Moving to Los Angeles from Vancouver

Relocating to Los Angeles

   Los Angeles is city of about four million Angelenos. It's greater metropolitan area (i.e. 88 cities) is home to almost twenty million people. L.A. is known for being the home of Hollywood and its entertainment industry. Not so widely known is that Los Angeles has the largest container port in the North and South America.

The realities of living in Los Angeles include:
   • Los Angeles is a large city with all the typical things that contribute to that status. Its Mediterranean like climate is impacted in fall by Santa Anna winds. They bring a dryness to the heat that gets only about 35 days with rain each year. The fires can also result in winter and spring mud slides and floods.

   • Los Angeles is documented to have some of the worst traffic congestion in the world. What is inconsistent with that is its streets are designed to handle traffic better than other cities. The almost 500 sq miles the City of Angels occupies tends to have a lower high rise profile than one might expect. Its large area keeps cars on the road longer due all longer distances than if its people were concentrated in a higher rise pattern. Public transit is poor in the face of greater distances. Cabs, etc. are also overly expensive in the face of those distances. Angelenos drive. Even during traffic congestion it feels more open than people from other cities expect due to the low rise nature of L.A. None the less arrival can still end up an hour or more late.

   • Los Angeles has air pollution that shows itself as smog. Atmospheric inversions holds particles from cars, trains, planes and manufacturing over Los Angeles at levels recorded at over 50%.

   • Los Angeles is on several fault lines making Earthquakes a fact of life. Thousands of them happen each year, at very low levels. The 6.7 magnitude Northridge earthquake in 1994 caused 72 deaths and $12billion in damage. It is said the big one is overdue. Like getting up early, to be able to interact with the eastern USA is a part of life, so too is earthquake awareness.

   • L.A. is known for its exorbitant prices however it is on a par with Toronto as far as cost of living goes.