The Brief

Dillon was just 12 years old when his uncle took him to his first street takeover.

“It was like the first time going to an amusement park,” he said. Pure exhilaration. Cars spinning. Smoke in the air. “People literally do not care.”

If you live in Southern California and you’ve never heard of a street takeover, you’ve probably heard one: Engines rev, tires screech and fireworks explode. These illegal gatherings happen frequently on weekend nights throughout Los Angeles and Orange counties. Cars block major intersections and create space for other drivers to perform reckless maneuvers, including burnouts and donuts. Spectators gather around the middle of “the pit,” filming cars spinning past with passengers hanging precariously out of windows.

Fueled by a social media feedback loop, the phenomenon took off during the pandemic, and events can attract hundreds of spectators. The crowds, often made up of minors, seek out street takeovers to find community. They know the risks, which can be deadly.

A USC reporting lab investigation found that local and state law enforcement are well aware that takeovers have surged, but they have struggled to curb them. Talk to people who live near popular takeover intersections and you will learn about scarred streets, mangled poles, looted stores, injured bystanders and tragic deaths.

How an injury at a takeover led to online fame

To report this story we analyzed 400 social media videos of street takeovers in the L.A. region.

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USC Open-Source Intelligence Reporting Lab

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Dillon was hooked after that first night in 2019. He loved the thrill of rushing away whenever the police showed up and speeding down residential streets to the next address shared in the group chat. He found new friends in the scene, brought old friends with him and often stayed out until 6 in the morning. (LAist is using a pseudonym for “Dillon,” who asked he not be named due to concerns the takeover community would be hostile if it knew he spoke with reporters.)

One night in November 2024, Dillon, then 17, was standing in the crowd at a takeover in north Long Beach when a Corvette entered the pit.

“Everybody saw him coming in hot,” Dillon said. “He was coming in hot as f--k.”

The Corvette drifted toward Dillon. He threw himself backward, only for the crowd to push him back toward the car. As the Corvette swung back toward him, Dillon jumped into the air in one last effort to avoid being hit.

“I landed, feet planted, smack on the middle of the hood,” he said. He then fell to his knees and made eye contact with the driver, who didn’t slow down. “I saw him turn the wheel more.”

The driver’s maneuver flung Dillon onto the ground, and his car spun over his arm. Dillon bounced up and ran away while other spectators followed, filming him.

“Not even my pinky would move,” he said. “I was just freaked out, like my arm might actually be gone. It was just dead.”

His friends put him into a car and sped to the emergency room, where he was sedated and sent to surgery. When he woke up, his grandparents were there, along with the police. He said he refused to give up the identity of the person who hit him and the officers left. The doctors were not optimistic about his recovery and told him he’d be very lucky if he ever got to use his arm again.

Dillon’s injury did not stay private. Footage from that night was shared and reshared across the vast network of social media accounts devoted to street takeovers. USC’s analysis shows the more violent the footage, the more traction it gets, and Dillon’s accident was gruesome. After his friends tagged him in some of the posts, his Instagram profile blew up, and he now gets as many as 1.1 million views a month.

His skin-and-bones injury made him a social media celebrity.

We analyzed social media data. Here’s what we learned about takeovers

Takeovers are not just documented on social media; their popularity is driven by it. Hundreds of accounts on Instagram and TikTok are dedicated to takeover content, with footage livestreamed and then posted and reposted. That content creates a feedback loop, leading to more takeovers in Southern California and across the nation.

Social media posts and streams also provide plenty of data for analyzing the phenomena.

The University of Southern California’s Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) Reporting Lab reviewed more than 500 social media videos of takeovers in Los Angeles and Orange counties. Our team determined the precise locations for 400 videos of takeovers between 2020 and 2025 and found more than a dozen repeat hotspots. The city of Los Angeles was the location of 36% of the social media content we verified, while the city of Compton accounted for 29%.

Explore the mapped data

Go deeper: How we investigated Los Angeles street takeovers

Forty-eight of the videos featured at least one person getting “smacked” by a vehicle, with 14 of those incidents involving someone getting run over.

