GREATER LOS ANGELES AREA

The 'Greater Los Angeles Area', or the 'Southland', is the agglomeration of urbanized area around the city of Los Angeles, California, United States. There are two "official" definitions—the Los Angeles metropolitan area consisting only of the Los Angeles and Orange counties, and the Combined Statistical Area (a group of interacting metropolitan areas) sprawled over five counties in the southern part of California, namely Los Angeles County, Orange County, San Bernardino County, Riverside County and Ventura County. A common unofficial definition includes the region ranging from Ventura County to the southwestern area of San Bernardino County. It is not always meaningful to refer to Los Angeles as a distinct city, and people outside of Southern California often refer to the entire region as 'L.A.' even though it includes five counties, more than 100 distinct municipalities, and more people than any individual state except for Texas, New York, Florida, and California itself.
The region contains some of the most affluent areas of the country, namely in Ventura, Los Angeles, and Orange Counties. It has been one of fastest growing regions in the United States for decades, first in Los Angeles County, then Orange County, and now in the Inland Empire. As of 2005, the official estimate of the population of the Los Angeles metropolitan area is more than 12.9 million, while the larger five-county region has a population of over 17.6 million. Either definition makes it the second-largest core-based statistical area^[3] in the country, behind the New York metropolitan area. The U.S. Bureau of the Census has designated the five county region as the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Riverside consolidated area, with a July 1, 2006 population estimate of 17,776,000^[4]. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the Los Angeles metropolitan area has a total area of 4,850 square miles (12,562 km²), while the wider combined statistical area covers 33,954 square miles (87,941 km²), but more than half of this is the sparsely populated eastern areas of Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Contents

Geography

Urban Form

Identity

Boundaries

Tourism

Theme Parks

Beaches

Shopping

Motion Picture Studios

Waterparks

Zoos and Aquariums

Nightlife

Museums

Other

Commercial Airports

Sports

Counties in the Southland

Regions of the Southland

Cities

County Seats of the Greater L.A. area

Other important cities of the Greater L.A. area

Cities with a population over 200,000

Cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants

See also

References

Geography

Urban Form

Los Angeles has a long-standing reputation for sprawl; however, this reputation is more historic than real. Los Angeles became a major city just as the Pacific Electric Railway spread population to smaller cities much as interurbans did in East Coast cities. In the first decades of the twentieth century, the area was marked by a network of fairly dense but separated cities linked by rail. The ascendance of the automobile helped fill in these commuter towns, leading to a slight decrease in density.
However, Los Angeles is in fact among the denser urban areas in the nation. The overall density of the city (municipality) of Los Angeles is low compared to some other large American cities (less than one-third the density of New York City, for instance).^[5] However, this figure is deceiving, in part because the region includes largely uninhabited areas such as parts of the Santa Monica Mountains; many of the city's suburban satellites have densities among the highest in the nation.^[6] The population density of the central area was more than 13,500 per square mile in 2000[2]. Within its urbanized areas, Los Angeles is noted for small lot sizes, low vacancy rates, and general lack of large exurban spreads. This area stretches over 120 square miles and has a population of 1,750,000.
Suburban areas surround the city of Los Angeles on all sides. Starting in the early twentieth century, there was a large growth in population on the western edges of the city moving to the San Fernando Valley and out into the Conejo Valley which comprises Calabasas, Hidden Hills, Agoura Hills, Agoura, Oak Park, Westlake Village, Lake Sherwood, Hidden Valley, Thousand Oaks, and Newbury Park which was formerly an unincorporated area that is now the most westerly part of Thousand Oaks, and into the rest of Ventura County. Much of the working class whites migrated to this area during the 1960s and 1970s out of East and Central Los Angeles.^[7] As a result, there was a large growth in population into the Conejo Valley and into Ventura County through the US 101 corridor. Making the US 101 a full freeway in the 1960s and expansions that followed helped make commuting to Los Angeles easier and opened the way for development westward. Development in Ventura County and along the US 101 corridor remains controversial, with open-space advocates battling those who feel business development is necessary to economic growth.^[8] Although the area still has abundant amount of open space and land, almost all of it was put aside and mandated never to be developed as part of the master plan of each city. Because of this, this area which was once a relatively inexpensive area to buy real estate, has seen rising real estate prices.^[9] Median home prices in the Conejo Valley for instance, now range from $700,000 to $2.2 million.^[10]
New, cheaper or undeveloped areas are being sought, and recently popular areas have been in Riverside County, Irvine, and Coachella Valley. As such, in these areas, populations as well as housing prices have exploded.
The Los Angeles urbanized area has the highest density of any over 1,000,000 in the United States. The Los Angeles urban area had a density of 7,070 people per square mile (2,730/km²) according to the 2000 census. The area continues to grow, principally on the periphery, especially in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties, which attracted most of the population increase between 2000 and 2006. This growth continues both adjacent to existing development and significant development is also occurring outside the urbanized area in the desert regions of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. As in virtually all US core cities, there is now residential development in the downtown area, both new buildings and renovation of former office buildings. The ''Los Angeles Downtown News'' keeps a list of ongoing development projects, updated every quarter, [3].

