One Year Downtown

This week marks our one year anniversary living in Downtown Los Angeles. It's been a momentous year, both for our little family, and for the city, state and country at large. Back in July I wrote a two-part post on future of downtown (Part 1 and Part 2). Just ten months ago, I was complaining about California's 5.5% unemployment rate, little knowing that today we'd be looking at more than 11% unemployment and climbing and the prospect of the state completely running out of money.

Some of the predictions I made back then have come true: the condo market has indeed collapsed and people in the know are saying it may not return for another decade. Retail is floundering and the prospect of downtown attracting a big box retailer like Target is dimming as chains shut down stores and in some cases (Circuit City) are completely going out of business. A flood of rental units has come onto the market as a result of the condo collapse, with mixed results for downtown: fewer buyers with substantial ties to the community but more people living downtown overall. Also, rents are coming down, which is attracting a more diverse pool of people to the neighborhood. Downtown is also seeing the loss of local jobs as banks and government both take big hits.

Despite the ugly economic realities, Downtown has been undergoing an amazing transformation right before our eyes, one that is embodied by what has happened on 6th Street between Los Angeles and Broadway (and where we happen to live). The past year has seen the reopening of Cole's, the launch of the Association, and the launch of new restaurants/cafes, including Blu LA Cafe and the D-Town Burger Bar. The Cecil Hotel (on Main but close to 6th) and the Hayward have refurbished their retail spaces and are getting new tenants (or in the case of the Hayward, launching their own clothing store, Crack Gallery). There have been some casualties--626 Reserve has shut down, along with a handbag store located in the Hayward--but other retailers are moving in to replace them. Even Barry Shy's buildings are seeing a flurry of retail occupancy with a make-up school, clothing store and a coffee shop all opening in the SB Lofts.

With the new retail has been an influx of foot traffic on 6th Street, which has dramatically changed the block for the better. It feels safer, especially after dark. And it feels like a destination, a place people want to visit and move to. Considering the economic climate, the transformation of 6th Street has been truly remarkable. Add to this the fact that people in LA are still driving less even though gas prices have dropped to reasonable levels, and I think you are seeing a community that will thrive in the long term.

Unfortunately, that long term isn't likely to include our family. My husband and I absolutely love living downtown. We love being able to walk to work, to walk to our favorite restaurants and bars. The cultural environment is incredibly rich, and it's a tremendous pleasure to do things like walk to MOCA and attend plays at the theater on Spring Street. But we have Kidlo to think of, and Downtown isn't a viable place for our family in the long-term. The two big sticking points: parks and schools, especially the latter.

When you are raising a kid without a backyard, having access to a good park is absolutely essential, and Downtown just doesn't cut it. Pershing Square is a travesty and Grand Hope Park, while lovely and clean, is a fairly long walk for us and doesn't have a very good playground. I believe that Pershing Square will eventually get a playground, but it won't come soon enough for us. My son is old enough that some outdoor play every day is important and I can see that very soon the lack of a park is going to become a big problem.

The school situation is an even bigger problem. 9th Street Elementary is the only public school zoned for Downtown and they primarily serve homeless kids. According to Susana Benavidez, they are doing a great job for those students, but in terms of test scores they are ranked among the lowest in the city--not a surprise, given the unsettled lives these kids lead, but not a great fit for a kid who is achieving at grade level or better. The only other alternative is private school. As it turns out, there is a good private school in City West, the Pilgrim School. But we can't afford to shell out $15K-$20 a year for tuition, so that's not an option for us (I'd much rather save money to pay for Kidlo's college tuition).

The upshot of all this is that we are likely to be moving out of the neighborhood two or three years from now, when Kidlo is ready for kindergarten. It's really a damned shame because we love living a pedestrian lifestyle, we love having relationships with all the local merchants, and we love seeing the neighborhood grow and change before our eyes. It's something so rare in Los Angeles. But when you have a family you ultimately have to do what's best for the kid, and in this case, moving to a decent school district is what we need to do.

In the long term, will Downtown become a family-friendly (or at least friendlier) place? I think so. I just got back from a trip to New York City and was on the Upper East Side when the schools were letting out. The streets were clogged with families, kids in school uniforms and their younger siblings in carriages. Central Park's playgrounds were full of kids playing after school for a bit before walking home for dinner. I can see that happening in Downtown LA as well--eventually. But the eventually won't come soon enough for us.

At any rate, we plan to completely enjoy the neighborhood while we're still here. And I know when we leave we will definitely shed a tear.

Why We Moved Downtown (and why everyone else may follow)

The main reason was space. My husband (hereafter known as My Boy, or MB) is a computer consultant who works from home. He also has a lot of hobbies and loves to fix watches, collect and use old cameras, rehab motorcycles--basically, take things that aren't working and get them up and running agin. So he needs room for a workbench and tools. Plus just over a year ago we added a charming redheaded baby to our family and Kidlo needs his own room.

We'd been living in Silverlake and needed to move in a hurry (landlord poisoned our air conditioner--don't feel like getting into the details), but all of the places in our price range were tiny--700 sf or less for a two bedroom. We looked at houses but a) they were expensive and b) we were worried that we'd rent a house and then get kicked out a few months later when the owner defaulted on the mortgage (more on that later). We thought of buying but we didn't have enough of a down payment saved up (the days of no-money-down mortgages are over).

So basically we were screwed. Until MB saw an ad on craigslist for downtown lofts.

