Kipling St, Downtown North

Johnson Park, just north of downtown Palo Alto, is the park with the closest proximity to this bustling neighborhood full of restaurants and shops. While it may not be as big or extensive as some of the other parks in the area, it is a great little place to read, relax, or bring kids to play on the playground. The very well-thought-out layout (characteristic of most of Palo Alto) includes redwoods and palm trees alike.

Even parking is less nightmarish than it is a few blocks south, although I believe it is still subject to the stringent laws of downtown Palo Alto parking. While the fields are small and not really designed for large games of pickup football or baseball, it is a nice, relaxing, relatively uncrowded place to come to.

Downtown Palo Alto is the best and worth of Silicon Valley - great restaurants and cafes, high-end shops to suit even the wealthiest businessmen, decent nightlife, and intelligent people having tech-geek conversations over coffee. It is also one of the most crowded places, with traffic that is essentially blocked depending on where you go and available parking spaces about as common as typewriters and rotary phones. Given that it is a side street, Kipling is a little bit better than the main drag of University Place, but it is also in a central part of downtown and is home to the Apple Store (which is, of course, very popular in this neighborhood).

There are some residences on this street, which could be great for people who like to be within walking distance of many great shops and restaurants, but terrible for people who like to park in front of their own home or host the occasional party. Johnson Park offers a little bit of green space but is not nearly as vibrant as Stanford University, just a little further southeast.

The street itself is very short at only about three blocks long. Like most of Silicon Valley, cell phone reception is pretty good.