The use of laser pointers, usually aimed at drivers, at takeover events was common, showing up in 84 videos, while fireworks appeared 30 times. Larger fires, including cars set ablaze, appeared at least another 30 times. More than 65 videos featured cars destroyed in some fashion.

In the course of our investigation, we also reviewed more than 93 hours of takeover footage posted on the streaming service Kick by livestreamer Conner Remaly. He did not respond to our interview requests, but his stream led our reporters on a Sunday night over the summer to multiple takeover spots, including the intersection of Santa Fe Avenue and Dominguez Street in Carson, where the roar of engines trumpeted the start of the action. The noise was deafening; our sound meter registered levels as high as 109 decibels, right at the threshold to cause pain.

Street takeovers are chaotic and carry many costs including looted businesses, damaged infrastructure and injuries to adults and teens.

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Kevin D. Reyes

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Local residents, visibly annoyed, emerged from their homes to see the commotion. Hundreds of spectators cheered and jeered, many of them appearing noticeably under 18 years old. We observed attendees huffing nitrous oxide out of balloons and smoking weed and cigarettes. Some people shined laser pointers and lit fireworks, pointing them at the center of the action — known as the "pit" — the crowd, the sky and each other. There was a mix of distinct burnt smells: rubber, fireworks and marijuana. It was an adrenaline-charged, disorienting environment.

At local businesses near takeovers, break-ins and ransacking 

Takeovers like the one we witnessed are a public health issue for the surrounding community, according to Damian Kevitt, executive director of Streets Are For Everyone, an organization that advocates for pedestrian and cyclist safety.

“You can't sleep,” he said. “You can't function.”

Local businesses across Los Angeles and Orange counties suffer too.

Last year, a Compton bakery was ransacked during a takeover, and the business had to deal with more than $40,000 worth of stolen goods and damage. Some businesses, like the Felix Chevrolet near USC, have suffered damage multiple times; the dealership had its windows broken in 2024 and a takeover participant rolled away an iconic Felix statue this summer.

In our analysis of Remaly’s Kick stream, we observed 27 instances of break-ins and/or looting between June 15 and July 11, in Bellflower, Compton, Long Beach and South Los Angeles, along with the unincorporated areas of East Rancho Dominguez and Florence-Firestone.

Andrew Swank, an officer with the California Highway Patrol, told us just “being at a takeover is illegal.” He said once someone is participating in a takeover, additional illegal activity is common, adding, “It just all kind of goes downhill into the criminal element.”

A staple of SoCal culture that took off during the pandemic

Street takeovers are a California original, born from the same automotive culture that produced classic car shows, car clubs, Chicano lowriders and drag racing.

The earliest versions of street takeovers were called sideshows, and they took shape in Oakland in the 1980s. What started as informal gatherings where residents showed off their restored American muscle cars and performed stunts, soon evolved into vibrant community events.

Over time, sideshows became takeovers, spreading into the streets, influenced in part by films like Grease and The Fast and the Furious, along with the video game Grand Theft Auto V, all of which glorified street racing around Los Angeles.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, takeovers ballooned in popularity, with the scene spreading across the United States. Young people had spent so much time in lockdown “sitting and watching and not doing” that they released all that pent-up energy into the streets, said Johnathan Lawson, a car enthusiast who is working on creating a legal venue for takeovers.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 15 states have enacted new laws since 2020 that target “exhibition driving,” which includes street racing and takeovers.

The deadly consequences

Here in Southern California, injuries have been common, and sometimes drivers hit many people at once.

“They call it striking, like bowling,” Dillon said. “Everybody goes flying like bowling pins.”

In November 2024, two 19-year-olds, Efrain Rodriguez and a person described as Richmond D. in court records, were run over by a driver performing donuts at a takeover in Anaheim.

An extremely graphic, close-up video of the aftermath made the rounds on social media. We were unable to track down Richmond, and Rodriguez did not respond to requests for comment, but his sister described his condition on a GoFundMe page seeking $50,000 for medical care: “Rodriguez had to recover from multiple fractures in his shoulder, hips and spinal cord” and has had many surgeries, “including skin grafting.”

