University Hills, Los Angeles

For other uses, see University Hills (disambiguation).

University Hills
Neighborhood of Los Angeles
University Hills sign at Lansdowne Avenue near Eastern University Hills sign at Lansdowne Avenue near Eastern
University Hills Location within Central Los Angeles
Coordinates:
Country	United States
State	California
County	Los Angeles
City	Los Angeles
Time zone	PST (UTC-8)
• Summer (DST)	PDT (UTC-7)

University Hills is a district on the East Side of Los Angeles, California. It is the site of California State University, Los Angeles.

Geography and transportation

University Hills is bordered by El Sereno on the north, Hillside Village on the west, City Terrace on the south, Alhambra on the north-east, and Monterey Park on the south-east. The street boundaries are Valley Boulevard and Marianna Avenue to the north and west, Eastern Avenue and the San Bernardino Freeway to the south, and Interstate 710 to the east.

Major thoroughfares include Eastern Avenue, Marianna Avenue, and Valley Boulevard. The San Bernardino and Pasadena freeways run along the district's southern and western edges, respectively.

The campus of California State University, Los Angeles occupies nearly 200 acres (0.8 km²) on a hilltop site that affords views of the San Gabriel Mountains to the north, the San Gabriel Valley to the east, metropolitan Los Angeles to the west, and the Palos Verdes Peninsula and Catalina Island to the south.

History

University Hills is on a site that once housed one of California's 36 original adobes. It was built in 1776 by Franciscan missionaries and destroyed by a fire in 1908. These lands once were part of a Spanish land grant known as the Rancho Rosa Castilla, created by the family of Juan Batista Batz, a Basque rancher from northern Spain who settled the district in its early years.

References

• Jennifer Delson, "A Campus Enclave That's a Study in Contrasts." Los Angeles Times, April 24, 2005