Downtowners Need Daycare, Kid Friendly Spaces

Downtown Los Angeles is fast becoming one of the city's new "it" places to set up a permanent address and play house. But a new worry is plaguing residents of the high-rises and converted lofts that dot the one-way streets of LA's civic center: What happens when we have kids?

The big concern is chiefly becoming options for daycare, which is part of the overall issue of whether Downtown is a good place to raise a kid in the first place. This week's LA Downtown News features a piece by Kathryn Maese, who also happens to be expecting a bundle of joy in about two months. Maese discusses issues like soundproofing, and where to put the crib in the open-layout of a loft. Other issues like schools are on the minds of the area's parents, with many opting to commute to outlying areas like Santa Monica for their little ones' education. One of the mothers in particular sees Downtown as "one big playground for [her son] to explore," but wishes there were more primary schools slated to open in the coming years.

While it's curious to think of the urban jungle of our downtown as a kind of living play-space, it does seem on the whole to be a place more suited to daytime outings and field trips, and not day-to-day living with a young family. Of course, worries like green spaces, safety, resources, and kid-friendliness are the same kinds of issues that have been on the minds of parents in other cities like New York and Chicago, where people have long shared the urban landscape.

At least Downtowners have a great big supermarket to run to (at least until midnight) when they need those inevitable emergency rations of diapers, formula, and baby aspirin.

Photo of kids reading in LA's Central Library by LWY via Flickr