The Wild Contradictions (and Beauty) of Long Beach, CA 

Welcome to...THE COMMENTS. Read this one first! Bellroy has cool items that improve my quality of life nicely, AND they're made from upcycled materials. Receive 10% off anything from their store using my custom link: bit.ly/49dGfMp

A full video examining why New York and Los Angeles are so different from one another would actually be fire.

Car-free Angeleno here!! I take Metro to Long Beach regularly and sometimes bring my bike too. I'm part of a community in LA that is advocating for car-free mobility (we worked on Measure HLA, which you should read about if you don't know about it!), and most of my friends here are either car-free or extremely car-lite. I agree with you that there are a TON of contradictions of the amazing weather here and people still choosing to spend it in metal cages, and we are working to make mixed mobility and walkability a reality here. I think that many parts of LA are in better shape, mobility-wise, than Long Beach, and it doesn't really make sense to me given Long Beach's historic grid, Metro access, and bike infrastructure. I think that a lot of it is a mentality issue that needs addressing.

My in-laws lived in Long Beach, and I used to complain bitterly about visiting there every Christmastime. After my father-in-law died, my mother-in-law moved to Phoenix, where I discovered that I LOVE LONG BEACH!

This past winter, I went to Long Beach to meet up with a friend visiting from France. He was staying with a Long Beach resident who doesn't own a car and not because he is too poor. He happily told me about how he can get anywhere he needs to go via transit. I had no idea that was possible ANYWHERE in the LA area.

It's mind-blowing that wind mills, especially off shore wind farms, are constantly hindered by being an "eyesore" but these oil drilling machinery can exist endlessly in the middle of a community

Award-winning definition of the Los Angeles River : « really only a river in the sense that it discharges liquids of unknown origin into the Pacific ocean ».

CityNerd, Thank you for limiting your grumbling about the $40 ticket price for boarding the Queen Mary. Visiting the Queen Mary when I was about ten years old set me on a trajectory that led to a degree in Naval Architecture and many years of employment in the engineering department of a large shipyard. -GV

I actually wouldn't be surprised if longshoremen lived in downtown Long Beach! Love it or hate it, the ILWU has quite a lot of power in west coast ports and longshoreman salaries are >$100k.

"Indianapopolitan" here: lol we have much bigger problems than a giant racetrack two miles out from downtown. Light rail is still illegal, I'm not even kidding. We just got done fighting a senator trying to ban a new BRT line to the airport, over his insistence that a single dangerous rundown stroad remain two lanes in both directions (when there are several much more widely used ways to get downtown). We can barely get anything pedestrianized downtown, and we're not dense enough for the racetrack to even matter. Let us have our brickyard so we can get SOME enjoyment from cars going vroom here

Looks like my opinion on Long Beach is here!

I lived in Long Beach without a vehicle for just about 5 years. I can confidently say that Long Beach is one of the only places in Southern California that I could live. Living within walking distance of the Line formerly known as the Blue Line opens you up to one of the best car free experiences in the country. It is very walkable, but the most frustrating thing is that Long Beach calls itself "The most bike friendly city in America" which is an absolute joke. The bike culture in LB is basically nonexistent and honestly terrifying. I think the number one thing LB shines at though is the fact that there is some of the most affordable housing in the LA area due to the preserved supply of pre-war construction.

I live in Long Beach! Thanks for making a video about us.

