Tarzana is the epicenter of ickiness in the Valley. Say what you will about “impoverished” Van Nuys, with its broken down apartments and tacky business district. Yet Van Nuys has good bones. There is the beautiful 1933 city hall, a modern and sensitively designed government building, the beginnings of a revival of bungalow houses, a brand new landscaped bus route and possibly the Valley’s first historic district. The mostly Latino population is basically polite, and practice such outmoded practices as allowing a driver to merge into traffic in front of them.
Tarzana, by contrast, is a grotesque and sprawling 1950’s and 6o’s junkpile of blacktop baking in the noontime sun. Near Reseda and Clark Streets, huge parking lots scream with honking horns, as aggressive and rude people shove their way into Gelsons. There is a generous amount of immigrants of here, but they aren’t Spanish speakers. Instead, they mostly come from the letter “eye” nations. Cell phones and cigarettes are their passport. “Thank you” or “excuse me” are unspoken here.
There is a wonderful Jewish bakery here, but surrounding it are dozens of shops peddling junk: nail salons, hair products, candles and Russian souvenirs. Completely absent in this man made hell are trees, grass, water, fountains. Billboards and wooden power lines deface Reseda Boulevard, which itself is a road without rules. Speeding drivers, with ear piercing woofers and noxious music blasting, race to exit and enter the 101. Walking, solitude, peace…..are you kidding?
Along Ventura, east of Reseda, there are slutty women’s stores selling purple gauze midriff tops and mini-mini skirts with glued on sparkling plastic, beaded sequin bra tops. Psychic readers, Indonesian coffee tables, mass -produced poster art and the ubiquitous falafel restaurants line the “upscale” street. A mini mall calls itself “Wall Street”, a name sure to appeal to the money conscious Botoxed mommies in their Lincoln Navigators who jam the front parking area.
Burbank Boulevard is the northern border of the “Ugly District” and this speedway is full of elderly and medically impaired drivers turning into the Tarzana Medical Center, and those angry younger ones in the SUV’s who are desperate to step on the gas. The bellowing smoke and fumes from the freeway, and huge piles of trash are the street sculpture of this area.
Even the “Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf” on Reseda and Ventura is dirtier and more unpleasant than other locations. There is less graciousness, less room and more trash. The Mexican style restaurant chain Sharkys also has a branch nearby but the interior smells of the restrooms more than food. Can anyone eat without indigestion here?
Tarzana is fabled as the place where Edgar Rice Burroughs once had a magnificent rural ranch. He is fortunate to have died many years before his beloved region descended into an urban jungle of unimaginable grossness and vulgarity.
Here in Van Nuys 