i live in LA and walk often. it's great. the weather is awesome (60's and sunny today, in the middle of winter), i have dozens of good restaurants and cafes within walking distance, as is most of my shopping needs. parks, theaters, museums, bars, and other entertainment can be easily reached by walking. LA is a big city so not everything is right there, but everything i need day-to-day is.
The majority of people who live in LA, live somewhere nestled into the bigger sprawl that is the region. While there are plenty of neighborhoods that have walkable aspects, the city is by no means walkable (even with transit) to huge portions of the city.
I had all that when I was living in Westwood, which is far far far aaay from downtown, but I could have had that in belverly hills, or Culver City, or even (but just barely) Brentwood.
my listed criteria wasn't even complete, just what came to mind in the 30 seconds i thought about it. there are plenty of neighborhoods that are walkable in LA (silverlake, hollywood, highland park, even north hollywood, etc.). the whole city doesn't need to be reachable by foot to be a walkable neighborhood.
sounds like your bar may be set particularly high or your assumptions about what you need to walk to may be extraordinary.
My definition would be could you live comfortably without ever using a car, such as being able to go grocery shopping without having to walk a ton, be near enough to the rail system such that you can get around easily, be in a neighborhood where going clothes shopping doesn't mean an inconvenient trip to a mall, ect.
venice is super-walkable, and i'd guess it's better to live in the venice/santa monica bubble without a car than with, because getting out of the westside is awful by car for large parts of the day. within the bubble you can walk, bike, run, skate or scooter to just about anything you need.
but outside of LA proper, it's true that san bernardino, the inland empire, and the san fernando and san gabriel valleys generally are car-oriented, and it's unwieldy to live in those areas without a car (although there are pocket exceptions, particularly in the valleys).
The problem, is that Venice is what a regular suburban area should be like in terms of walkability, when for the most part, suburbs have nowhere to walk too.
Doesn't LA have literally the most polluted air in the country? Doesn't sound great for walking.
I know people who live in Downtown LA and don't own cars.
I get the impression there are several parts of LA you can live in without regularly driving, and still have a very normal lifestyle. Not sure about the air quality downtown but my friends didn't complain about it.
> Not sure about the air quality downtown but my friends didn't complain about it.
I think unhealthy air quality is dangerous long before you actively notice it. I'd rely on measurements instead of subjective impressions.
but it's the worst for ozone, where it's 80's reputation for smog comes from. to be fair, LA's air quality is far better than the 74 major cities in chinaa: https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-china-la-smog-stats...
which is where a significant portion of the air polution comes from (enough to go from good to bad): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_pollution_in_the_United_St...