I had to pause everything I was doing to watch this!! LB is my hometown and I know it’s pointless to comment on RU-vid videos before watching them but this is a historic event for me Edit: okay finished the video, you made a lot of good points I agree with. Here’s my few cents as someone who lived there from ages 3-25 (well, with one year of my 20s in another state): 1. It’s absolutely possible to live there without a car, but the ease at which you can do so will high depend on the area of the city you’re in. LB Transit is pretty okay at best, and incredibly frustrating at worst. It does not service all parts of the city equally, so depending on where you’re going it can take anywhere from 20-60 minutes on average. Certainly not always convenient but anyone who tells you it’s impossible is a liar. When I lived there I would joke I was probably the only Southern Californian without a driver’s license. Long story long, it can be done! 2. Oh god, the Blue Line. It is completely insane that it hasn’t been completely overhauled to make getting to LA faster and easier. And you’re lucky if your destination is at the end of the Blue Line, because if you need to transfer to another metro line to get to your final destination, the full journey could take anywhere from 2-3 hours. 3. Fuck the Grand Prix. Even taking your notes on it out of the occasion, it’s so damn noisy. 😂 You can hear it from miles and miles away, even if you don’t live downtown. 4. The housing/rental costs are outrageous. I know so many people in their 30s and 40s who live with roommates, not because that’s their preferred living situation, but because it’s all they can afford. I was fortunate enough to be able to live with my mom the last 6 years before I moved away, but had I wanted to stay, I probably would have left anyways because the cost of living there is astronomical. I’m sure there are other people who grew up in LB or otherwise spent a long time who have had to leave by necessity, and that’s heartbreaking. 5. The oil islands are such an eyesore. 6. You are spot-on about how much people talk about driving and parking in SoCal! Conclusion: I know it doesn’t seem like it from this comment, but I love Long Beach. The culture, diversity, queerness, food, art, and music scene…there’s a lot going for it. But there’s so much that needs improvement, too, which can feel disheartening. I’m really grateful I grew up there, but I’m very happy I was able to leave. I’m stoked you were able to visit and give us your perspective. If you ever return give the community tab a heads-up so your loyal viewers (me) can give you recommendations!

I live car free in DT Long Beach. My family loves it and it has been a great place to raise my kids. We bike everywhere. The city is best in the spring and summer during festival season. Every weekend has several events to choose from. There has been a lot of mixed use infill construction. It feels like the city is on the verge of a major transformation. We have a lot of new residential units and empty street-facing storefronts. I'm hoping for the day when we get a wave of new shops and restaurants. Getting around LA from Long Beach is pretty easy, though it does take longer than it should. On occasion we will rent a car and every time we are reminded why we don't own one. I would rather spend an extra half-hour relaxing on a train or bus than have to be behind the wheel and then waste time looking for parking. We really need to build a subway that connects DTLB with Cal State LB and the airport. It would also be great to have a direct rail connection to Santa Ana to the east and the bay cities to the west.

4:54 I notice this non-stop whenever I'm out and about, it's just staggering how much of life is driving, parking, car car car. My favorite is when they complain about how far they had to park, when the bus I took dropped me off at the front door.

Thanks for coming! I thought I'd bugged you about Long Beach before, but maybe not! I've lived here without a car for 3.5 years and got into a nice place with a 95 walkscore in 2023 (and I also work in transportation here). I think you would have liked the Zaferia and Rose Park areas much better than Downtown, and Long Beach Transit punches far above its weight (especially if you live in the right areas). I would say that of all the cities in LA and Orange counties, Long Beach is one of the most walkable and is making steps to emphasize that part of its appeal.

Really recommend Robert Fogelson’s “The Fragmented Metropolis: Los Angeles 1850-1930” as a great view into how LA’s urban land use emerged. Essentially a story of sprawling real estate speculation preceding the establishment of strong local governance. The electric tram lines were built by speculators to entice buyers, but they were, on their own, money losing propositions. Once they had served their purpose (selling land and cheap houses) the fractured city governments never really treated them as public goods/services and let them wither rather than really knitting them together into a cohesive system. And then automobiles showed up. At least that’s my memory of the thesis.

if California had walkable cities and efficient and robust transit systems paired up with its weather and politics, it would be so objectively the best state in the US, it wouldn't even be a competition edit: didn't think I'd have to state that affordability would obviously factor in.

I never expected to see a whole video dedicated to my home town! Thanks for showing the world Long Beach!

I live in Long Beach and would not consider living any where in the City of Los Angeles. And get this I am an engineer for the City of Los Angeles for the last 33 years! Long Beach is a like a big city with small town appeal.

