Pockets of privilege stand near less favorable neighborhoods.

IT'S easy to estimate income levels when driving through the high-priced neighborhoods of Brentwood, Beverly Hills or Bel-Air.

But what about the more unassuming communities of East Hollywood, Koreatown and Wilshire Center, which include such pockets of wealth and prestige as Hancock Park and Windsor Square?

Across Los Angeles, small enclaves of prosperity stand out among the rows of tract homes, far removed from other communities that would be their equal.

There's gated Bradbury, above the auto malls lining the 210 Freeway in Duarte. There's also Hidden Hills, nestled up against the Ventura County line, and Naples, the island community protected by water from the mere affluence of Belmont Shore.

How did they get there?

For some, the answer lies in history. For others, it's geography, or an architectural vision from a century ago that still resounds and cannot be duplicated.

Windsor Square was the original Westside. The community sprouted in 1910 when the city of Los Angeles was paving Wilshire Boulevard--an escape for those weary of the once coveted Victorian homes of West Adams.

"They were starting already to think, 'Well, I don't know if I really want to live here; I'm so close to this and that,'" said Suz Landay, a member of the Windsor Square-Hancock Park Historical Society. "Here was a nice new clean housing development in an area that didn't have any taint whatsoever."

The median household incomes in the 90004 and 90020 ZIP codes, which include Hancock Park and Windsor Square, were between $24,000 and $28,000, according to 2000 Census data. But in those two neighborhoods, home prices range from $700,000 to more than $5 million, and median household incomes approached $100,000 in some Census tracts west of Plymouth Boulevard.

Naples was developed in the early 1900s by financier Henry Huntington and AM. Parsons. They envisioned a community of canals, gondolas and Mediterranean-style houses--an ocean-encompassed Venice.

Today, 2,000 people live on the two concentric islands, mostly in single-family homes that can sell for $1.5 million or more. That's well above the $655,000 median home price in its 90803 ZIP code, which also includes Belmont Shore and a portion of southeast Long Beach. The differences also show up in median household income, which as of 1999 was $20,000 higher in Naples than the overall 90803 area.

While Hancock Park and Windsor Square are in the middle of densely populated neighborhoods, and Naples is by the sea, Bradbury and Hidden Hills are remote enclaves where people with money go to get away.

In Hidden Hills's 91302 ZIP code, which includes parts of Calabasas and unincorporated Los Angeles County, last year's median home price was $880,000. The median household income in 1999 was $93,378.

In Bradbury, where two thirds of the city's 300 homes are behind gates, median household income was $78,890 in 1999. Add the broader 91010 ZIP code that includes neighboring Duarte, and the figure drops to $50,000. Likewise, the median home price in 91010 was $285,000 last year, but homes in Bradbury go for much higher.

"We even have some people who wanted to get to the country, and they came from La Canada/Flintridge," said Bradbury City Manager Katie Wilson. "We have some that are not as wealthy and then we have the extreme wealth. So it's more like the rich and the filthy rich. We joke about it."

Duarte resident Mary Barrow, who also performs public relations for the city of Duarte, said the people of Bradbury might have more money, horses and five-acre properties, but the library and the parks are in Duarte. She said all the kids play well together and the communities share committees and activities.

"They are very much a part of the fabric of Duarte as much as they are Bradbury," Barrow said. "I don't detect there's any snobbery there."