Neighborhood Aspirations: Three local communities striving to create or retain a distinctive flavor in metropolis. (Economic Outlook 2002 - Starting Over).

Los Angeles is less a homogenous city than a collection of communities with their own interests and concerns. The Business Journal examines three areas that are worth watching in the new year.

Eagle Rock

With a Starbucks outlet slated. to open on Colorado Boulevard just west of Eagle Rock Boulevard, it's official.

Eagle Rock has landed.

The ubiquitous coffee purveyor's arrival is just the latest reflection of a Colorado/Eagle Rock shopping district that is responding to the changing demographics of the surrounding community.

Newer businesses like Fatti's coffeehouse and Cafe Boulangerie have joined the half-dozen tax preparation and notary houses near the intersection that cater to longtime residents, students at Occidental College and the increasing number young families that cannot afford the rising house prices of Silver Lake and Los Feliz.

"All this is upbeat for the new residents coming into the area," said Lorelei Young, owner of Century 21 First on Colorado Boulevard. "There's just a lot more variety coming in."

While two-bedroom houses in Los Feliz and Silver Lake are pushing the $500,000 threshold, a three-bedroom house off of Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock can be had for $300,000.

"I was so priced out of Los Feliz," said Patricia Neal, who bought a home in Eagle Rock last year after renting a townhouse on Hillhurst Avenue. "I was paying $1,200 a month. The minute I moved out, it went up to $2,000," she said.

"We have younger people coming -- younger families who had been renting on the Westside," said Young, who has been a broker in the area since the early '80s. "It's been going on for about two years."

Neal was so confident about the influx that she opened an interactive coffee bar, called swork, at the corner of Colorado and Eagle Rock. "The demographic is definitely there to support it," said Neal.

Having seen the development of big-block shopping centers on Eagle Rock Boulevard to the south and the Westfield Shoppingtown a mile west on Colorado, community members are wary of the threat of chain stores overrunning a Colorado/Eagle Rock district that retains many of its original brick buildings, as well as its community feel.

A group called TERA (The Eagle Rock Association) recently sent a note to the Los Angeles city planning department opposing the teardown of a 1940s' structure on Colorado for the build-out' of a Walgreens. In the note, dated Dec. 3, the group argues that the Walgreens development "would destroy one of the last vestiges of our history... and virtually annihilate our town center."

Though Neal has no qualms about Walgreens coming in, she is not surprised to hear a response from longtime community members that can be protective as well as a bit old-fashioned. "When I was opening up (swork), somebody told me, 'We already have a coffee house here. It's called Winchell's,'" said Neal.

East Hollywood

Though Vram Sarafian prides himself on his optimism, it's beginning to wear thin.

For years, he has been hearing how business at his East Hollywood print shop would benefit from the opening of the Hollywood/Western Metro Rail station across the street, as well as from ensuing development projects in the area.

"They said I was sitting on a gold mine, but (the opening) hasn't improved my business at all;' said Sarafian, who has owned Melton Printing Co. for 18 years. "The only thing I'm betting on is the complex next door."

That complex is the Hollywest project on the northeast corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Western Avenue, and it is emerging as the most likely catalyst for the long-sought evolution of the East Hollywood neighborhood that separates Little Armenia from Thai Town.

Conceived in the late 1980s, Hollywest, with 120,0,00 square feet of retail space and 100 senior housing units, is scheduled for completion in July. Its ground-floor space has been fully leased to Ralph's, Ross Dress For Less, Starbucks and Jamba Juice.

"We've got quite a melting pot in that area," said Tim Bower, a CB Richard Ellis first vice president handling leasing at the project. 'This is probably the first neighborhood center built in that neighborhood in 15 to 20 years."

"It's evolving very quickly' added Tony Salazar, president of McCormick Baron Salazar Inc. Salazar's company. built and quickly leased the 60-unit, low-income housing project Carlton Court Apartments. In March, it plans to break ground on a 61 unit residential project with 10,000 square feet of retail space on top of the Metro Rail station.

Also in the works is renovation of the Louis B. Mayer office building at the southwest corner of Hollywood and Western and completion of the Urs Jakob-owned L.A. Hotel at Hollywood and Garfield Place. Jakob operates the hip Gershwin Hotel in New York.

"We have white-collar professionals and blue-collar workers," said Salazar. "Hollywood's going to be one of those few places with the mom-and-pops all the way up to the big boxes (that) welcome and complement each other. You're creating that kind of an urban mix."

Whether consumer and tenant demand keeps up remains to be seen. The sex shop on Hollywood Boulevard just west of Western and the abandoned restaurant at the northwest corner of Hollywood and Garfield are reminders of a neighborhood still trying to turn the corner. Even Bower admits that the Ralph's and Ross Dress For Less at Hollywest will be dependent on Los Feliz residents to the north, who now have to go to Glendale for big-box shopping.

Sarafian notes that the area is a lot cleaner than it was before the Metro Rail station was installed in July 1999. "We don't have any prostitutes and we don't have any pimps -- they took their business somewhere else," he said.

Historic Uptown Whittier

While merchants 'and community leaders decry the over-branding of shopping districts from Santa Monica to Long Beach, Whittier paint store owner Jeff Langan has an unusual take on the subject.

"I'd like to see them;' said Langan, who has owned Whittier Paint & Wallpaper in Historic Uptown Whittier with his father-in-law for 34 years. "We're hoping we can fill some of these empty stores."

The dozen or so "For Lease" and "For Sale" signs are the only visual blights on a three-block stretch of Greenleaf Avenue that makes up Historic Uptown. Whittier's first commercial district, it encompasses a 10-square-block area established in 1887 and is surrounded by turn-of-the-century homes. The area underwent a major rehab after the Whittier earthquake in 1987.

It is popular with locals because its scale is more personal than the 32-acre Ralph's-anchored center on Whittier Boulevard, while it has yet to become chain store-dominated like Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade or Old Town Pasadena.

"The people who come here hate to go to malls," said Lydia Solorza, whose son Carlos and daughter-in-law Mary Ann have owned Unique Gifts, a religious collectibles store, for three years. Solorza noted that the store attracts people from all over the Mid-Cities region. "We get people from Long Beach, Downey, Moreno Valley... nuns that come from Albambra," she said.

Historic Uptown is not without its chain stores. National brands like Starbucks and Burger King' operate stores along Greenleaf, as do regional chains 99 Cents Only Stores and Penny Lane Records.

A slowing economy and soft holiday season have magnified the need for more nationally-recognized anchor tenants, according to Langan, who is also a 24 year member of Whittier Uptown Association. In early 2001, the business community group enlisted Santa Monica-based Fransen Co., which has bandied many of the chain store leases on, Third Street Promenade, to do the same for Historic Uptown, but to no avail.

"Their credentials were great, but their timing wasn't very good," said Langan.

He added that the odds of the district becoming chain-dominated are slim, considering its location. Uptown Whittier has no major thoroughfares running through it, and it's four miles from the nearest freeway.

"With the (location) criteria these (national chain) companies use, I don't think that'll be a problem," said Langan, adding, "I wish I had that problem to deal with."