On the night of Christmas 2022, Elyzza Guajaca was watching a street takeover at Crenshaw Boulevard and Florence Avenue, in South Los Angeles, when she was struck by a Camaro. She was taken to the hospital and died from her injuries. She was 24 years old. The driver, Dante Chapple Young, fled the scene, but authorities tracked him down the following month in New Mexico. In August 2025, he was sentenced to 13 years in state prison for vehicular manslaughter, as well as assault with a deadly weapon, his car.

The fatalities at takeovers are not limited to drivers hitting spectators.

In November 2021, hundreds of spectators gathered for a takeover at the intersection of Bullis Road and Pine Street in Compton. Among those spectators were 22-year-old Juan Antonio Orozco and 19-year-old Javier Carachure Menchaca, both of whom were shot and killed in a car at the scene. Orozco’s body was discovered with the car door open and one foot on the ground. Menchaca’s body was found a few steps from the car. He had been shot from behind.

Karen Orozco says she still thinks about her brother every day.

“He had such a big heart,” she said. “He would always think of others before himself.”

No arrests have been made and the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department case remains open. The L.A. County Board of Supervisors is offering a $60,000 reward for information on the homicides.

For some, the takeovers mean community

To outsiders, street takeovers may appear as chaos just for the sake of chaos. The reality is more complicated — and organized.

Takeovers are not just random weekend throwdowns. They are often organized by close-knit groups of young people with assigned roles: Some send out addresses; others monitor for police activity; others are sometimes charged with acquiring “stolos,” or stolen cars; while others, known as “spinners,” drive the cars and perform the stunts. Social media is a big part of the process, with a lot of the filming done by spectators, aka “servers.”

Street safety advocates say the gatherings often attract young people who are drawn in by the thrills and stay for the sense of belonging. 

“This is their support network,” said Kevitt, of the nonprofit Streets Are For Everyone. “They don’t care if it’s legal or illegal. They’re just there for camaraderie.”

Our interviews with participants confirmed this sentiment. Dillon went to takeovers to hang out with friends. We heard from other participants that the community feels like family.

Law enforcement’s response

Those working to curtail takeovers know that tapping into that sense of belonging has to be central to solutions.

“We’re talking about youth who have found community with each other,” said Lili Trujillo Puckett, founder of Street Racing Kills. “You have to educate them. You have to help them. You have to talk to them.”

Trujillo Puckett’s connection to the issue is personal. In 2013, her daughter was killed riding in a car that crashed during a street race.

Both Trujillo Puckett and Kevitt, of Streets Are For Everyone, are involved in L.A. County’s Street Takeover Reduction Workgroup, a collaboration between law enforcement and other organizations inside and outside of the government. The group released an action plan in February 2025, focusing on various solutions, including changes to road infrastructure and stronger legal enforcement. The most recent update of the plan was published in December 2025.

The plan calls for installing barriers at popular intersections to deter cars from a skidding maneuver known as "drifting." The estimated cost is $10,000 for each leg of an intersection.

They are not popular with takeover enthusiasts. In June, Remaly posted a video from the intersection of Atlantic Avenue and Compton Boulevard, a popular takeover spot that now has plastic barriers running along its center lanes. In the clip, he held his arm out of the car window and grabbed hold of a barrier.

“This is the s--t that ruined the spot,” he said. “We can’t have fun no more.”

Some takeovers now happen one block north at Atlantic Avenue and San Luis Street.

A few miles from that intersection, at Alameda Street and El Segundo Boulevard, California Highway Patrol officers swarmed a takeover in the early morning hours of July 12. According to CHP Capt. Joe Diaz, officers made 28 arrests and issued 16 citations that day, along with towing 25 vehicles and seizing three firearms. Diaz said the show of force was not a new approach, but Remaly and another Kick streamer were shocked by the number of patrol cars that showed up with blaring sirens and flashing lights.