Long Beach is f***ing awesome. Never been in a city so diverse, beautiful, and complex. Its truly everything that makes the LA area unique but in only 1 city.

We were house hunting in LA county and because it's so ludicrously expensive we were looking everywhere including Long Beach, Wilmington, and Carson. Honestly the biggest concerns we had were the health impacts. Yeah, the jacks are scary to look at, but the real concerns come from the ports and the oil refineries. Cardiovascular disease, asthma, and cancer rates are much, much higher for the populations that live downwind of those facilities than they are elsewhere in LA county. The area regularly has some of the worst air quality in the country (it was truly gnarly during covid when the ports were backed up). SB1137 needs to survive referendum. Unfortunately, though the county tried to ban new oil drilling-which would have included LB-the CA Supreme Court struck down a similar ban in Monterey county as unenforceable while the referendum is on the ballot. So the city is trying to push forward new wells while local advocates sue them to stop. It's a big mess. On the more hopeful side, there are community programs that are actively seeking to remediate the soil around decommissioned oil wells and providing resources/education for at risk communities. Even as the number of pollutants has increased, the rates of cancer have decreased. The drilling will also eventually end. Which is good, because it's a beautiful place with a great community.

Thanks for doing a video about Long Beach, I was literally wondering a few days ago why this city isn't more like Jersey City when it comes to density and skyline heights.

“That means you’re gonna have beaches, especially long ones” had me weak 😂 but silliness aside, I agree.. Long Beach has a lot of potential

An hour transit into DTLA is not bad! It takes 40 mins by car without traffic and excluding time for parking, meaning it is almost always faster to take transit in. It also took me 1:15 to take transit to LAX when I was living on Cherry & PCH. Lots of transfers, could be faster, but so much better than dealing with the clusterfuck of cars there. Having lived in Long Beach, their transit goes tragically unsung.

As someone who lives in Orange County, Long Beach is the perfect mix of OC and LA. You’re right in between both and Long Beach is far cheaper to live in than LA. I’d also say Long Beach is more diverse than much of OC and also more welcoming to all groups and ages. Long Beach definitely attracts a younger crowd with its Belmont Shore area and the CSULB being nearby but I wouldn’t call it a “college town”. It’s also rapidly improving with dense housing developments going up in a number of areas so my guess is Long Beach won’t be a cheap option for long.

Long Beach is about the size of Washington DC both by area (80 vs 68 square miles respectively) and population (451k vs 671k). Imagine if Long Beach had its own robust metro and more densely built homes.

"The expensive housing of New York with the car dependency of.. Phoenix," is so apropos.

This is where I grew up and where my dad lives and where I own property. It's always been ripe for urbanist development. I've been wanting to do a more extensive metro in LBC forever. Seriously, you showed my childhood home in this video and I know every street in this shot. Crazy.

My wife is from Long Beach and I’m from OC near the area. It definitely has its mix - second street is a bit of an urbanist pocket there with second & PCH as well as once second street runs on to Belmont shore. Thanks for covering the area!

It’s awesome seeing your photos of the city where I go to college, and recognising all the familiar streets, restaurants, and landmarks I walk by

I live in Long Beach and I love it! I’m glad you finally did a video on it. I’ve commented on other urban planning videos before on how walkable Pine St, 4th St, Broadway and Belmont Shore areas are to name a few. They’re trying to be more pedestrian friendly. They’re installing more bike lanes and investing more in alt transport. It’s not where it needs to be but I’m glad it’s one of the few cities in SoCal trying to make a difference. As for the Long Beach Grand Prix, trust me, everyone down here loves it. It’s not like the Las Vegas F1 race lol the Grand Prix is packed and pure joy watching Porsches scream down Shoreline.

Here's a topic suggestion that I hope you'll look into: city street lighting: what cities do it well and make it easy on the eye, versus cities (like mine) that put up blinding omnidirectional LED "glare bombs" and don't seem to notice how ugly they are. I've met with the mayor and the city engineer, but they don't seem to get it.

