The concept of urban resilience \u2014 which is the capacity of a city\u2019s communities, businesses and systems to adapt to complex challenges and grow \u2014 has received increased attention as of late, given the multitude of stress factors affecting the global economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is especially true in the case of a global city like Los Angeles. To that end, using data from CommercialEdge and the U.S. Census Bureau, CommercialCafe published a study analyzing the history of residential and commercial real estate in Los Angeles<\/a>. The goal was to see how the city was affected by various crises, as well as how it adapted to maintain its status as a major global city. Key takeaways of the study include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Per the study, the post-World War II growth of the aeronautics industry was identified as one of the major contributors to Los Angeles\u2019 robust residential market. Thus, to keep up with the metro\u2019s booming population, more than 724,000 housing units were constructed between 1950 and 1959 \u2014 nearly twice as many as in the previous decade. Many of these housing units were built in areas such as Long Beach and Torrance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Residential development then slowed in the following decades, reaching around 200,000 units between 1990 and 1999. The subprime mortgage crisis also had a significant effect on the LA market, and the metro now generally distances itself from urban sprawl.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although the Los Angeles residential real estate market was in its prime in the 1950s and has slowly trended downward since then, office space in Los Angeles<\/a> spiked in the 1980s. In that decade, LA overtook San Francisco as the main financial hub of the West Coast, attracting a multitude of companies with a global reach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n