Overview
About Old Town West
Old Town West covers 45 acres and carries 469 addresses on only 136 parcels, the ratio that comes with attached housing. Five streets run 1.02 miles inside the boundary, Catalina, Chestnut, Florista, Sausalito and Walnut, and the city zones the whole of it Multi Family Residential.
Land Use Policy 4.3 names Old Town West with Old Town East and Apartment Row as one of three multifamily neighborhoods where the city promotes coordinated property maintenance and improvement, and the Mobility Element proposes Class III bike routes along Florista, Catalina, Oak, Sausalito, Reagan and Bloomfield to connect the schools with downtown. Three parcels on the south side of Cerritos Avenue east of the Coyote Creek Channel are surrounded by homes here and in Royal Oak Park, and the Land Use Element concludes that residential is their highest and best use. Los Alamitos Unified School District covers the neighborhood and enrolls 603 students at Los Alamitos Elementary, 1,017 at Oak Middle, 1,031 at McAuliffe Middle and 2,809 at Los Alamitos High.
View available homes in Old Town WestHistory
How Old Town West was built
This is the oldest ground in the city, and it exists because of sugar. In 1896 the future Montana senator William Andrews Clark bought over eight thousand acres of rancho land and built the first sugar refinery in Southern California, and Llewellyn Bixby laid out a town beside it: streets of company houses for the factory workers, with the beet farms starting at the edge of the last block. County construction years inside this boundary reach back to 1898, which is two years after the town was drawn.
The street names come from two different eras. Chestnut and Walnut are the plain tree names of a nineteenth century company town. Catalina, Florista and Sausalito belong to the twentieth century fill in, when the blocks north of the old grid were rebuilt at higher density; Florista is Spanish for florist, and Los Alamitos Terrace, a subdivision of a hundred and ninety three units, went up north of here on a dairy farm the Bixbys had been running. The median construction year across the whole boundary is 1953.
By the Numbers
Old Town West by the numbers
Lifestyle
The Old Town West lifestyle
The city keeps 18 acres of public park across four neighborhood parks and five pocket parks. Little Cottonwood Park on Farquhar Avenue is the largest of them at 6.75 acres, with a basketball court, a sand volleyball court and a softball field. Coyote Creek Park opened in 2013 and turned a bare utility corridor into a 3.69 acre greenway along the Coyote Creek Channel.
Laurel Park runs to 4.33 acres on Bloomfield Street with a lighted multipurpose field and lighted tennis courts, and it has hosted the Los Alamitos Girls Softball League since 1974. The Aquatic Center, which the city leases and operates, is home to the USA Water Polo National Training Center and an outdoor 50 meter pool.
Schools
Schools serving Old Town West
Los Alamitos Unified School District covers the whole of Old Town West. The campuses below are the district's, with enrollment from the state's 2025-26 census day count. The district publishes no attendance boundary map, so confirm the assigned campus for a specific address with the district.
9-12 · 2,809 students
6-8 · 1,031 students
6-8 · 1,017 students
K-5 · 680 students
K-5 · 641 students
K-5 · 638 students
K-5 · 636 students
K-5 · 603 students
K-5 · 569 students
FAQs
Common questions about Old Town West
Where is the oldest house in Los Alamitos?
On Chestnut Street, inside Old Town West. The city names 10802 Chestnut as the oldest house and structure still standing in Los Alamitos, thought to have been built in 1898, and lists 10901, 10927 and 10931 Chestnut alongside it as homes that may be of local historic significance. None of them carries a state or federal historic listing, and the city has said it may seek registration for some of its historic sites.
What kind of housing is in Old Town West?
Attached housing, mostly. The county records 469 addresses on 136 parcels inside the boundary, and the city zones the whole neighborhood Multi Family Residential. Land Use Policy 4.3 names it as one of the three multifamily neighborhoods where the city promotes coordinated property maintenance and improvement.
When were the buildings in Old Town West built?
Across almost a century. The county carries a build year on 115 parcels here, the earliest 1898 and the latest 1989, with half of them 1953 or before. Recorded tract maps over the neighborhood run from Tract 3896 in 1961 through to Tract 17482 in 2013, so infill has continued throughout.
How big is Old Town West?
The boundary the city draws encloses 45 acres. Five streets run 1.02 miles inside it: Catalina, Chestnut, Florista, Sausalito and Walnut.
Which schools serve Old Town West?
Los Alamitos Unified School District covers all of it. The district enrolls 603 students at Los Alamitos Elementary on Bloomfield Street, 1,017 at Oak Middle on Oak Street, 1,031 at Sharon Christa McAuliffe Middle on Cerritos Avenue and 2,809 at Los Alamitos High at 3591 Cerritos Avenue. All nine of the district's comprehensive schools have been honored as National Blue Ribbon Schools, California Distinguished Schools, or both. The district publishes no attendance boundary map, so confirm the assigned campus for a specific address with the district.