Lived in Seal Beach and Long Beach from 1997 to 2013, then moved to Seattle. We loved living in LB. Our first place in LB was a rental near the peninsula. From there it was an easy walk/skate to the beach path. We would skate from our rental to the Queen Mary most weekends. A five minute walk took us to restaurants and shops on 2nd street. The whole LA basin has improve greatly since we first moved there. I recall only being able to see the mountains after a winter rainstorm. When we left, we could see the mountains year round. Though still hazy.

I used to work on the cruise ships out of Long Beach 20 years ago. There were some entertainment staff that had cars when they got off the ship, but the majority had to walk, take public transit or cabs. I was pretty impressed by the bus service from the port and in town. The buses were free, clean and the stations had digital signs that told you wait times.

Long Beach is all fun and games until you realize you're constantly stuck behind, next to and in front of big rigs. So awesome that you got blessed with that fabulous rainbow though! 🌈

The Longshoremen in the port make pretty good money. Plenty live in LB and the surrounding area. There's still a lot of industry in LB with Boeing, the film industry, and the oil industry

Besides the offshore drilling, majority of the oil wells are in Signal Hill. Majority of those buildings were built around the oil wells. Very few of those wells are capped, I'm 52 and I remember most of those wells from when was a little kid. I moved to LB in the mid 80s and back then some areas in Signal Hill didn't have street lighting because of WW2. Some streets/ areas still have air raid horns mounted, nowadays they're getting hard to find due to modernization...

I live in LB. Started watching your videos about a year back which led me to start using the bus and metro to get around on occasion. I know its not a New York City when it comes to public transit, but it feels so walkable and not as car dependent when coming from the Central Valley in CA. Great video👍🏽

16 year Long Beach resident originally from the midwest. I tell people back home about how awesome it is to live here because of the weather, beaches, entertainment, vast and nearby natural beauty (I'm an avid hiker/camper), economy, heck, it's even easy to garden here but it's ALL almost outweighed by the horrible traffic. I have even learned to plan ahead when driving home Sunday from a campout because you can get stuck in HOURS of traffic on the Cajon pass or through LA. On SUNDAY. It's bad news.

Love your channel and love living in long beach! Thanks city nerd!

Had to come here from Nebula to read & leave a comment! I’m so glad you finally visited and covered LB! I agree there are a ton of contradictions with this city in particular. Growing up in the city, I didn’t even think too much about how bad it was to have the oil pumps so close to people’s homes. But anyway, I don’t live there anymore but I used to commute to DTLB from the Eastside on the bus system and miss it so much. After moving back to LB from Australia, living/working there made me realize that it truly *was* possible to live with one car or less in LA/the U.S. Compared to the surrounding cities to LB, it is one of the better served in terms of transit, and I hope the city continues to make the streets more amenable to everything but cars. Loved this video!

I understand your points about the racetrack. However, I will say it’s one of my favorite circuits and would love to visit it during a race. Street tracks are so interesting.

Finally! My city! Also, Signal Hill where there are oil rigs by the streets is its own city surrounded by Long Beach. Bunch of rich people wanted a separate city within a city to hoard the oil revenue.

When my grandparents and 4yo father arrived in Long Beach in 1939, they rented an apartment at The Breakers. By dad grew up to be a bartender at my grandfather's restaurant (where Legend's is now in Belmont Shore), and then a cop. Granddad started the continuing tradition of floating Christmas Trees in the lagoon in 1947. Then my sister and I were born in LB in the 1960s. So much history, so much has changed.

