Sunset Boulevard is a

boulevard A boulevard is a type of broad avenue planted with rows of trees, or in parts of North America, any urban highway or wide road in a commercial district. In Europe, boulevards were originally circumferential roads following the line of former ...

in the central and western part of

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, California, United States, that stretches from the Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades east to Figueroa Street in

downtown Los Angeles Downtown Los Angeles (DTLA) is the central business district of the city of Los Angeles. It is part of the Central Los Angeles region and covers a area. As of 2020, it contains over 500,000 jobs and has a population of roughly 85,000 residents ...

. It is a major thoroughfare in the cities of

Beverly Hills Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. A notable and historic suburb of Los Angeles, it is located just southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Beverly Hil ...

and West Hollywood (including a portion known as the Sunset Strip), as well as several districts in Los Angeles.

Geography

Approximately in length, the

roughly traces the arc of mountains that form part of the northern boundary of the

Los Angeles Basin The Los Angeles Basin is a sedimentary Structural basin, basin located in Southern California, in a region known as the Peninsular Ranges. The basin is also connected to an wikt:anomalous, anomalous group of east–west trending chains of mountai ...

, following the path of a 1780s cattle trail from the Pueblo de Los Angeles to the ocean. From Downtown Los Angeles, the boulevard heads northwest, to Hollywood, through which it travels due west for several miles before it bends southwest towards the ocean. It passes through or near Echo Park, Silver Lake, Los Feliz, Hollywood, West Hollywood,

, and Holmby Hills. In Bel-Air, Sunset Boulevard runs along the northern boundary of

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

's Westwood campus. The boulevard continues through Brentwood to Pacific Palisades, where it terminates at the Pacific Coast Highway intersection. The boulevard has curvaceous winding stretches, and can be treacherous for unalert drivers in some sections. Sunset Boulevard is at least four lanes wide along its entire route. Sunset is frequently congested with traffic loads beyond its design capacity. Sunset Boulevard historically extended farther east than it does now, starting at Alameda Street near

Union Station A union station, union terminal, joint station, or joint-use station is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway company, railway companies, allowing passengers to connect conveniently bet ...

and beside Olvera Street in the historic section of Downtown. The portion of Sunset Boulevard east of Figueroa Street was renamed Cesar Chavez Avenue in 1994, along with Macy Street and Brooklyn Avenue, in honor of the late

Mexican-American Mexican Americans are Americans of full or partial Mexican descent. In 2022, Mexican Americans comprised 11.2% of the US population and 58.9% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% of Mexican Americans were born in the United State ...

union leader and civil rights activist.

History

In 1877, Harvey Henderson Wilcox, one of the earlier real estate owners from "back East", decided to subdivide more than of land (mostly orchards and vineyards) along Sunset Boulevard, including what is today Hollywood and Vine. In 1890, Belgian diplomat Victor Ponet bought of the former Rancho La Brea land grant. His son-in-law, Francis S. Montgomery, inherited this property and created Sunset Plaza. Originally, Sunset Boulevard only extended from Hollywood in the west to Marion Avenue in the Echo Park district in the east. The Board of Public Works proposed to extend Sunset east to Main Street in the Plaza by routing the road over the existing section of Bellevue Avenue, but the plan was delayed until approximately 1904, due to active opposition by affected land owners. According to the 1910 Baist Real Estate Survey Atlas, Sunset Boulevard reached the Plaza by that time, but it did so by two short and narrow segments which were not aligned with each other and thus did not provide a proper thoroughfare to it. In late 1912, several properties along the route were condemned so that the boulevard could be changed in both its width and its alignment. With these changes completed, Sunset Boulevard now reached North Main Street and continued as Marchessault along the northern end of the Plaza. In 1921, a westward expansion of Sunset began, extending the road from the then-current terminus at Sullivan Canyon toward the coast. This land, a portion of the original 1838 holdings of Francisco Marquez, stretched across a mesa and became known as the "Riviera section". Will Rogers, who had bought much of this land as an investment, later donated it to the State of California creating Will Rogers State Historic Park. , Sunset was a paved road from Horn Avenue to Havenhurst Avenue. The section variously marked and signed as Marchessault Street or East Sunset Boulevard, remained open to traffic until the late 1960s or early 1970s. At that time, Sunset was realigned one block north and Marchessault was closed to motor traffic. The westernmost stretch of Sunset Boulevard in Pacific Palisades runs through an area devastated by the January 2025 Southern California wildfires. Many homes, businesses, and landmarks along the boulevard, such as the Pacific Palisades Business Block, were burned down.