“Oh, my god, there’s so many,” said Remaly, filming as he ran back to his car.

“I’m telling you right now,” one street participant said, “the police don’t do s--t at all. The only thing they do is show up, turn on their sirens, and everyone leaves.”

Participants don’t necessarily go home after the police arrive at an intersection. They often just move to the next address, or “addy,” and start up the action again. Our analysis of Remaly's Kick stream found an average of seven successful takeovers each night he filmed.

County Supervisor Holly Mitchell’s district, which extends from Koreatown to the South Bay, was the location of 74% of the takeovers on the stream. She told us she believes accountability is critical, across the board.

"If you organize, participate or you are a spectator, you’ll face consequences," she said. "If you’re the audience, you are also contributing to the problem.”

For some safety advocates, the larger solution can be found in providing youth with legal alternatives to taking over streets.

“No matter how many arrests, no matter how many times these guys go to jail, there’s always somebody new coming into the scene,” said Fabian Arroyo, longtime member of the Brotherhood of Street Racers, an organization formed in 1960s South Los Angeles to channel street racing into safe, legal events. “The best way to solve the problem is to have everybody go to a place, a venue somewhere where they can just do it legally.”

Donald Graham, the deputy chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, agrees.

“We live in a county where the city of Long Beach turns their entire downtown into a Formula One racetrack every year,” Graham told us. “So how can we not figure out a way to use the existing infrastructure to do pop-up tracks and pop-up burn boxes to allow people to express themselves in this way, but do it safely?”

Authorities have their eyes on the social media promoters

In February, police arrested Erick Romero Quintana, on allegations the 22-year-old helped organize takeovers. Romero Quintana ran the Instagram account @privatemeetz, which prosectors said shared locations for 16 gatherings across South L.A. between December 2022 and November 2023.

One of the gatherings he allegedly promoted was the Christmas night takeover at Crenshaw Boulevard and Florence Avenue where 24-year-old Elyzza Guajaca was killed. Prosecutors argue Romero Quintana’s social media activity played a central role in drawing large crowds to this and other high-risk events. He is charged with 16 counts of conspiracy to commit reckless driving. If convicted, he could face more than a decade in prison.

L.A. County District Attorney Nathan Hochman discussed Romero Quintana’s case at a press conference in August and emphasized Romero Quintana was not the driver.

“He was the promoter, the social media promoter, who thought that by hiding behind his computer, by hiding behind the internet, we weren't going to find him. Maybe he thought we didn't care about what he was doing on social media to go ahead and promote this illegal, destructive and ultimately deadly type of practice. But we do care,” Hochman said.

Romero Quintana currently is banned from social media as a condition of his release and is due back in court in January. He did not respond to our request for comment, but his attorney, Bart Kaspero, said he believes the case sets a dangerous precedent.

“I’ve never seen anyone charged just for posting videos where crimes happen,” he said. “It’s kind of like passing out flyers to a house party.”

Quintana’s case is part of a larger push by L.A. officials to hold social media companies and users accountable for profiting off videos of street takeovers. County officials have contacted social media companies and asked them to remove posts that promote illegal activity. We reached out to Meta, the parent company of Instagram, but did not receive a response.

Deputy Chief Graham also spoke at Hochman’s press conference, lamenting that the city still saw three young people die this year in “street racing-related activities.” Then he called out social media executives.

“You are monetizing this criminal, dangerous and deadly behavior,” he said. “So maybe, just maybe, before you cut a check, maybe look at the content that you're sending out.”

The message driven home by Hochman, Graham and other speakers was that there will be consequences for everyone in the takeover scene: drivers, organizers and spectators.

"Enough is enough," Hochman said. “We will not yield the streets.”

The question remains whether participants will listen to that message.

“I don’t think things will change,” said Dillon, after we texted him about Hochman’s comments. He recently bought a car and is now a driver at takeovers.

Another street takeover participant wrote back, “And yet we will STILLL be outside EVERY WEEKEND.”

Data center builders don’t tell the public how much water they use, according to a new report — and the industry is encroaching into water-stressed and vulnerable communities.