I know it’s not nearly the best spot in the country, but it’s my favorite place I’ve lived in. I live in a mixed housing neighborhood (single family houses, multiplexes, and apartments) that has some mixed zoning. It’s close enough walking distance to a lot of really great spots. And the rent I pay here isn’t that more than I was paying when I lived in Nashville, where I could only walk to a few spots, and biking was dangerous. So yeah it definitely has its drawbacks, but overall I’m pretty happy to call this place home. *also I think that there are plans to further expand bike infrastructure over the next few decades iirc

I have distant family who live in the Long Beach area. They had settled out there shortly after WWI, a distant time when Los Angeles County was well served by Pacific Electric and other interurban/electric streetcar systems. It is uplifting to see some of the urban form molded by the region's long-lost interurban railways remains in place. Contrary to popular wisdom, LA County has its share of areas that are refreshingly something other than typical SoCal suburban sprawl (e.g., Koreatown, Westlake, Santa Monica, Venice, Manhattan Beach, Long Beach). One can hope the foundation laid in the pre-auto era will continue to foster the spread of good urbanism throughout the region!

Old Long Beach girl here. About the Queen Mary... I remember when it was free to tour her. I left my hometown 30 years ago. I still love her. My childhood in Long Beach was MAGICAL. Musical theatre (Ha'Penney Player's) sand building contest.. I love Long Beach & if I could afford living there, I certainly would. My hometown & childhood friends are there. God Bless Long Beach, my hometown

Long Beach is to L.A. as Oakand is to San Francisco and Tacoma is to Seattle. A rough and tumble blue collar port town sitting next to its more famous and glamorous sister city. It’s probably not the worst place in the world to live if you can afford it. Public transit isn’t terrible and as long as you can work in the area and not commute it seems nice enough.

I lived in Long Beach for 6 years (2011 to 2017) and LOVED It. I worked in Anaheim, so I did have to drive to work, but on the weekends I often didn’t have to get in my car at all. I was right downtown and could walk to everything I needed. Other things I didn’t need a car for: I could take the train to Hollywood to see shows at the Hollywood Pantages, which I loved. I also would take a regularly scheduled charter bus to concerts at the Hollywood bowl. I loved LB because it was a place where people of all different economic levels mixed and people were genuinely friendly. I mean like talking to each other while waiting in line at the grocery store friendly. I had to move to the Bay Area for work, and let me tell you….people here are NOT friendly. I miss Long Beach. One note about the Queen Mary: unless something changed, I used to take out of towners there for free. We’d just walk in and explore on our own.

My great grandpa on my dad’s side developed some of the residential real estate in Long Beach back in the 50’s and 60’s. He also built the buyers of his homes dining tables and coffee tables and fancy front doors upon request. I wish I could get my hands on one of those pieces.

Good for you getting such a cool sponsor! 👍

Missed you last week!

Really wanting a Chicago city visit video! I grew up in WI and have been living in Portland for almost 20 years. Ready for new scenery and Chicago is top of my list.

Hey! Glad you came to my town.

I miss living in Long Beach, 1.5 blocks from the sand-- biking, rolling, running... I do not miss having to drive to/from/around it, wherever I needed to be in LA/OC. Thanks for reporting. Great cat!

i visited long beach and seal beach a couple years ago and yeah, there's a real strong sense that southern california _has_ transit, but it always feels like a tacked-on afterthought. the aqualink is a really good example of the attitude... the seal beach stop is outside of town, at the end of a parking lot, instead of off the downtown pier. the queen mary stop is a parking lot, inside a parking lot, behind like three layers of highways. and the "long beach" stop drops you off in a parking lot, with a freeway and a highway between you and downtown

We missed you last week! Welcome back, City Nerd!

Long beach is a pretty scrappy city. The sort of problem of it being walkable, is there is so many cool shops/bars to check out, but they are spread out blocks and blocks. Go to the Red Room (Closed) on 4th st, Go to Que Sera on (7th), go eat pizza on broadway (Long Beach Pizza Co). Then go to the Pike for whatever gods reason. I mean they did give us these Scooter to ride around on, but I haven't tried it yet. haha If they had something like the OCsteetcar, or a trolly to jump on, it could be a different experience.

Long Beach is an interesting place (I go there occasionally because my bank is there). It's simultaneously industrial and residential. The oil pumps have been there for about 100 years now. The ports of LA and LB (really, it's one big port) are massive - pretty much everyone west of the Mississippi owns something that came through that port. It has ritzy parts and gritty parts. It's kind of a cool city, really.

