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Soo...tell me about the West LA/Hawthorne area.

N546RV

Well Known Member
I know we've got lots of RVers out in SoCal, and I just applied for a job with SpaceX in Hawthorne. I may be getting way ahead of myself here, but I'm trying to get a feel for the area in case I end up relocating.

I'm specifically interested in good/bad areas that aren't too horribly far from Hawthorne. I'm even more interested in any air park communities that might be near Hawthorne. Since SpaceX is on an airport, it'd be nice to just fly to work and avoid the traffic (assuming, of course, the traffic is as bad as reputed). Alternatively, what's the situation for finding a hangar in that area? The LAX airspace looks...interesting...

For that matter, are there any VAFers at SpaceX? :)
 
I know we've got lots of RVers out in SoCal, and I just applied for a job with SpaceX in Hawthorne. I may be getting way ahead of myself here, but I'm trying to get a feel for the area in case I end up relocating.

I'm specifically interested in good/bad areas that aren't too horribly far from Hawthorne. I'm even more interested in any air park communities that might be near Hawthorne. Since SpaceX is on an airport, it'd be nice to just fly to work and avoid the traffic (assuming, of course, the traffic is as bad as reputed). Alternatively, what's the situation for finding a hangar in that area? The LAX airspace looks...interesting...

For that matter, are there any VAFers at SpaceX? :)

I was a plant rep at Hughes Aircraft in the early 90s. I lived in El Segundo. I hate commuting. I could go home for lunch if I wanted to.

El Segundo is a little enclave surrounded by the ocean, the refinery, LAX, and a business/commercial area. Close to the beach... close to Hawthorne... nice little bedroom community.

Don
 
Wx

Any plans to commute to work by air must include an instrument rating. Despite SoCal's well earned reputation for lots of good flying weather, there is another side. Many days, especially in the spring and early summer, the normal wx pattern is an onshore inversion/marine layer that keeps all airports within 10-20 miles of the coast IMC until mid-morning or noon-ish. We call it "May Gray" and "June Gloom." It extends to other months as well. Best of luck on your job app.
 
The traffic is every bit as bad as reputed on the 405, which would connect Hawthorne to any points north or south. There aren't any airparks in the immediate area outside of the high desert or San Diego (I think), and both of those would be over 50 NM away.

Instrument rating is a must have. Usually the marine layer is only about 1000 feet thick so it's just the approach section of your flight when you're in the soup. KHHR has a localizer approach, but ATC will holler at you if you drift north of final.

There are nice airports in El Monte, Fullerton, Torrance, Long Beach and Corona, all of which are local to nice neighborhoods (although if you decide to drive in from Corona you will be fighting a special kind of soul-deadening traffic on the 91 fwy). Santa Monica and John Wayne if you have the dough.

I would really consider the above-poster's advice and find a place in El Segundo, Torrance, or Hermosa Beach, and drive in without having to get on a freeway.
 
That's a 24 minute flight at RV-8 speed from my place in the High Desert (quicker than my drive to work in Palmdale!).

1CL2, VPNEW, KVNY, KHHR.

...And I just happen to have a lot and hangar available for sale.

Give me a shout sometime if you want more details.
 
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Ah SoCal how I miss ya. We lived there for 15 years until work moved us on to the north wet. It does take some time getting adjusted to the airspace there but once you understand the flow you will be surprised how easy it is to get around. Suggest finding a local to give you a tour through the LAX VFR corridor. A very effective tool for going VFR north to south right over LAX. Perhaps you noticed how close the final to HHR is to that of the 800 lbs gorilla LAX? Although the theory is first come first served you may be holding IFR ticket number 195 waiting to get into HHR on a true IMC type of day. Not always but there have been problems with IFR into HHR conflicting LAX south complex arrivals. If you are working in the HHR area then you should consider remaining in the South Bay area to keep the commute to a minimum. That's El Sugundo, Manhatten Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance, P.V., San Pedro, Long Beach but from GA to CA you may find what you get for a home/property a bit breath taking but you can abide. Best of luck with the prospects.
 
Yeah, the bit of looking I've done at property in the area, there's definitely a bit of a difference. I'm already trying to work up a good comparison of cost of living in Atlanta vs. SoCal, because that will definitely factor into my salary requirements to get me to move out there.