I work on the west side of downtown and we'd been going to Art Walk for a few years, plus we love going to Little Tokyo for conveyer belt sushi. So we knew the area and liked it a lot, plus MB and I grew up in New York (me in the Bronx, him on the Upper West Side), so we're city kids at heart. We decided to take a look at new lofts on Spring Street and holy shit, they wuz cheap. Crazy cheap. Like $1600/mo for almost 1,000 sf cheap. We were paying almost $2100 for our shithole in Silverlake, so when we saw those prices we did the Tex Avery eyes-bulging-tie-spinning routine. We would have to pay for parking, but even with that we were looking at saving almost $300 a month.

So we went for it. And here we are.

There have been a few things to adjust to. Having the car a block away is a pain in the ass when you have the baby and groceries and other shit to haul around. And the neighborhood is definitely still on the gritty side (though a helluva lot better than it used to be). Seeing drug dealers on 5th did not make me a happy mama.

The good part is that our loft is unbelievable. Brand new kitchen, two bathrooms with deep tubs and marble floors, dark wood (well, Pergo) floors and huge windows. We even have a patio! We're having a wall put in to section off the baby's room and still have enough left over to fit in MB's work area and a writing desk for me.

Plus the creative vibe in the neighborhood is amazing. Our next door neighbor is a DJ, the Japanese guy across the hall is a dealer in vintage vinyl, a woman on the 5th floor runs a dressmaking business. And it's a real city, so I walk down the street and overhear people's conversations (Today's example: "Women, money and drugs they didn't pay for!"). And Broadway reminds me so much of the Bronx. I love how whole families turn out to shop, Abuela, Mami y Papi, Tia and all the kids. I love how you can see some big tough cholo with baggy jeans and tats cradling his baby cousin in his arms.

Financially, living here is an incredible bargain. It's not just the cheap rent--not driving every day is going to save us a huge amount of money. And here's where I get to the "why everyone else will follow" part...

Because the condo market has collapsed and condo buildings are being converted to rentals, the rents have dropped and are going to keep dropping. It's just flat out cheaper to live here than in Los Feliz, Silverlake and even Echo Park (which is ridiculously overpriced). Cheaper rents = what I'm seeing in my building, which is an influx of young artist types who are no longer priced out of the neighborhood. The more creative people who flood in, the more retail we'll see, the streets will get safer and that in turn will attract even more people.

Also, the price of gas is going to keep going up--China and India want gas too, which means the days of cheap gas are over. Mass transit ridership is booming. Downtown is where all the transit lines for the region converge, so you can live downtown and take the Rapid to Santa Monica...or the red line to the Valley...or the gold line to Pasadena...you get the picture. Or if you're like me and work downtown, you get to walk, get some exercise and completely eliminate your commuting cost.

(As an aside, places like the Inland Empire and Antelope Valley which have long, expensive commutes, high rates of foreclosure and no local employment are fucked).

Of course, there have been artists moving into downtown for more than ten years, but what you're seeing now is the second wave--people weren't willing to deal with hard core skid row or couldn't afford to buy a luxury condo, but are now getting pulled in by the Art Walk vibe and the cost of living.

Downtown has gone over the tipping point, so now it's just a matter of watching the people flood in.

Why We Left Silverlake and Moved Downtown

Well, the main reason is that our landlord hired an incompetent air conditioner repairman who painted the inside of our air conditioner vent with a chemical approved only for use outdoors, thereby rendering our apartment uninhabitable. But there were other reasons to leave Silverlake:

1. Parking Nazi neighbors: We drive old Mercedes-Benz's. They're cheap so we have no car payments, they're roomy so we can stash baby gear without driving a mini-van or (shudder) an SUV, and they're comfortable in a rolling-sofa kind of way. One of our cars is a diesel Benz, painted brown, with a dent in the front. We call him Heinrich. Poor Heinrich has seen better days but we love him anyway. But our neighbors did not, as I discovered one morning when I put my key in the lock and a woman darted out of her house to tell me she'd called the cops to have my car towed. My reaction: "What the fuck did you do that for?" She babbled about abandoned cars but the real answer is that she didn't like having my old, ugly car parked in front of her million dollar house. She later threatened to call the EPA on my because the car leaked oil. Then there was the dude who kept chalking our tires to see if we were moving the car. He finally let the air out of one of the tires and pulled the pin out of the valve so it couldn't be refilled. Ah Silverlake, what a tolerant and progressive community, hm?

2. More neighbor nastiness: There was a protest in our neighborhood over a new apartment building going up because...I have no fucking idea why that sparked a protest. They weren't building a shopping mall or a twenty story building, just your run-of-the-mill townhouses. I guess that affects property values somehow? Then there was the crazy bitch who threatened to call the cops on neighbors who were having a yard sale. No, I have no idea why.

3. Insane earthy-crunchy parents: There was an anti-vaccination flyer posted on the Coffee Table bulletin board. Parents push around $1200 Bugaboo strollers. A friend of mine who teaches at Ivanhoe told me about a parent who protested when her kid got detention for wrapping his hands around another kids throat because, "He was just expressing himself."

4. Head-up-the-ass syndrome: One of the shop owners in Sunset Junction had a dachshund that she let roam loose up and down the block. Predictably, the dog ran into the street and was killed by a car. So how did the hipsters react? By having a candlelight vigil for the dog. Seriously.

5. Silverlake is just like San Francisco: This is not a compliment.