Keep these videos coming! Random rural cities that one has at most seen on a map!

I live in Long Beach. You nailed it! One note I wish you had seen, there is an area of Long Beach around and north of CSULB called "Los Altos" that has well separated roads and streets, best city planning I've seen in LA. Non-Grid, Non-Stroad life is hard to find in LA.

One non-obvious issue for increasing housing density in Long Beach and any place in California within a few miles of the Pacific Ocean is the California Coastal Commission, which limits a lot of development near the coast. The CCC is unelected and answers to nobody. Some of there restrictions are for environmental reasons, at least nomially, but others are merely to protect ocean views. So, it is nearly impossible to build a tall building between the ocean and a not-so-tall building, for instance.

Love watching this as someone who has gone car free in los angeles recently.. the quality of my life has greatly improved. Saving so much money too. It’s def doable now.

As a complete aside to every thing else in your vid.... I really enjoyed hearing the term "gifted" used in the original meaning, as in positive attributes of a thing. Many speakers believe that gifted means given or gave. Thanks. -

As pointed out by others, Signal Hill is a separate city. And that’s why you are seeing the multitudes of transit operators. Each city can and often does operate its own system along with Los Angeles County’s Metro who run both rail and buses.

Even when you're roasting the city I'm yelling LONG BEACH MENTIONED RRAAHHHHH with immense pride

1. Great video 2. Would love more of a overview/ map of the transit options 3. For some reason I will check out the sponsor

Living in the north end of Long Beach I can confirm this is all pretty much accurate. In the 20 years I've been here though the transit system has beefed up substantially and a lot of people can get by without a car. The problem is by the time you can afford a house here a car as an expense is tantamount to buying a refrigerator. You have the space for one so you might as well offer yourself the convenience. Still, if less people drive it does us all a favor so it's still worth the effort.

FYI, going back to when you filled stadiums with your subscribers, you are approaching Indianapolis Motor Speedway's permanent seating capacity of 257,325 (total capacity with infield seating, standing room etc... is about 400,000). EDIT: I commented before watching. My bad.

Great video! You almost lost me with Outback Steakhouse as no. 3 but the picture of the oil pump behind the Tesla won it. Great content!

This is random, but given how underused and unpopular downtown Long Beach is, I always thought the Clippers should’ve explored that area for their new arena. They’re building in Inglewood now, which I believe ultimately may overwhelm that small suburb given that So-Fi Stadium and the Forum are already there (making another arena redundant). An arena in DTLB with a new entertainment district nearby would’ve definitely added a boost to the area.

I'm am a resident of Long Beach, I would have given you a real tour of the The Beach!!!Thank you for sharing

Sitting here watching the bellroy ad with my bellroy wallet my dad got me for my birthday my sophomore year of high school 8 years ago chillin on the table next to me was not somethingI expected great sponsor congrats!

i guess all of those postcards of oil drill pylons on La Beachs from the 1950's just got rediscovered.....

Love your video on my hometown but did want to correct one thing - those Port of LB/LA longshoremen make absolute BANK but they are probably not living in DTLB, they have some big house in San Pedro or Signal Hill

Long Beach born and raised here. Growing up I saw both sides of the coin, attending elementary and middle school in Belmont Park and then going to high school at Poly. I agree with some of your points. I would definitely say Long Beach has had a leg up in terms of transit options for a long time now. And especially around the eastside higher density housing has been popping up as of recently to accommodate demand. But the downside has been the cost of gentrification of the neighborhoods around areas like the Eastside, pretty much forcing out minority residents who cannot afford the changes. Shame with how uniquely diverse some our neighborhoods are. Its getting harder to see at one time Long Beach was the breeding ground for rappers like Snoop Dogg, Nate Dogg, Warren G, Foesum, Twinz etc

Sucks that they have to charge just to get on the Queen Mary now. After a series of bad ownership and severe neglect, the ship was in critical failure. There’s been a tremendous amount of restoration and repairs done throughout the ship and I think it looks fantastic! Oh, and the Queen Mary was a transatlantic ocean liner, not a cruise ship. It was also used to transport U.S. troops during WWII. Very historical!!

