Boyle Heights, California

Boyle Heights is a neighborhood within the City of Los Angeles, California. Boyle Heights lies to the east and south of Downtown Los Angeles and covers approximately 6 square miles. Although neighborhoods such as Boyle Heights are not recognized by the United States Census Bureau, Boyle Heights is estimated to have about ninety-three thousand residents.

Boyle Heights is one of Los Angeles’ earliest suburbs. Boyle Heights contains extensive multi-unit housing neighborhoods. Forty-two percent of its buildings were constructed before 1940. Many of those buildings were constructed between 1900 and 1930, when many other portions of Los Angeles were largely undeveloped. Murals are an important element of the streetscape of Boyle Heights.

Boyle Heights is notable for having a high proportion of small businesses, including many eateries. Boyle Heights also has a vibrant street vending sector. The former Sears building, situated on a 9-acre lot at Olympic Boulevard and Soto Street, was both a retail store and the only large mail-order plant constructed by Sears, Roebuck & Company in the southwestern United States. Constructed in 1927, the mail order section of the building closed in 1992. The retail section of the building closed in 2021. Plans for redevelopment of the site have not yet been finalized.

Thoroughfares such as Whittier Boulevard, First Street, Wabash Avenue, and Soto Street act as mixed-use corridors. The western and southern fringes of Boyle Heights are industrial. The main employment industries are Manufacturing, Transportation, Warehousing; Health Care and Social Assistance; and Retail, Food Services.

Boyle Heights is located in Council District 14. Boyle Heights Neighborhood Council is a quasi-city entity that is an advisory board to the City Council. Boyle Heights is comprised of four districts, each of which is represented by an Area Representative from the Boyle Heights Neighborhood Council. Boyle Heights is served by the Hollenbeck Division of the Los Angeles Police Department and the Central Bureau of the Los Angeles Fire Department.

Boyle Heights is served by a light rail system, the Metro L (Gold) Line, which connects East Los Angeles to Downtown Los Angeles and also services the San Gabriel Valley.

The Pico/Aliso Station services the western portion of Boyle Heights and is accessible to students of Felicitas & Gonzalo Mendez High School and residents of the Pueblo del Sol Apartments project. The Pueblo del Sol Apartments project was built on the site of the Aliso Village Public Housing Community, the largest public housing project in the Western United States. Other Metro L (Gold) Line stations in or adjacent to Boyle Heights include Plaza Mariachi Station, Soto Station, and Indiana Station.

Due to its location near Downtown Los Angeles, Boyle Heights is accessible via several freeways, including Interstate 5, Interstate 10, U.S. Route 101, and California State Route 60. Several major thoroughfares also pass through the area. Major freeway interchanges are located in or near Boyle Heights. By some estimates, nearly 15% of the land area of Boyle Heights has been consumed by freeway development.

Boyle Heights is near several major railway lines and the bustling Union Station.

Known historically as El Paredón Blanco or Paredón Blanco ("White Bluff"), residents of Boyle Heights were served by an early form of public transportation, the Los Angeles Cable Railway Company, which opened in 1889. In the early decades of the 20^th Century Boyle Heights was a diverse area ethnically with a significant Asian, Latino, Russian, Armenian, African American, and Jewish presence. Boyle Heights was sometimes referred to as the “Ellis Island of the West.” There are many reminders of the area’s past, including Boyle Heights’ Japanese Hospital, a forty-two-bed facility that opened in 1929 operated until the 1960s.

Racially restrictive covenants were a legal tool whereby the buyer of a property agreed as a condition of the purchase not to sell or rent the property to identified racial or ethnic groups. Racially restrictive covenants were common in many Southern California communities. However, things were different in Boyle Heights. In keeping with the spirit of a late 19^th Century banner posted in Boyle Heights that read "East Side Greeting We Welcome All,” Boyle Heights did not have racially restrictive covenants.

The new Sixth Street Viaduct connects Boyle Heights to Downtown Los Angeles and was the largest bridge project in the history of Los Angeles. It replaced the original, seismically deficient viaduct, which was built in 1932. The viaduct spans 3,500 feet, crossing the Los Angeles River, local streets, a freeway, and railroad corridors. The Bureau of Engineering is slated to create approximately 13 acres of public recreational space in areas underneath and adjacent to the Viaduct, in what is known as the Sixth Street Park, Arts, River & Connectivity (PARC) Project. The PARC Project will include pedestrian access improvements so Boyle Heights residents can safely and easily connect to the recreational space. Phase II of the project would involve installing reinforced concrete planted terraces on the banks of the Los Angeles River channel.

Hollenbeck Park is one of the oldest parks in the City of Los Angeles, dating to 1892. Situated on 21 acres of donated land, the park was named after John Edward Hollenbeck, a noted businessman and investor. At one time, a proposal was circulated to rename Boyle Heights as “Hollenbeck Heights.”

Felicitas & Gonzalo Mendez High School, located in Boyle Heights, is notable for the presence of Sylvia Méndez Wellness Center. Sylvia Méndez Wellness Center provides physical, mental, and dental health services, and is the largest facility of its type in the Los Angeles School District.

Evergreen Cemetery was established in 1877 and is the oldest nondenominational cemetery in Los Angeles.

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