Local Facilities

By: Haley Stokols and Grace King

Echo Park has a variety of service agencies throughout the community. The building structures of these various agencies do not stand out, but rather fit in with the other building structures around. To name a few, there were agencies for citizen’s personal use, such as an income tax company, family services, HIV testing and a key shop. Several of the shops had gated windows, but otherwise were pretty discrete and integrated with the rest of the shops around.

We didn’t come across any major shopping centers, big retails stores or malls. There were a couple of small Mexican markets, but much of the shopping seemed to be store-front and street-shops, as opposed to larger enclosed stores one might find at malls are major shopping centers in other places.

On our route through Echo Park there was one major chain grocery story – Vons - but other than that, there were mostly just small convenience stores

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There is a main public library in Echo Park called Edandale Library. (website link - http://www.lapl.org/index.html) It was actually a very good sized and decent looking library; quite impressive. There was a nice children’s section where kids could quietly play and read, there were many computers for people to use, and of course, a myriad of books to read from all categories. There was also a section where information about community events, news and updates was posted, which served as great resources for people interested in keeping abreast of the happenings, issues and actions in the community.

Although our walking routes did not pass any schools, there is an Echo Park Elementary school located on 14100 County Rd. It seems to be a pretty comprehensive school with opportunities for parent involvement and extracurricular activities and classes for the kids. More information about this school can be found on their website pasted below.

http://www.district196.org/ep/

Echo Park has many banks. One of the first banks we came across during our community immersion walk was Citibank on Sunset Blvd. There is also a Bank of American on Sunset, a Los Angeles National Bank also on Sunset, and a Wells Fargo on Alvarado. This makes it possible for community members to choose between banks based on their financial preferences – whereas in a space where there is only one bank easily accessed community members have less (or no) options.

The hospitals in Echo park are: Barlow Respiratory Hospital, located at 2000 Stadium way; Gateway HospitalMental Health Center, located at 1891 Effie St.; and City of Angels Medical Center, more recently named Silver Lake Medical Center, located at 1711 W Temple St. The Silver Lake Medical Center is the only hospital in Echo Park that does not offer acute services only, seeing as Barlow Respiratory Hospital offers respiratory care and Gateway Hospital offers care for patients suffering from illnesses related to mental health. Silver Lake Medical Center is a 117-bed facility and is community based. It offers inpatient and surgical procedures as well as a variety of outpatient procedures. The center is readily available using the DASH, public transportation that costs only 25 cents, and also has MTA stops out front. In additon there is ample parking at the site. and

In Echo Park there is no city hall or local courthouse. This may be difficult for community members who would like to bring up a grievance with city hall, or for members who may be involved with the law and need to reach the courthouse. There are a number of reasons community members may need to reach these places, and for that reason it is unfortunate that they are not readily accessible. However, during our immersion walk our guide did inform us that Councilman Eric Garcetti has an office in the building where Citibank is located on Sunset Blvd.

There are many gas stations in the Echo Park. Among them are the Gas Express and the Sunset 76 stations located on Sunset Blvd. In addition to gas stations for automobile users, there are public buses and cabs in the community.

The DASH is a bus that only costs 25 cents, making its services available to a much wider community than other public buses that have much higher rates. The only downside to using the DASH as one’s main form of transportation is that it can be behind schedule or overcrowded – making it difficult to arrive at one’s destination at a determined time. The DASH in Echo Park connects with Pico Union.