Where is LA?

One thing you may hear about LA is that it's not very neighborly. I call bullshit. First, I know all of my neighbors and their kids/animals pretty well. Also, LA as a whole has may distinct areas, such as Brentwood and Hollywood. And there are sub-areas within these (for instance, within Hollywood is the ThaiTown section) The LA Times as decided on taking on the thankless task of determining the exact borders of each one at this link.

Besides all of the local cranks who complain about a boundary being this street instead of another street, there's an interesting dynamic of how neighborhoods shift, particularly those primarily identified by their ethnic makeup. For instance, do the Koreatown borders change as Korean-American owned businesses move in or out? Should South LA (a name normally associated with African-American neighborhoods) have a different name now that is has a Hispanic majority?

Any border is arbitrary, but some are interesting. Using a very LA motif, Brentwood and Bel Air are separated by a freeway and Harbor Gateway is basically defined by the freeway that leads from the main part of the city to the port of Los Angeles. Some are defined pretty clearly due to sharing a border with fully surrounded city(ies), like Westwood which is bordered by Beverly Hills.

Of course, with some of the names and boundaries it's all about property values and prestige. Everyone's looking for an angle for some $$.