I'm all about working for a company putting stuff into space, but I do still have to live, and I would like to finish this RV sometime in the next decade or so. :p
 
Livability

I would like to recommend the web site that our own Doug Reeves recommended to me to compare Livability Score of different locations. It also compares the cost.

http://www.areavibes.com/search-results/?ct=el+segundo&st=ca&ll=33.9213142+-118.4062347

I retired and already sold my place so am in the process of moving out of the area. Almost everywhere in the USA, what I was making would be considered a very good wage. What I was making after 29.5 yeas of service would not be enough for me to move into the area. With the present economy that exists, my salary had no where to go but sideways at the best. I felt like if I stayed, I would be making less each year after the cost of living so am bailing out and going to enjoy life out of the Peoples Socialist Republic of Kalifornia.

I am gong to miss my friends, the climate, and the scenery. I will not miss the congestion, the restrictive gov't regulations, the denial of my 2nd amendment rights, the high taxes, the Left Wing Liberal attitudes, and the snobs in Hollyweird that think everyone owes them something. I am willing to concede that the rats won the rat race.

My condo in the southbay sold in 23.5 hours after it hit the MLS. The first offer was for $10K more than asking price and the offer came from someone that had not see the place before making the offer.

To see what traffic is like, go to http://www.sigalert.com/Map.asp#lat=33.9293&lon=-118.02111&z=2
 
I will not miss the congestion, the restrictive gov't regulations, the denial of my 2nd amendment rights, the high taxes, the Left Wing Liberal attitudes, and the snobs in Hollyweird that think everyone owes them something.

This is definitely one of my concerns. Without getting into politics, let's just say that there are lots of things about CA that look unpleasant to me. For example, have a rifle in the gun safe that would not be able to make the move without some modifications. I don't have any particular personal attachment to it, but the mere fact that I have to think about this is distasteful to me.

On the other hand, I'm not getting any younger, and every day that goes by, I'm less satisfied putting 40 hours a week into work I care nothing about. I'm good at my job, but the products I build are things I would never use. There's no personal investment on my part. So the prospect of finding a way to use my skills in a field I do care about is a powerful prospect. I'm a strong supporter of private spaceflight, so working for SpaceX looks to be right up the alley I'm looking for.

So on the one hand, I have the prospect of finding work I can throw myself into instead of just slogging through to make it home. On the other hand, I have a 2200-mile move, including two cars, two motorcycles, and an airplane project in progress (thankfully in the early stages), plus the legal and financial ramifications of living in CA. Oh, and suddenly I'd be on the opposite coast from my family, instead of just a few hours away by car.

It's a big commitment, and there's a lot to think about.
 
Yeah, the bit of looking I've done at property in the area, there's definitely a bit of a difference. I'm already trying to work up a good comparison of cost of living in Atlanta vs. SoCal, because that will definitely factor into my salary requirements to get me to move out there.

I'm all about working for a company putting stuff into space, but I do still have to live, and I would like to finish this RV sometime in the next decade or so. :p

Look at the cost of living REALLY close! I lived in CA back in the late 80's, and at least comparing Texas to CA, it is a HUGE HUGE HUGE difference in the cost of living! I don't know the cost of living in GA, but I'd venture to bet it's similar to TX?
 
LA, love it or hate it. I grew up in SoCal (Long Beach), worked in El Segundo for years at Hughes Aircraft (on spacecraft), and still live in SoCal (San Diego area). I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. Yes, the cost of gas, water, utilities and taxes are high, but the weather sure is nice. :D

The south bay area of LA is very liveable, and minimizing the commute is key to having time in the shop to work on your project.
 
LA, love it or hate it. I grew up in SoCal (Long Beach), worked in El Segundo for years at Hughes Aircraft (on spacecraft), and still live in SoCal (San Diego area). I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. Yes, the cost of gas, water, utilities and taxes are high, but the weather sure is nice. :D

The south bay area of LA is very liveable, and minimizing the commute is key to having time in the shop to work on your project.

I also worked at Hughes/Hughes-GM/Raytheon in El Segundo for 22 years.

I left in 1999 when I realized that the freeway rush hours had just extended into my lunch hour and I couldn't drive down a short distance of the 405 to get to Earls in Lawndale...:)

I lived in Mar Vista and never used a freeway to commute.

The weather is nice, but 'you pay$ your money and take your choice' as the old saying goes.
 
Any chance you could work elsewhere for SpaceX? Maybe you could work a year or two in California and then move to either Texas or Florida.
 
When working on my son's IFR rating, we parked our Socata at Hawthorne for a few nights and did some sight seeing. When we left, we filled out the little self service envelope and paid our tie-down fees.

Several months later I received an invoice from the California revenue authority seeking five figures in annual taxes, fees, and fines. It took months to prove to CA that we were just visiting from AZ. It all traced back to a ramp audit CA did at Hawthorne (with a current AZ decal on the airplane).
 