The shot of Toronto at 10:27 made me really happy that winter is finally over here.

7:37 Menu shot. Menu shot. Right now you're looking at the menu shot.

Thanks!

I've moved to Long Beach two years ago and I love it here. Long Beach feels like it's the sleeper of SoCal.

Really enjoyed this one - California is filled with weird paradoxes. Thanks for all of the great content and love the cat! 😻

love your cat's "you have got to be f'n kidding me, Long Beach did what?" look at the end, and then just puts it head down

Very accurate analysis of Long Beach. I hope you were able to get an In & Out Burger.

Love those travelogs. Hope you can do more from Europe and Asia soon.

The breakwater is my pet peeve. I moved in the 70;s to go to college and live in Seattle and as I look to downsize now I often look at Long Beach as an option. If only for the weather and a familiarity of places I'd live, Belmont Shore, Alamitos Heights. It has its charms.

Thank you for putting the advertisement at the end 👍🏻

Long Beach is the most walkable and bikeable city. My friends all live in the same borough and we ride our bikes everywhere!

The one thing about all the bus agencies is they all accept payment from a single transit card (TAP card)

The reason Long Beach looked like a race track when you were there, was because of the Drift car racing series that was there at the end of May.

I lived in Long Beach for over 20 years. While I often used the Metro Rail to get to LA , I rarely used the bus. From my apartment to downtown Long Beach it was 15 minutes by Car yet 90+ minutes by bus. ( PS I drove to the Del Amo station when I wanted to go to LA / Hollywood .

I visited the aquarium. It was pretty cool.

The video is good overall, however, many of the jack pumps you showed are actually in Signal Hill which is a separate city and an enclave surrounded by the City of Long Beach. Signal Hill has its own history and land use policies that made it a very distinct place from Long Beach.

When I moved to the Central Valley, I was shocked to discover oil pumps and cotton farms. There are oil pumps just off the highway on the way from Bakersfield to LA, right before the Grapevine. I had never seen them in person before. And I thought cotton was only growing in the south.

I lived in Long Beach for 14 years (moved to Seattle in 2010) and the Grand Prix sucks. :/ You can hear the noise from like a mile away, traffic is horrible during race week, and the bus schedule is out the window, largely because of the afore-mentioned traffic. If you're a race fan, I'm sure it's massively cool, but for everyone else, especially those who live within a mile or three of the race route, it's a nightmare.

I just got back from a trip to Palm Beach, FL, and I felt similar vibes. The whole area is rather compact, but the 6 lane stroads merging onto 8 lane highways make it seem like Thunderdome. I found the affluent area that was somewhat walkable, but there were still narrow sidewalks in a car dominated street.

There's an excellent architecture and urbanism book about Long Beach called Long Beach Architecture, The Unexpected Metropolis. Published in 2004, but still worth looking at. There's a lot to like about Long Beach.

I was in Long Beach a couple of month ago for 2 weeks. The street sweeping schedule can make it very difficult for some in Long Beach to find street parking for their cars. The interesting thing was an SUV constantly parked on the street outside the BnB. When the street sweeper came through the owner pulled into the road to let it pass and then backed right back to the curb. That's the only time I saw it moved. I would be one to get rid of my car in this situation. I did borrow my family member's car some days when I wanted to take a longer trip outside of the city, but otherwise I would walk to her place, the grocery store, or even local restaurants. As for the oil rigs? I thought they were funny so I did a bit of research and found an article. It basically stated that the surrounding area of Los Angeles County would like LB to stop drilling, but the state seems to tailor the laws so that Long Beach is exempt and can continue drilling - in other words the state likes the money from these wells regardless of what they say in the press.