The report, by the think tank Next10 and researchers at Santa Clara University, finds that planned data centers — the ganglia of artificial intelligence — are spreading to regions reliant on overtapped groundwater and strained surface water, with potentially major effects in the Central and Imperial Valleys.

But, reinforcing previous studies, the researchers found that a patchwork of state, federal and local policies allows data center operators to avoid publicly disclosing their actual water use.

California lawmakers tried to address this last year, but California Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed the measure. Now, the legislature is trying again, with bills mandating disclosures about water use and planning.

“We have this huge build out, and we have very little data,” said Irina Raicu, who directs the Internet Ethics program at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

Paired with California’s precarious water supplies, Raicu said, “It’s just not a good combination.”

Shaolei Ren, an expert on the environmental impacts of AI at UC Riverside who was not involved in the study, said the findings point to a much broader problem.

“Limited publicly available information about data center water use makes it difficult for communities, water providers and researchers to have meaningful public discussions and responsibly assess power-water trade-offs,” Ren said in an email.

Murky water use 

Few environmental impact reports for California’s data centers were publicly available online, the researchers found.

Raicu and co-author Iris Stewart-Frey, a professor of environmental science, went looking for the reports, meant to assess and disclose a project’s impacts for both nature and people under the landmark California Environmental Quality Act.

They found almost none. The ones they did find were largely for facilities in the city of Santa Clara.

Through interviews with planning officials, they discovered that projects can slip through with little environmental review if they fall under certain size or water use thresholds, or if they meet a city or county’s criteria for other approval pathways. These include something called ministerial approval, which requires planning agencies to approve a project that meets local zoning and other standards.

Even for data centers that undergo more stringent environmental scrutiny, the researchers found that documentation is rarely available to the public.

In the few cases the planning documents were posted publicly, the information — on the data center’s owner or operator, size, type of cooling system, the amount of water used, whether it’s recycled or potable — was often “missing, contradictory, or vague,” the report said.

The researchers said they contacted water providers in areas where data centers cluster, seeking usage data. None responded.

A shift to vulnerable regions

California’s data centers mostly cluster in the south San Francisco Bay Area and the city of Los Angeles, with smaller concentrations in Sacramento and San Diego.

But the report noted large, planned projects in rural and less affluent regions — like in Santa Clara County’s Gilroy, as well as in the heavily agricultural Imperial Valley.

“They need a bunch of cheap land,” Raicu. “If we’re not careful, they will end up being pitched, very convincingly, to communities that have real needs — without enough attention being paid to the water part.”

Khara Boender, director of state policy for the Data Center Coalition, which has opposed bills mandating more granular water-use reporting, said in an email the industry is “committed to being a good neighbor.”

Boender argues that data centers collectively “used significantly less water than other essential industries in 2025, including the agriculture, power, food and beverage, and semiconductor sectors,” but the coalition offers no data to back that up.

Collective use matters less than local impacts in a state where each community has its own mix of water supplies and strains, according to a previous study published by a team at UC Berkeley.

Whether data centers use a lot or a little water relative to agriculture or other industries, “what matters most is the scale of new local use compared to available local supply,” the Berkeley team concluded earlier this year. “Unfortunately, this picture is clouded by data deficiencies.”

In this week’s report, the Santa Clara University team drilled into those local supplies and community vulnerabilities to anticipated expansion.

“We’re at the brink of this happening in California,” Stewart-Frey, the environmental scientist, said. Her report, she added, isn’t advocating against data centers. But “communities should know what they’re getting themselves into.”

Debates over proposed data centers are erupting in a Kern County desert community with dwindling groundwater and in the hot Imperial Valley, which draws from the strained Colorado River. 

Monterey Park residents in the San Gabriel Valley successfully opposed one data center project over environmental concerns and inadequate information and secured an upcoming vote on a citywide ban.

In a letter to city officials, a representative for the developer dismissed opponents as “rage-baiting an uninformed mob to pressure your decisionmaking.”

