City, Orange County
© McCormack's Guides
Zip Codes: 90620, 90621, 90622, 90624
One of the
first bedroom cities of the suburbia that swept into Orange County in the
1950s. By OC standards, a good place to shop for your first home. Population
82,768. www.mccormacks.com
Gradually
overhauling and improving itself. Old businesses are giving way to new and this
often leads to new buildings or renovations.
In 2006,
Buena Park opened a Metrolink station — commute trains to downtown Los
Angeles and other parts of Los Angeles and Orange counties. City plans to build
apartments around the station.
Click for regional or detailed map
Interstate 5 and
Highway 91 cross the town, along with a half dozen arterials, Beach Boulevard
the most important. These roads move a lot of traffic but at peak hours they
have a lot of traffic to move, which causes delays.
On the plus, Metrolink will
help and because Buena Park is located to several jobs centers (Long Beach,
Anaheim) many residents have a short drive.
The 2000
census put the median age of residents at 32 and placed 34 percent under age
21. Translation: family town with many children.
Located next
to Anaheim, Buena Park complements that city’s Disneyland with its Knott's
Berry Farm, an amusement park that draws about 3.5 million visitors annually
and at the height of the season employs about 4,000. www.mccormacks.com
Served by five school districts:
Savanna, Centralia and Buena Park at the elementary level; Anaheim and
Fullerton at the high school. Many children in the Buena Park Elementary
District are scoring the 40th to 70th percentiles. At
Buena Park High, scores in the 40th percentile. See Schools.
In 1998,
Buena Park passed the first school bond in Orange County in over 30 years. The
money, $13.5 million, was used to renovate and build schools. In 2002, the
Anaheim and Fullerton districts passed bonds to renovate many schools.
Overall
crime rate about suburban average. Two homicides in 2005, three in 2004, two in
2003, four in 2002, two in 2001, zero in 2000, two in 1999, one in 1998, two in
1997, three in 1996 and 1995 and for preceding years, three, seven, four, two,
four, one and five. See Crime.
The state
in 2008 counted 24,280 housing units, of which 14,191 were single-family
detached, 1,958 single attached, 7,840 multiples and 291 mobile homes. About 57
percent of housing units are owner occupied, 43 rented.
Buena Park
boomed at the time when many veterans, with G.I. loans, were coming in the
housing market and defense industries were thriving in Los Angeles County, a
short drive from Buena Park. Their was a great need for plain but sturdy
housing that Buena Park delivered from 1950 to about 1980, when lots filled and
construction slowed. www.mccormacks.com
Buena
Park, residentially, can be divided north, middle and south.
In the
north, tucked away in the east corner, is a country-club subdivision,
townhouses and large ranchers, two-car garages, not way up the scale but nice,
well-cared-for, neatly landscaped, here and there graced with topiary. Large
regional park borders the golf course. California State University at Fullerton
built housing in this area for its faculty and staff.
In the
middle section, which is straddled by two freeways, apartments dominate. Two
story, neat, nothing fancy.
South of
Highway 91 lie most of Buena Park’s homes and apartments, the housing built in
the decades just after World War II.
At that time, Americans favored the two-
and three-bedroom tract home, one story, 1.5-car garage. As incomes rose, the
number of bedrooms moved up to four but Buena Park stayed focused on the middle
class. In some units, the garage will be offset from the house. You pull into
the driveway and turn left into the garage, which is attached at an angle to
the house.
During
this era, throughout California, a gingerbread style was popular for a few
years. Some homes look like they stepped out of Hansel and Gretel. www.mccormacks.com
The
occasional home will look faded and in need of yard work or paint but the great
majority of homes show the old tender loving. Not too much landscaping or many
trees, which makes the streets seem a little plain. Overhead utility lines are
routed in back of the homes.
Apartments
also can be found in this sector, mainly along La Palma Avenue. And some newer
homes. Buena Park built 2,400 units in the 1980s and 1,400 in the 1990s. Between
2000 and 2006, the city built 310 units.
The homes
and apartments are built in tracts and buffered by walls and landscaped strips
from arterial traffic.
Buena Park
Mall was extensively renovated and added a Wal-Mart and an 18-screen movie
complex. Many stores along Beach
Boulevard. Auto row strengthens sales tax base and raises funds for civic
amenities.
On its northwest side, Buena Park has many office buildings and
warehouses, and medical center — all in all, a nice number of jobs, which
means a short commute for residents employed here.
One
library, 11 parks, golf course, regional park close by, usual sports and
activities for kids and adults. Health and recreation club. Large community college on southern
border. Many classes, activities, low fees, open to the public. Town celebrates
its history with Silverado Days. www.mccormacks.com
Other
entertainments, Ripley’s Believe It or Not, Medieval Times and a new place, Pirates
Dinner Adventure (swordplay and acrobatics while you dine).
Chamber of commerce (714) 521-0261.
• In 2004,
voters rejected a ban on holiday fireworks, a fundraiser for local civic
groups.
• For 43
years, Movieland Wax Museum was a popular attraction, drawing 10 million
visitors. It was closed in 2005 and many of its figures auctioned in 2006. The
highest bid: $120,000 for a replica of Michelangelo’s David. Elizabeth Taylor
as Cleopatra drew $25,000 and Elvis $14,000. How fleeting fame! Star Trek set
and cast went for $34,050.
• In 2006,
a small plane heading for Fullerton Airport had engine trouble and crashed in
Buena Park, clipping a roof, plowing through a block wall and ending up in rear
yard. Pilot seriously injured, passenger minor injuries. House empty; no one on
ground injured. www.mccormacks.com
• Deadly
challenge. Leap the Tongue. Skateboard leap over tongue that connects two tractor-trailers.
A 14-year-old boy tried it, fatally, in 2006 and was run over by an oil tanker.
Driver didn’t even know he had hit the kid. When stopped by cops, he was too
upset to continue driving.
• Nabisco
used to bake its Graham crackers, vanilla wafers, fig newtons and snacks in a
large plant that covered 23 acres and at its peak employed 500. Bouqueted its
neighborhood with sweet aromas. No more, closed in 2004. City is looking for
retail stores and commercial to fill site.
• Located
in Buena Park: the Speech and Language Development Center, a non-profit that
works with autistic and handicapped children and young adults, many of whom are
referred by school districts in Los Angeles and Orange County. Enrollment 340.
• Well
read. In 2006, Guinness Book of World Records confirmed that a group of Buena
Park High students had broken the world record for reading aloud. Old record,
100 hours; new BP record, 103 hours and three minutes.
• Walter
Knott, founder of the amusement park, also grew the first boysenberry, a cross
of red raspberry, loganberry and blackberry. Clever man. www.mccormacks.com
City web
site: www.buenapark.com
