the new north library, and El Pollo Imperial serves Peruvian chicken a few blocks up. La Catrina Michoacana Paleteria scoops paletas and ice cream, and Daily Bread Bakery is on the same stretch. Getting around mostly means driving. The 91 traces the city's northern edge and the 710 sits across the river, so freeway access is easy. For a big grocery run, Food 4 Less on Cherry Avenue is a few minutes east. The limit is that the shops on Atlantic lean toward counter service and quick stops, and there are few places to linger over dinner nearby. Houghton Park fills that role instead, and on summer evenings the ball fields and courts are the busiest place in the neighborhood.