Raicu pushed back. “If those communities are uninformed about the issue — whose fault is that? Who should be informing the people so that you don’t have this kind of pushback, if there is no need for it?”

New laws v. Big Tech

Last year, Assemblymember Diane Papan, a Democrat from San Mateo, authored a bill requiring data center operators to report estimated or actual water use to their water supplier when seeking or renewing a business license or permit.

Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed the measure amid industry pressure, saying he was “reluctant to impose rigid reporting requirements about operational details on this sector without understanding the full impact on businesses and the consumers of their technology.”

Now, Papan is trying again with two bills. One largely reprises last year’s measure, with additional reporting required to the city and county. The other would bar local governments from approving new or expanded data centers unless the developer discloses information about their water use and plans.

It would also set other requirements — like prohibiting development in overdrafted groundwater basins in places like the San Joaquin Valley, unless state water managers OK it.

“You cannot manage what you have not and cannot measure,” Papan said. “The public likes transparency, and they should.”

Both bills cleared a key legislative chokepoint this week but face staunch opposition from the tech industry and business groups.

“If they run out of water, guess what happens? And they can’t cool their systems — are they going to succeed?” Papan said. “To which I say, help us help you.”

Nestled between Historic Filipinotown and Echo Park is a bookstore turned artisan craft space turned food market, all within 900 square feet. Every Sunday, A Good Used Book on Glendale Boulevard transforms from a retail bookstore into what they call “Sunday Funday Market.”

Founders Jenny Yang and Chris Capizzi spent seven years operating as a pop-up without a brick-and-mortar location. Opening their doors to local vendors pays homage to their own roots selling at Los Angeles markets, from the Melrose Trading Post to the Pasadena Rose Bowl Flea Market.

“Mega giant online sellers have the scale and the resources and the patience and the reach to capture most people,” Capizzi said. “Whereas for us, I think we have to be really creative — we have to band together.”

Nestled between Historic Filipinotown and Echo Park is a bookstore turned artisan craft space turned food market, all within 900 square feet. Every Sunday, A Good Used Book on Glendale Boulevard transforms from a retail bookstore into what they call “Sunday Funday Market.”

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Yang and Capizzi’s long history of vending at markets taught them how isolating running a small business can be. At their market, they aim to build connections with each vendor and strategize the best timing and layout so everyone can succeed.

“[Amazon and Barnes & Noble] are Goliath, and we’re not even David — we’re just the ant underneath David’s foot,” Capizzi said. “I think we can do what we do and try to get as many people, at our level or even smaller, to get together.”

Weekly markets at A Good Used Book have captivated the neighborhood since its opening in October 2023, with charming names like “Sunday Funday,” “Saturday School” and “Hi-Fi Friday Night,” plus hand-drawn flyers by well-known artist Noah Harmon. Now, it’s become a weekly occurrence where LA pop-ups can display their own crafts, allowing local readers to indulge in a little more than a pocket paperback.

Each week holds a Pandora’s box of niche snacks, crafts or trinkets you didn’t know you needed, ranging from Southeast Asian-inspired trail mix to natural incense sticks to vintage Japanese audio equipment. One week you might be enticed to adopt a kitten from a rescue booth outside, another week you might impulsively get a stick-and-poke tattoo in the back of the store.

Nestled between Historic Filipinotown and Echo Park is a bookstore turned artisan craft space turned food market, all within 900 square feet. Every Sunday, A Good Used Book on Glendale Boulevard transforms from a retail bookstore into what they call “Sunday Funday Market.”

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Nick Ducassi

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The LA Local

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On one sunny Sunday afternoon, Brandon Stanciell hand-tossed fresh pizza dough on the sidewalk outside the bookstore. His 2-year-old pop-up, Pizza Ananda, which he named after his daughter, is an homage to her and to Italian cooking, a hobby he started during paternity leave. An hour before the market closed, Stanciell had already sold out and garnished his last pepperoni-and-hot-honey pie for one lucky customer.

“I love that places like this allow us all to meet at once to share what we have and give it to the community around us,” Stanciell said.