Any chance you could work elsewhere for SpaceX? Maybe you could work a year or two in California and then move to either Texas or Florida.

Sadly, the particular position I'm going for is specific to Hawthorne. I did look at open positions for MacGregor or Canaveral, but none of them match my skillset.
 
I have lived almost my entire life in Ca. The first half was up near San Francisco; the last half down here. I can tell you that I have no love for this place and much of Mr Sobek's comments resonate with me. If it is private spaceflight that might drag you into the living **** of the LA basin, have you considered the booming enterprise up here in Mojave? Virgin Galactic (and their spacecraft spinoff company) seem to be hiring like crazy.
 
I have lived almost my entire life in Ca. The first half was up near San Francisco; the last half down here. I can tell you that I have no love for this place and much of Mr Sobek's comments resonate with me. If it is private spaceflight that might drag you into the living **** of the LA basin, have you considered the booming enterprise up here in Mojave? Virgin Galactic (and their spacecraft spinoff company) seem to be hiring like crazy.

I've looked at Virgin Galactic and at the moment, they're not hiring anyone with my skillset. Honestly, I was very surprised that SpaceX was hiring someone like me.

(I shall digress for a moment and explain my current situation)

I'm a web developer, I'm doing quite well in my current job, but the stuff I build inspires me not at all. My current job search is not to find the next step up on the career ladder, it's to find something that I can do and feel personally motivated about. I've talked to Robert at Dynon about possibly transferring my knowledge into embedded systems and doing avionics work; it's a possibility, but they're not hiring and I need to teach myself more anyway before I could competently do the work. If I was already a competent embedded developer, there would be lots of things open to me...pretty much any avionics company, maybe even Virgin, who knows?

But I'm not there yet. In the meantime, I got to thinking that maybe there were aircraft-related opportunities I could apply my current skills to. On a long shot, I checked the SpaceX job listing, expecting to see nothing matching...and I was stunned that they had something that I was a perfect fit for! It turns out, based on my research, that they have an internally-built and maintained Web app that pretty much everyone in the company uses. That's pretty unusual, and it makes this opportunity pretty unusual as well.

So basically, the job I'm applying for with SpaceX isn't likely to carry over to any other company in the same or similar biz. I'd go so far as to say this might be a one-of-a-kind opportunity.

So while I have numerous reservations about moving to California, on the other side of the coin, I have a very unique chance to take the skills I've already been honing for years and immediately go use them to put stuff in space. Any other path I might take would be probably a year or more in the future, and I'd be almost certainly taking a pay cut to do that mini-career change. With SpaceX, I have a good chance to maintain my income, which is just an added bonus to finding compelling work.

Anyway...that was kind of long, but that's where I am.
 
Its not so bad

I have been here for 25 years and it is not so bad. I work near LAX and live in the south bay. As long as you stay west of the 405, the people are reasonable. The areas of Manhattan, Hermosa are attracting the richer crowd, so property values are going up and the beautiful people are moving in. What I like most is all the people are reasonable and pretty even keeled. Not so east of the 405. Dealing with the traffic just takes planning, or an airplane. Hawthorne is a reasonable airport with a tower and very little traffic. SoCal makes a nice base with surfing, skiing, the desert, mountains and Catalina all reasonably close. And with all the young kids spending their time on Facebook, the recreation areas are not as busy as one would think; it just takes some planning and looking. Welcome to LA.
I had a friend who bailed on LA in the 90's; he was back in 2 years; he said you can get anything in LA with a short drive. He claimed no where else was that possible.
 
give it a shot

My two cents:

I'm a SoCal native, grew up in the suburbs, and walked to school with the vistas of the distant mountains every single day. High school wasn't too bad; I got used to the freeway commute, and didn't realize how fortunate I was to avoid much of the traffice.

But what happens if you put too many rats in the same box? Many behave normally, but you really notice the abnormal behaviors. I love the natural beauty of the state, but I have less tolerance for the craziness of the residents... and I'm one of 'em.

To the original point, I suggest you go for it! This isn't going to be the last job you'll ever have, you're of a flexible mind, and you've already proven you can take on a long-term project. The worst that happens is you get some El Lay stories to dine out on.
 
Until recently I was working next door to Spacex in the Tesla studio. We actually started out inside Spacex thanks to having the same boss!
I had a hangar spot at Hawthorne. They are obtainable but mostly pricey except for the old ones on the north side. About $500/month for one of the newer T-hangars.

I commuted from the San Pedro South Shores which was fairly easy and about 30-40 minutes up the Harbor Freeway. I agree the run in from El Segundo or even Westchester and Playa del Re is generally quick and trouble free.