Identity

The term "Greater Los Angeles" can be used to denote the metropolitan area or the consolidated area. The term "Southland" is more nebulous and can refer to either. As is the case in virtually all major metropolitan areas, most employment is now outside the downtown core and many people commute and conduct all of their daily activities in suburban areas, such as the large counties and the municipalities that are outside the city of Los Angeles.

Boundaries

Some areas are bounded by natural features such as mountains or the ocean; others are marked by city boundaries, freeways, or other constructed landmarks. For example, Downtown Los Angeles is the area of Los Angeles roughly enclosed by three freeways and one river: the Harbor Freeway to the west, the U.S. Route 101 to the north, the Los Angeles River to the east, and the Santa Monica Freeway to the south. Or, the San Fernando Valley: lying north-northwest of downtown ("The Valley") is a 15-mile (24-km) wide basin ringed by mountains.
Some other areas of Los Angeles include the Westside; South L.A. (formerly known as South Central L.A.); and the San Pedro/Harbor City area. Adjoining areas that are outside the ''actual city boundaries'' of the incorporated city of Los Angeles include the South Bay, the San Gabriel Valley and the Foothills. The San Pedro/Harbor City area was annexed by the city of Los Angeles so the city could have access and control over the Port of Los Angeles, and is connected by only a narrow Corridor, which follows the Harbor Freeway for the most part, with the rest of L.A. Many Angelenos consider the Eastside to be the area east of the Los Angeles River, above Orange County.
The city boundaries are quite complicated. For example, Beverly Hills and West Hollywood are completely surrounded by the City of Los Angeles except for a small border the two cities share. Culver City is surrounded by L.A. except where it shares a boundary with the unincorporated communities of Ladera Heights and Baldwin Hills. Both Santa Monica and the unincorporated area of Marina del Rey are surrounded except on their ocean side. San Fernando in the northern corner of the San Fernando Valley is also a separate city entirely surrounded by L.A. territory. Most of the Los Angeles County land area is unincorporated and under the primary jurisdiction of Los Angeles County.

Tourism

Due to LA's stance as the "Entertainment Capital of the World", there is an abundance of attractions here, and that is why it is one of the most visited destinations in the world. Here is the breakdown of some of the major attractions:

Theme Parks

★ Disneyland

★ Disney's California Adventure

★ Knott's Berry Farm

★ Pacific Park

★ Six Flags Magic Mountain

★ Universal Studios Hollywood

Beaches

★ Malibu

★ Venice Beach

★ Huntington Beach

★ Laguna Beach

★ Newport Beach

★ Manhattan Beach

★ Hermosa Beach

★ Redondo Beach

★ San Clemente

Shopping

★ Rodeo Drive

★ The Grove at Farmer's Market

★ Beverly Center

★ Glendale Galleria

★ Westfield Century City

★ Westfield MainPlace

★ Westside Pavilion

★ Valencia Town Center

★ Third Street Promenade

★ South Coast Plaza

★ Downtown Disney

★ Universal CityWalk

★ The Block at Orange

★ Ontario Mills

Motion Picture Studios

★ Warner Brothers Studios

★ CBS Television City

★ Paramount Studios

★ NBC Studios

★ Walt Disney Studios

★ Universal Studios

★ Santa Clarita Studios

★ 20th Century Fox

★ Sony Pictures Entertainment

Waterparks

★ Raging Waters

★ Knott's Soak City USA

★ Six Flags Hurricane Harbor

★ Wild Rivers

★ Pharaoh's Lost Kingdom

Zoos and Aquariums

★ Los Angeles Zoo

★ Santa Ana Zoo

★ Aquarium of the Pacific

Nightlife

★ Hollywood

★ Sunset Strip

★ Santa Monica

★ Huntington Beach

Museums

:''See also, Los Angeles City Museums

★ Bowers Museum

★ California Science Center

★ Discovery Science Center

★ Getty Center

★ Getty Villa

★ Griffith Observatory

★ Huntington Library

★ La Brea Tar Pits

★ Los Angeles County Museum of Art

★ Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

★ Norton Simon Museum

★ Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles

★ Museum of Latin American Art

★ Museum of Tolerance

Other

★ Queen Mary

★ Mission Inn

Commercial Airports

Airport	IATA code	ICAO code	County
Los Angeles International Airport	LAX	KLAX	Los Angeles
LA/Ontario International Airport	ONT	KONT	San Bernadino
John Wayne Airport	SNA	KSNA	Orange
Bob Hope Airport	BUR	KBUR	Los Angeles
Long Beach Municipal Airport	LGB	KLGB	Los Angeles
LA/Palmdale Regional Airport	PMD	KPMD	Los Angeles

Sports

Major sports teams serving the Greater Los Angeles area include the Los Angeles Clippers and Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and Los Angeles Dodgers of Major League Baseball, the Los Angeles Kings and Anaheim Ducks of the National Hockey League, the Los Angeles Galaxy and Chivas USA of Major League Soccer, the Los Angeles Sparks of the Women's National Basketball Association, the Los Angeles Avengers of the Arena Football League and the Los Angeles Riptide of Major League Lacrosse.
The Los Angeles media market currently lacks a National Football League team. After the 1994 season, the Los Angeles Rams moved to St. Louis, Missouri and the Los Angeles Raiders moved to Oakland, California, their original home.
There were several years that made Los Angeles area sports dominate:

★ 1972: The Lakers, having won 33 straight games at one point in the regular season, finally won their first NBA championship in Los Angeles, with a victory over the New York Knicks in the NBA Finals. The UCLA Bruins won their eighth national championship in Division I basketball overall, and a sixth consecutive during their amazing tenure with John Wooden as coach. The USC Trojans got their seventh national championship in Division I-A football, with a victory over the Ohio State Buckeyes in the Rose Bowl Game.

★ 1988: Having guaranteed a repeat during the 1987 chamipionship parade, head coach Pat Riley and the Lakers became the first repeat champions in the NBA in 19 years, with a victory in the 1988 NBA Finals over the Detroit Pistons. In the summer, the Los Angeles Kings acquired Wayne Gretzky from the Edmonton Oilers, in the biggest sports trade before the Los Angeles Galaxy's acquisition of David Beckham in 2007. And in October, the Dodgers pulled an improbable run to the World Series championship, with victories over the New York Mets in the NLCS, and the Oakland Athletics in the World Series.

★ 2002: The Los Angeles Lakers (NBA), Los Angeles Sparks (WNBA), Los Angeles Galaxy (MLS), and Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (MLB) each won championships, giving the Los Angeles area 4 major professional titles in a single year. The Lakers won a third consecutive championship, with a victory over the New Jersey Nets in the NBA Finals. The Sparks won their second consecutive title. Meanwhile, the titles for the Angels and Galaxy were a first for each of them. The Galaxy beat the New England Revolution in the MLS Cup, while the Angels beat the San Francisco Giants in the 2002 World Series.
In 2007, the Los Angeles area finally acquired the only title that had eluded the region, when the Anaheim Ducks captured the Stanley Cup chamipionship over the Ottawa Senators, in the 2007 Stanley Cup Finals.
As a whole, the Los Angeles area has more national championships, all sports combined (college and professional), than any other city in the United States, with over four times as many championships as the entire state of Texas, and just over twice that of New York City.