Nestled between Historic Filipinotown and Echo Park is a bookstore turned artisan craft space turned food market, all within 900 square feet. Every Sunday, A Good Used Book on Glendale Boulevard transforms from a retail bookstore into what they call “Sunday Funday Market.”

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Nick Ducassi

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The LA Local

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For the owners, building a community market is about deepening relationships with the people who walk through their doors. In an increasingly digital landscape, it is also a reciprocal partnership among local businesses.

“A lot of people talk about community building nowadays as a marketing strategy,” Capizzi said. “But I think the actual community building comes from talking to each vendor and each customer and being a consistent presence in the neighborhood.”

Nestled between Historic Filipinotown and Echo Park is a bookstore turned artisan craft space turned food market, all within 900 square feet. Every Sunday, A Good Used Book on Glendale Boulevard transforms from a retail bookstore into what they call “Sunday Funday Market.”

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Nick Ducassi

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The LA Local

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While customers browsed for unique titles, Gerin del Carmen worked her booth of ceramic dishware, oyster-shaped trinket holders and vases resembling miniature boxes. As a ceramicist, del Carmen draws from her Filipino heritage, including the Balikbayan boxes that represent immigrants sending gifts to family in the Philippines.

“Sharing the community and your space is such a big deal. This is not a huge, gigantic Barnes & Noble store,” del Carmen said. “It has so much foot traffic, and the fact that [the owners] are setting up and sharing the space once or twice a week with other vendors and other artists is huge.”

Yang and Capizzi may think of themselves as an “ant underneath David’s foot,” but A Good Used Book is building a colony of vendors, rooted in community.

Whether you and your friends are looking for a brunch spot to cater to everyone's palates, or taking a trip to the historic Grand Central Market, food halls make for an easy, affordable place to satisfy cravings — especially in SoCal, where diverse selections of dishes reign supreme.

But these spaces fill a void much deeper than our appetites. They bring new life to old storefronts, factories or even airfields (see list below), and can offer a way to keep dollars within the community by becoming a hub for local businesses.

With that said, here's a short list of food halls where you'll get more than just a killer meal.

For good vibes

BLVD MRKT food hall on the corner of 6th Street and Whittier Boulevard in downtown Montebello.

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BLVD MRKT is an open-air food hall in downtown Montebello that feels like a party. The 8,500-square-foot space currently has five eateries, or "concepts" as they're known in the restaurant industry, and hosts live DJs every Friday night and Sunday during brunch. They also host Open Vinyl Night on the second and forth Tuesday of every month, where patrons get $2 off beers and margaritas from Alchemy Craft if they bring a vinyl record to be played in the BLVD courtyard.

The space is pet-friendly and has growing concepts like Los Taquero Mucho, which offers classic al pastor, grilled chicken and slow-cooked carnitas tacos, as well as specialty flavors like vegan tacos with whiskil sautéed in coconut milk, and Pork Belly Cochinita Pibil Tacos, perfect for those who crave crispy, slow-roasted pork with a hint of sweetness.

Los Taquero Mucho participates in BLVD's incubator program, run by co-founders Barney and Evelyn Santos. The program offers mentorship to local entrepreneurs until they can set up shop permanently.

Pork Belly Cochinita Pibil Tacos with salsa from Los Taquero Mucho at BLVD MRKT in Montebello.

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BLVD MRKT is part of the couple's commercial real estate development firm, Gentefy. Its mission is to invest in retail and hospitality projects that ignite economic development and revitalization in Black and brown neighborhoods.

"Blvd Mrkt is our first project," Barney Santos wrote in a text message. "It was our social proof to prove to banks, investors and cities that a socially conscious business model could exist in a traditionally overlooked area."

VCHOS Pupuseria Moderna also has a spot in the BLVD courtyard, offering handmade pupusas with filling choices such as shrimp with spinach and cheese, and tender beef birria with a side of consommé, onions and cilantro. Coffee lovers can get an Oaxacan Mocha at Cafe Santo, or stop by Cold Pizza for a wood-fired slice.