Cultural aspects

The Sunset Strip portion of Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood has been famous for its active nightlife since at least the 1950s. In contrast to other American cities where it referred to a concentration of radio retailers, in Los Angeles, Radio Row was understood in the 1940s–1950s as the area around the intersection of Sunset Boulevard and

Vine Street Vine Street is a street in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, that runs north–south between Franklin Avenue, Los Angeles, and Melrose Avenue. The intersection of Hollywood and Vine being symbolic of Hollywood itself. The intersection has be ...

in Hollywood, where the broadcasting facilities of all four major radio networks were located. In the 1970s, the area between Gardner Street and Western Avenue was a center for

street prostitution Street prostitution is a form of prostitution in which a prostitute solicitation, solicits customers from a public place, most commonly a street, while waiting at street corners or walking alongside a street, but also other public places such as ...

. Shortly after a much publicized incident in late June 1995, police raids drove out the majority of prostitutes on the Boulevard. Part of Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood is also sometimes called "Guitar Row" due to the large number of guitar stores and music industry-related businesses, including the recording studios Sunset Sound Studios and United Western Recorders. The portion of Sunset Boulevard that passes through Beverly Hills was once named Beverly Boulevard. The boulevard is commemorated in

Billy Wilder Billy Wilder (; ; born Samuel Wilder; June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an American filmmaker and screenwriter. His career in Hollywood (film industry), Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most brilliant and ver ...

's film ''

Sunset Boulevard Sunset Boulevard is a boulevard in the central and western part of Los Angeles, California, United States, that stretches from the Pacific Coast Highway (California), Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, Pacific Palisad ...

'' (1950), the

Andrew Lloyd Webber Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber (born 22 March 1948) is an English composer and impresario of musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End theatre, West End and on Broadway theatre, Broad ...

musical of the same name, and the 1950s television series '' 77 Sunset Strip''.

Jan and Dean Jan and Dean were an American rock music, rock duo consisting of William Jan Berry (April 3, 1941 – March 26, 2004) and Dean Ormsby Torrence (born March 10, 1940). In the early 1960s, they were pioneers of the California Sound and vocal surf m ...

's 1960s hit song " Dead Man's Curve" refers to a section of the road near Bel Air estates just north of

's Drake Stadium where Jan Berry almost died in an automobile accident in 1966. The

Buffalo Springfield Buffalo Springfield was a Canadian-American Rock music, rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1966 by Canadians Neil Young, Bruce Palmer and Dewey Martin (musician), Dewey Martin and Americans Stephen Stills and Richie Furay. The group, widely know ...

song " For What It's Worth" was written about a riot at Pandora's Box, a Sunset Strip club, in 1966.

Metro Local The Los Angeles Metro Bus is the transit bus service in Los Angeles County, California, operated by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro). Metro Bus operates in the Los Angeles Basin, the San Fernando Valley, and th ...

lines 2, 4 and 602 operate on Sunset Boulevard, with Line 2 running through most of Sunset Boulevard between Echo Park and UCLA, Line 4 between Sunset Junction and Downtown LA, and Line 602 from UCLA west. The Metro B Line operates a subway station at Vermont Avenue. At 4334 W. Sunset Boulevard lies the wall featured on the cover of the late singer-songwriter Elliott Smith's 2000 album ''Figure 8''. Since Smith's death in 2003, the wall has become a memorial for the artist; fans have left many personal messages there over the years.

