I Drove Through The WORST Neighborhood In Los Angeles. This Is What I Saw.

Wow Los Angeles has some bad areas!

For this video, I drove to the south side of Los Angeles County - as far south within the county limits as you can get, actually. The goal was to witness the worst neighborhood in Los Angeles firsthand. I entered LA on the city’s far south end, along the coast, in the Los Angeles harbor region. The industrial landscape smelled of chemicals, and was eerily desolate. It was Wednesday, October 28, 2020 at 11 am

The LA neighborhood of Wilmington is well known among people who grew up in Southern California. Not many have been here - but it’s notorious for news reports and pop culture lore. The type of place Long Beach rappers talked about in the 90s. This neighborhood has racked by crime and poverty for decades. Wilmington is about 9 square miles big, bordered by Long Beach and Carson. There are about 50,000 people in this hood - big enough that it would be a fairly large city in some states.

To get a good look at Wilmington, I’ll be generally driving north up Avalon Blvd, which splits the neighborhood in half. I’ll criss cross various side streets to give you some perspective on what the area is like.

Most of the Wilmington neighborhood is poor - folks earn about $15k a year each annually, which is really low - even for Los Angeles. 2 in 3 people here rent their home.

87% of Wilmington is hispanic, which is a huge difference from what this neighborhood was like back in 1990 when this area was 40% black. Gangs have always been a problem here, but gang activity peaked decades ago - back in the late 1990s there would be 40 gang related killings in this neighborhood each year. There’s still a lot of gang activity here these days, just less so.

Crime rates are nearly triple the national average in this part of Los Angeles. To make matters worse, the air pollution in this neighborhood is terrible, because it’s just blocks away from oil refineries. In fact, Wilmington sits on top of the third largest oil field in the country. That’s correct - right here in south Los Angeles, next to a bunch of ports, railyards and distribution centers along the LA Harbor is a large oil field.

On many Wilmington blocks, there’s either a liquor store, a fast food restaurant, a rundown school or a dirty park.

Anyways, I’ll continue the drive so you can take a look and judge the area for yourself. The worst neighborhood in Los Angeles.

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[Forest]

the crazy thing is that its a "ghetto" but those houses are like 500- 800K.

[keenanketsdever]

I used to think Wilmington was rough, then I accidentally booked a motel in a New Orleans ghetto, then i learned what real terror was

[AprilRoseStar]

I grew up in Wilmington and I loved it! Yes it’s ghetto, I mean it is in LA, but trust me there are WAY worse cities in LA area than Wilmington! I still go back to visit all the time and It’s nothing how you describe 🤷🏼‍♀️

[bdflatlander]

From what I see of the houses and neighborhoods in this video, Wilmington doesn’t look all that bad. Most of the homes seem to be reasonably well maintained and there’s no visible trash on the streets.

[ak]

I'm from LA and a lot of people are fooled by the way the neighborhoods look. They aren't total slums like on the east and midwest but the stats are just as bad.

[kimberleymartinez]

I've lived in Wilmington my whole life, and I have never had my life threatened. I do all the normal things teenagers do. I freely go on runs, go on bike rides, and go to the park with my friends. Maybe it's luck who knows, but I personally feel completely safe. I agree that air pollution is not the best for the community.

[Rumskitt]

West coast ghettos never look as bad as ghettos in other parts of the country

[priscillagee]

This popped up in my recommendations. I’ve lived in Wilmington my whole life. This is home.

[tommatthews]

It looks nice! 😁 You should've stopped at Tommy's Burgers for lunch! 8:48

[ronnieg.]

Lmao thanks for showing the beauty of our city! Yes it has "ghetto" parts, but show me a city that doesn't. I was born and raised right here in Wilmington. My great grandparents planted their roots here. So again, thank you for showing our beautiful little city to the world.
Edit: it's funny all the hate my comment has gotten! I'm not mad though, this is still my city.

[swabby]

I was waiting for the ugly, decrepit housing tenements. The homes actually look very nice. The business district looked better any within a similar size city in Nebraska. I guess the crime rate makes the place bad, though.

[brienmcnally]

Clean streets, no graffiti, reasonably maintained housing. Just a working class hood. Residents showing pride

[josephoxandale]

I've been doing a long term photography project in south LA and it's astonishing how a neighborhood can seem post-apocalyptic and very dangerous at 3 in the morning, but when you go back in daylight hours it's totally fine... just a lot of working class latinos driving pickup trucks. It's like there's 2 versions of every neighborhood down there.

[martinhuerta]

Didn’t see what’s so bad about Wilmington. It’s a working class neighborhood. And it’s certainly better than other parts of LA. South Central for instance.

[discopoe]

Doesn't seem to be that bad tbh. I've certainly been to parts of LA that look worse.

[FeatheryBird]

You haven't passed a single homeless tent.

[sabrinacle]

Wilmington had nice houses. Didn’t see homeless encampments or trash. What are you talking about?

[chadnielsen]

I saw new asphalt on some streets. Well maintained yards. All vehicles looked in great shape. Cute older houses. A lady watering her lawn. Man, what a terrible place! 🤣🤣🤣 so nice to see at least the majority of the comments being positive about the city!

[richmaint]

I grew up in Southwest Atlanta, this place is Beautiful !

[urstylo]

I grew up in Carson and went to Wilmington Junior high. The salary figures you mentioned are wrong. A lot of Wilmington families are longshoremen at the LA ports. They make a good living there.