Carol and Leonard Thompson got their first glimpse of the Long Beach, California, neighborhood of California Heights while house-hunting 10 years ago. "When we saw it," Carol recalls, "I said, 'We have to live here.' It just felt like home."
California Heights has that effect on people. It's not lavish: Houses in the 50-block area are mostly Spanish and Craftsman bungalows built during Long Beach's 1920s oil boom. But even a casual sidewalk stroll past home after lovingly restored home gives the impression of a neighborhood that wraps itself around its residents as comfortingly as a favorite sweater.
Key to the area's success is the California Heights Neighborhood Association, which grew out of a successful 1990 effort to have California Heights designated as a historic district. Today the CHNA distributes a welcome kit to each new resident, publishes a bimonthly newsletter, runs an October home-and-garden tour, and has undertaken improvement projects ranging from tree planting to commissioning a new neighborhood mural.
To build a great neighborhood, "you need a clear focus," says Albert Guerra, president of CHNA. "Something that people will unite behind. Here, it's history. If people don't have something to do, they fall away and you don't hear from them again." — Peter Fish
CALIFORNIA HEIGHTS ESSENTIALS
FOUNDED: 1926
ELEVATION: 32 feet
AVERAGE COST OF 3-BEDROOM, 2-BATH HOME: $500,000–$600,000
AVERAGE JANUARY TEMPERATURES: High 68°, low 46°
LOCAL PLEASURE: Viewing Art Mortimer's California Heights Welcome Mural on the northeast corner of Orange Ave. and Wardlow Rd.
INFORMATION: California Heights Neighborhood Association, (562) 981-2258
MORE GREAT NEIGHBORHOODS
First Addition, Lake Oswego, Oregon. This leafy neighborhood dates from the 1890s and has an active neighborhood association. (503) 636-3634.Miraloma Park, San Francisco. Built on the slopes of Mt. Davidson, this 3,000-home neighborhood boasts great views and the Miraloma Park Improvement Club, complete with its own clubhouse. (415) 281-0892.
