It was once touted as a paradise “tempered by ocean breezes” — or so went the sales pitch of an ambitious developer more than a century ago.
The local newspaper soon added to the hyperbole, claiming that the area offered “splendid climatic conditions, as the weather is never hot on the warmest day.”
This magical place? Woodland Hills. Also now known as the neighborhood with the most brutal weather in all of Los Angeles during heat waves. Four years ago, it made history for ratcheting up to 121 degrees, a record for the region.
Still, current residents who were drawn here, not by dubious advertisements but by the family friendly appeal, say they aren’t overly bothered by the intense temperatures. “It’s just part of the deal,” said Larry Blum, 75, as he sat on a bench at Serrania Park, where dog owners are known to amble around a concrete loop and exchange pleasantries.
Located in the San Fernando Valley, Woodland Hills is a mere 15 miles, and one mountain range, away from Malibu, the coastal enclave where temperatures are about 25 degrees cooler this week.
Like many places in the region, it can seem a world away from downtown Los Angeles, so much so that outsiders are often confused whether it is actually within the city’s boundary. (It is.)
Home to about 75,000 people, Woodland Hills has all the features of a bustling town, with a business district and a main drag lined with grocery stores, eateries, retail shops and car dealerships. It recently welcomed a new training facility for the Los Angeles Rams.
But the residential parts, which feature serene hilly streets and access to hiking trails, are far from the congestion that plagues the center of Los Angeles. There is also a dazzling panorama of the valleys and mountains. For many, the neighborhood presented itself as a surprising pocket of the city where housing, while pricey, felt generous.
“We were so excited we could buy a house here that wasn’t just a shoe box by the freeway and an exorbitant amount of money,” said Bobbie Schwarcz, 51, who moved to Woodland Hills eight years ago and runs her own business recruiting nurses. “Here it was within our means, and we got elbow room and a safe community.”
Residents remind themselves of that every time a heat wave crushes Southern California and their neighborhood leads the way in numbers. Television forecasters regularly point to Woodland Hills as the poster child of extreme heat in Los Angeles. This week, as temperatures threaten to climb as high as 117 degrees on Friday, there are the usual complaints, but also a collective shrug.
“We swim, we do lots of water play, and then there’s a lot of great indoor play places that I like to take the kids to on 100-plus degree days, so we manage,” said Allie Isaac, who moved to the neighborhood with her husband, Don, and their three children two years ago.
Residents here tote around insulated bottles of water, keep extra ice water in the car, worry about their children’s sun exposure and head often to the beach. The Isaac family had been accustomed to muggy summers in Washington, D.C., so the cross-country move to a dry environment was an adjustment.
“With humidity, you feel like you’re sweating the moment you get outside,” Ms. Isaac, 34, said. “In the dry heat you feel OK, but then once you get really moving, you’re like, ‘It’s 100 degrees, I’m going to faint.’”
For many, the answer lies in swimming pools, a common feature of backyards in the valley. Mr. Blum, a retired electrician, often hosts his grandchildren at his pool — although he has found relief in riding his motorcycle.
When he can, he joins a group on an outing known as “the cool ride,” and they head west for the day. “It’s hotter than heck when we’re in Woodland Hills, and you can feel the cool spots when you hit the mountains,” he said. “Oh, it’s beautiful.”
Those mountains are among the forces that contribute to the neighborhood’s excessive heat. The sea breeze from the Pacific Ocean is forced to wind its way around the peaks to get to Woodland Hills. The hourslong journey means that the breeze arrives warm and unhelpful, if at all.
“The sea breeze is so delayed in getting into that portion of the valley,” said Todd Hall, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard, Calif. “It has to basically work its way counterclockwise around western L.A. County to make its way in.”
Even nearby areas in the San Fernando Valley can be five degrees cooler than Woodland Hills, simply because their locations offer less resistance or a different path.
For Jessica Bradley, 23, a summer in Woodland Hills is no worse than those she experienced growing up in Bakersfield in the Central Valley of California, often one of the hottest parts of the state. (In an unusual turnabout, Bakersfield is expected to be about 10 degrees cooler than Woodland Hills on Thursday.)
“I know how to deal with it,” she said.
Since she moved to the area a year ago to attend nursing school, she has found that the neighborhood strikes a happy medium between her hometown (too boring) and central Los Angeles (too chaotic).
And, as many residents pointed out, the triple digits come around only a couple weeks a year. Often that is in September, because of warmer ocean water that weakens the ability for the sea breeze to have a cooling effect.
“On the really hot days it’s pretty debilitating, you see a lot of people going walking early in the morning and right before the sun goes down. But for the most part, people just stay inside,” said Matt Bayless, 41, a manager at Woodland Hills Wine Company. Known for its European imports, the business has at least five air-conditioners running throughout the day.
“We spend a small fortune on electrical here,” Mr. Bayless said.
Calls for service for air-conditioners tend to increase threefold around this time of year, said Danny Amar, the co-owner of an HVAC business.
Mr. Amar, 45, a father of three, has lived in Woodland Hills for nearly two decades. The heat is a minor issue when considering everything else, he said.
“Family friendly area, big lots for homes, good schools — I think it’s enough, no?”
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