Landmarks (past and present)

* Amoeba Records * Andaz West Hollywood, formerly Hyatt West Hollywood * Beverly Hills Hotel * Blessed Sacrament Church * Book Soup * Carney's * CBS Columbia Square * Chateau Marmont * Cinerama Dome * CNN *

Comedy Store The Comedy Store is an American comedy club opened in April 1972. It is located in West Hollywood, California, at 8433 Sunset Boulevard on the Sunset Strip. An associated club is located in La Jolla, San Diego, California. History The Com ...

* Crossroads of the World *

Directors Guild of America The Directors Guild of America (DGA) is an entertainment guild that represents the interests of Film director, film and Television director, television directors in the United States motion picture industry and abroad. Founded as the Screen Dir ...

headquarters * Dudley Do-Right Emporium * Earl Carroll Theatre *

Emerson College Emerson College is a private college in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It also maintains campuses in Los Angeles and Well, Limburg, Netherlands (Kasteel Well). Founded in 1880 by Charles Wesley Emerson as a "school of Public Speaking, o ...

* The Garden of Allah * Gazzarri's * Gower Gulch * Haldeman House * Hollywood Athletic Club * Hollywood High School *

Hollywood Palladium The Hollywood Palladium is a theater (building), theater located at 6215 Sunset Boulevard in the Hollywood, Los Angeles, Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. It was built in a Streamline Moderne, Art Deco style and ...

* Hotel Bel-Air *

House of Blues House of Blues is an American chain of live music concert halls and restaurants. It was founded by Isaac Tigrett, the co-founder of Hard Rock Cafe, and Dan Aykroyd, co-star of the 1980 film ''The Blues Brothers (film), The Blues Brothers''. The ...

KCET KCET (channel 28) is a secondary PBS member television station in Los Angeles, California, United States. It is owned by the Public Media Group of Southern California alongside the market's primary PBS member, Huntington Beach–licensed KOC ...

KTLA KTLA (channel 5) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast flagship station of The CW. It is the largest directly owned property of the network's majority owner, Nexstar Media Group, and is ...

* The London Fog *

Los Angeles Film School The Los Angeles Film School (informally LA Film School) is a for-profit college in Los Angeles, California, offering associate and bachelor's degrees in majors relating to the entertainment industry. The school encompasses the Los Angeles Record ...

* Marymount High School * Metromedia Square (the former Fox Television Center and

KTTV KTTV (channel 11) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship (broadcasting), flagship station of the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox network. It is owned a ...

studios) * Nickelodeon on Sunset * Palisades Charter High School * Psychiatry: An Industry of Death Museum * Rainbow Bar and Grill * Robert Bridges House * Rock Walk * The Roxy Theatre * Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine *Sherry’s Club (now 1 OAK nightclub) * Spago * Standard Hotel *

Sunset Junction Sunset Junction is an informal name for a portion of the Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California, Silver Lake district of Los Angeles, California. It was home to the Sunset Junction Street Fair from 1980 through 2010. It is in the southwestern part ...

* Sunset Gower Studios * Tiffany Theatre * Tiki Ti * United Western Recorders *

* Viper Room *

Whisky a Go Go The Whisky a Go Go (informally nicknamed The Whisky) is a historic nightclub in West Hollywood, California, United States. It is located at 8901 Sunset Boulevard on the Sunset Strip, corner North Clark Street, opposite North San Vicente Boulev ...

* Will Rogers State Beach * Will Rogers State Historic Park

Notes

References

External links

* * {{authority control Streets in Los Angeles Streets in Los Angeles County, California Landmarks in Los Angeles Streets in Beverly Hills, California Brentwood, Los Angeles Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles East Hollywood, Los Angeles Echo Park, Los Angeles Streets in Hollywood, Los Angeles Silver Lake, Los Angeles Streets in West Hollywood, California Westside (Los Angeles County) Film production districts Former red-light districts in the United States Red-light districts in California Boulevards in the United States