Counties in the Southland

★ Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana Metropolitan Area

★
★ Los Angeles County

★
★ Orange County

★ Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario Metropolitan Area

★
★ Riverside County

★
★ San Bernardino County

★ Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura Metropolitan Area

★
★ Ventura County

Regions of the Southland

★ Antelope Valley

★ Conejo Valley

★ Crescenta Valley

★ East Los Angeles (also known as the 'Eastside')

★ Gateway Cities

★ Inland Empire

★ Orange County

★ Oxnard Plain

★ San Fernando Valley

★ San Gabriel Valley

★ Santa Clarita Valley (also known as "The 661" or "The SCV")

★ South Bay

★ South Los Angeles (formerly known as 'South Central')

★ West Los Angeles (also known as the 'Westside')

Cities

County Seats of the Greater L.A. area

★ Los Angeles (Passenger Airport: Los Angeles International Airport) (County Seat of Los Angeles County)

★ Riverside (County Seat of Riverside County)

★ Santa Ana (Passenger Airport: John Wayne-Orange County Airport) (County Seat of Orange County)

★ San Bernardino (County Seat of San Bernardino County)

★ Ventura (County Seat of Ventura County)

Other important cities of the Greater L.A. area

★ Anaheim

★ Burbank (Passenger Airport: Bob Hope Airport)

★ Glendale

★ Irvine

★ Long Beach (Passenger Airport: Long Beach Municipal Airport)

★ Ontario (Passenger Airport: L.A. / Ontario International Airport)

★ Oxnard (Passenger Airport: Oxnard Airport)

★ Palmdale (Passenger Airport: L.A. / Palmdale Regional Airport)

★ Pasadena

★ Santa Clarita

Cities with a population over 200,000

★ Anaheim

★ Glendale

★ Long Beach

★ Los Angeles

★ Riverside

★ Santa Ana

★ San Bernardino

Cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants

★ Burbank

★ Corona

★ Costa Mesa

★ Downey

★ El Monte

★ Fontana

★ Fullerton

★ Garden Grove

★ Huntington Beach

★ Inglewood

★ Irvine

★ Lancaster

★ Moreno Valley

★ Norwalk

★ Ontario

★ Orange

★ Palmdale

★ Pasadena

★ Pomona

★ Rancho Cucamonga

★ Rialto

★ Santa Clarita

★ Simi Valley

★ South Gate

★ Thousand Oaks

★ Torrance

★ Ventura

★ West Covina

See also

★ Megacity

★ Bajalta California

★ Southern California

★ San Diego-Tijuana Metropolitan Area

★ SanSan

★ United States metropolitan area

★ Largest metropolitan areas in the Americas

References

1. [1]
2. U.S. Census Bureau 2005 estimates for metropolitan statistical areas
3. Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Areas, U.S. Census Bureau.
4. 7/1/2006 Combined Statistical Area Population Estimates File for Internet Display, U.S. Census Bureau.
5. Haughton, Graham, and Colin Hunter, ''Sustainable Cities'', London: Routledge, 2003: 81.
6. Bruegmann, Robert. ''Sprawl: A Compact History''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005: 65.
7. Gutierrez, David. ''The Columbia History of Latinos in the United States''. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003: 94.
8. Curtiss, Aaron. "Bitter Land-Use Fights Seen For 101 Corridor Development." ''Los Angeles Times'' 20 November 1993: B1.
9. Olsen, Andy. "Local Home Prices Soar in May." ''Los Angeles Times'' 23 June 2003: B3.
10. Griggs, Gregory. "Local Homes Get Even Pricier." ''Los Angeles Times'' 21 August 2003: B1.