For eclectic tastes

Rodeo 39 Public Market in Stanton.

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LAist

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An O.C. favorite, Rodeo 39 Public Market lives on Highway 39, also known as Beach Boulevard, in Stanton. This 40,000-square-foot space is an eclectic mix of more than 20 food and drink concepts and retailers. There are three outdoor patios and five murals, plus an arcade, tattoo shop and photo booth. Food options cover everything from Lil' Breezy's adobo breakfast burritos to Cajun crab fries at The Crawfish Hut.

Mural by artist David Flores outside of Joystix arcade at Rodeo 39 Public Market.

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LAist

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Rodeo's menu choices make it well-suited for a casual weekend brunch. At its entrance sits Here & There, where you can grab a coffee or matcha latte, or try one of their signature drinks like the Iced Vienna, a combination of milk with caramelly demerara sugar and your choice of matcha or espresso, topped with sweet cream and garnished with sea salt. The result is a drink that's smooth and not too sweet.

Eggyo bulgogi egg sandwich with spicy mayo at Rodeo 39 Public Market.

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Audrey Ngo

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LAist

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Eggyo, a recent addition to Rodeo, offers Korean corn dogs and fluffy egg sandwiches on crispy, house-baked milk bread. Try the bulgogi option with spicy mayo for a savory kick. If you crave a cocktail, venture over to CAPO, which also serves craft beer. Or just sit on one of their sun-filled patios while you decide what to try.

For a page from history

The Hangar in Long Beach.

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The Hangar is a 17,000-square-foot food hall that pays homage to Long Beach's aviation history. It sits on former Boeing Co. land where military and commercial aircraft were built. Today, it serves as a dining destination at the Long Beach Exchange Shopping Center, or LBX, neighboring the city's international airport.

This space currently has a mix of 14 food concepts and two retail shops. Patrons can enjoy local favorites outside their flagship locations, like the Joe's Special bagel sandwich from Cassidy's Corner Cafe, with bacon, egg and the star of the show — tangy jalapeño cream cheese. Fans of spice can try Jay Bird's Nashville Hot Chicken, which offers chicken sandwiches and tenders, and Blazin' Fries, all with six levels of heat.

Historic aviation photos are displayed above food concepts at The Hangar food hall at LBX in Long Beach

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Audrey Ngo

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LAist

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Inside, there are vintage pictures of aircraft that were built at the site, and a wall of clocks showing the time in cities named Long Beach across the country.

A Pan Am Hawaii travel poster (left) and a TWA Spain travel poster (right) at the patio of The Hangar food hall.

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Outside, you'll find patio seating with umbrellas where you can sit and watch the occasional plane fly overhead. Or sit and enjoy the adjacent display of towering Pan Am and TWA posters promoting travel to Hawaii, Spain and Paris.

For fun and work

Mercado La Paloma on Grand Avenue in South L.A.

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Open since 2001, the approximately 34,000-square-foot Mercado La Paloma sits in the Figueroa corridor of South L.A., and is known for its focus on community, art and culture. From rotating art exhibits to colorful tiled tabletops, this space feels like it was made to nurture creativity.

Interior of Mercado La Paloma.

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There are meeting rooms to rent starting at $25 an hour. It's a space where locals can bring their laptop to work or study, or have a long conversation with a friend, with bites from six acclaimed restaurants.

Holbox's Erizo dish at Mercado La Paloma.

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Audrey Ngo

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At the Mercado, visit Holbox for Michelin-starred seafood dishes like Erizo — velvety sea urchin laid atop a bed of tender scallop ceviche. The combination is fresh, flavorful and oceanic. Tip: If you can swing it, come on a weekday to avoid a long line, or order ahead.

For something sweet, walk over to Oaxacacalifornia Cafe & Juice Bar for a Spicy Pineapple Juice with a gingery kick, or go for the classic pairing of Hot Oaxacan Chocolate, made with your choice of water or milk, and light-as-air conchas crowned with a solid layer of vanilla or chocolate streusel.