Long Beach’s Gay Village on Broadway. Where are we now?
Posted on 12 May 2009 by Shout Eric
Long Beach is well known to have a thriving gay community. Our pride extravaganza is one of the largest gay pride festivals in the country and the second largest event that the city hosts.
The Long Beach city council is gay friendly as well. Last year, each member of the city council voted in favor of marriage equality before prop 8 passed, solidifying the city’s relationship with the GLBT community.
If the Gay and Lesbian community is so large here in Long Beach, it is safe to assume that there is a thriving gay village here as well right? Depending on the person you ask here in Long Beach and in the neighboring communities, you are bound to get a variety of different answers.
A gay village according to Wikipedia, is sometimes referred to as “a gay ghetto, gay enclave, and increasingly gayborhood, and is usually in an urban geographic location with generally recognized boundaries where a large number of gay and lesbian people, as well as bisexuals and transsexuals live. They usually contain a number of gay-oriented establishments, such as gay bars or pubs, nightclubs, restaurants, bookstores, and other businesses.”
The Broadway corridor in Long Beach is our own gay enclave. It has been referred to lovingly or not so lovingly as the “Gay Ghetto” and it stretches down on Broadway from approximately Redondo to Alamitos. It has eclectic furniture shops, bars, restaurants, coffee houses, hair salons, boutique shops, clothing stores, and rundown empty stores with some nice and some not so nice residential buildings and small homes.
What do others think of our Broadway Gay Village?
“I think all of Broadway needs to be improved. It doesn’t have to be West Hollywood, but they could give it more of a neighborhood feel, right now it just feels like a traffic corridor” – says Don an Orange County Resident
“I think a Trolley that loops around Broadway would be a great way to ease parking conditions and create a more stable environment so that the businesses can thrive, and local consumers won’t have to drive ” – says Eric local Long Beach Resident
As a Long Beach city dweller, I applaud the efforts of the existing gay businesses on Broadway. Paradise’s hamburger’s are scrumptious and the bartenders at Falcon have turned the establishment around into a trendy thriving hipster bar.
Each improvement will light the way for more and as our interest grows in the area, the gay heart and soul of Long Beach will continue to flourish.
Tags | broadway, falcon, gay long beach, paradise
About the Author
Shout Eric
 |
Eric Gray is a volunteer blogger for shoutlongbeach.com. Born and raised in Long Island, New York, he resides happily in Downtown Long Beac |
Well, it all starts with the people first. If people want change, they need to speak up. When the sidewalks were deteriorating…someone spoke up. When someone complained about crucial parking issues AND SPOKE UP, a decade ago, they re-opened the Bixby Park parking lots. It’s not about being trendy, it’s about a community caring enough to collaborate on the safety of its visitors and inhabitants, as well as creating an atmosphere that would entice people to come in an spend some of their income. With as many closed storefronts as the Broadway Corridor has, there’s ample opportunity to get some businesses in there…all it takes is someone speaking up.
I know that the neighborhood along Broadway is the one that MOST feels like home to me here in Long Beach. I love the mix of coffee houses, restaurants, bars and shops that we can easily walk to from our house. While there are many businesses that have been here since I moved here there are also many news ones and I think some credit has to be given for how far this neighborhood has come! And yes Tom is right in that it is the responsibility of the PEOPLE that live here to make it better. Spend your money with local businesses, speak up at City Council meetings, complain to the city about negligent landlords.
This is more than a gayborhood this is a real community full of residents of ALL types that all share a love for this great neighborhood. When we marched along Broadway back in November, I was touched to see so many of our straight neighbors with their kids cheering us on from the sidewalks along Broadway. I can tell you that there is no lack of love for this community from the people that live here.