I don't know of any VAF'ers at Spacex, but there are definitely a few fliers. One with a Lancair 320 and several flying at the A&E and Beech Cities clubs.

The marine layer can persist for weeks on end and the only IFR approach normally available is the localiser which runs as a simultaneous approach with the LAX inbound stream, so a commute by air might be quite challenging.

I do miss having the hangar so close to my workplace and those after work sunset flights over the ocean.
DSC_0025.jpg
 
Flying commute

While I was working at Hughes, there was a guy who lived in Corona and used to fly in to Hawthorne everyday for the commute. He did it for 15 years. I have talked to him many times before he retired in 2000 and he said it was well worth it. Just an option. There was also a group who used to commute from Rosamond to JPL in Pasadena every day during the 80's. Although HHR gets IFR, it rarely is hard IFR for very long.
 
Dream On

Flying in SoCal for 40 years gives me some chops...

Don't even consider commuting by itty bitty airplane. Unless your boss tolerates office hours of +/- a day, weather will screw you more often than you hope. Yeah, May-August gloom, often less than a mile in the morning hours, ceilings may or may not be a problem. Winter wx comes and goes but some monsoon days will shut GA down. In either case you will be constantly having to brief next days wx before bed time, then have the day-after-day wrestling match with should I or shouldn't I fly. You're a single pilot in a highly congested area flying a poorly to modestly equipped airplane, fatigued in the p.m.

Live close to work. Avoid freeway commutes. Your life is more precious than a cheap (relatively speaking) rabbit warren 60 miles and two hours away, for sanity, family, and build time. Others' suggestions of Elsie, Manhattan, Hermosa are good, you'll even find enclaves of livability further from the coast but do stay west of the 405. Base your airplane at HHR or TOA and enjoy the blessing of being able to fly away from the madness for weekend adventures. BTW, the airspace is actually fairly easy to navigate; VFR and IFR to on top for departure are a snap.

And Sobek and I agree 100%.

John Siebold
Grateful to be in Idaho
 
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Things have change since I was there but...

I worked for Northrop during the 1990s primarily at Edwards AFB and some at the Hawthorne plant. At the time we were living in Tehachapi and I commuted by car (ugh) and airplane sometimes. Instrument proficiency is a must to get there reliably. Even then it was a hookslide to get it in sometimes. My work shifted to El Segundo full time in 1993 and we moved to Westchester which was a wonderful little enclave as I remember it. We rented an old house for $1295/month which was barely doable on my young engineers salary. I echo the advice to stay west of the 405. El Segundo (west of Sepulveda), Westchester and northeast Redondo along Aviation Blvd. are what I would recommend. It was bittersweet leaving.

Les
 
I worked for Northrop during the 1990s primarily at Edwards AFB and some at the Hawthorne plant. At the time we were living in Tehachapi and I commuted by car (ugh) and airplane sometimes. ...Les

I figure I have somewhere north of 8000 hours and nearly 0.5M miles commuting by car over the last 17 years between Tehachapi and the Air Force Research Lab at the NE corner of Edwards. It's not a bad drive at all, but I would love to make this an air commute some days, but the runway that used to be here is now an old rocket junkyard.:(

I'm looking to retire sometime this decade and will be leaving CA at the first opportunity. I'll be looking for someplace in the southeast or midwest (I'm from NW Georgia, wife is from SE Michigan). Too bad our skill sets don't overlap, Philip, or I'd trade you even. I can't even conceive of what it would take to get me to live south of Kern County in California.:eek:
 
I figure I have somewhere north of 8000 hours and nearly 0.5M miles commuting by car over the last 17 years between Tehachapi and the Air Force Research Lab at the NE corner of Edwards. It's not a bad drive at all, but I would love to make this an air commute some days, but the runway that used to be here is now an old rocket junkyard.:(

I'm looking to retire sometime this decade and will be leaving CA at the first opportunity. I'll be looking for someplace in the southeast or midwest (I'm from NW Georgia, wife is from SE Michigan). Too bad our skill sets don't overlap, Philip, or I'd trade you even. I can't even conceive of what it would take to get me to live south of Kern County in California.:eek:

I haven't heard anything back yet...not that means much just a few days later. I'm still on the fence about Cali.

In the meantime, I found positions at both EAA and AOPA and applied for them. I'd much prefer Wisconsin or Maryland. Heck, if I was in Maryland, I'd still be relatively close to my family, and close to some mountainous areas (which I like), and close to the coast (which my partner likes). Who knows, AOPA might be a win-win-win.

:)
 
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