Shoreline West

Shoreline West, Mountain View is a close-knit neighborhood of people and families that tend to be very familiar with each other. Frequently, you'll see neighbors out on a walk, waving at each other or chatting. It is a comfortable neighborhood to live in that is rather quiet and peaceful. With proximity within blocks of downtown Mountain View, but separated by Shoreline Boulevard, Shoreline West provides distance from the hustle and bustle, but closeness to conveniences. There are over 150 restaurants within blocks and two restaurants, Tommy Thai and Kolbeh, within Shoreline West's boundaries.

An active association of neighbors was reestablished in 2010. Known as "SWAN", the Shoreline West Association of Neighbors gets together annually at a block party where neighbors contribute food and enjoy music, dance, and visiting. 200-300 neighbors usually attend. Occasionally, SWAN does ice cream parties at their very own Mariposa Park, located within Shoreline West on Mariposa Street. Castro School Park is also in the neighborhood. While the focus of the neighborhood association is mostly social, they did come together in 2012 to address traffic safety concerns. Working together with the city, they had a stoplight installed at Escuela Avenue and California Street, as well as three safety crosswalks with flashing lights installed on Shoreline Boulevard to facilitate safer passage to downtown and safer foot traffic across busy streets. Being a residential neighborhood, yet so close to downtown, parking is much easier than in nearby areas.

In the 1900's, Pacific Press was located on Villa Street, and quickly became on of the City's largest employers. With the publishing company came more than 100 Adventist families who settled around Pettis Avenue and Latham Street. This became on of the first large residential subdivisions. (1) While homes tended to be cottage style for a long while, many are now being expanded upon or rebuilt into larger, two-story homes in the recent years. The median home price has risen rapidly, from $857,000 in 2011, to $1,512,000 in 2015. This has much to do with the expansion of technology industries nearby. In April 2011, Google purchased the historic property. "The space is necessary because '2011 will be our biggest hiring year in company history,' said Dan Hoffman, real estate director for Google, in a statement." (2)

In approximately 2003, Shoreline West was redistricted from a lower performing elementary school (Castro School) to a much higher performing elementary school (Bubb School). Since the change, more than double the amount of homes have changed hands than in the prior 13 years.

(1) http://www.mountainview.gov/about/history.asp
(2) http://www.mv-voice.com/news/2011/05/26/google-buys-former-home-of-the-pacific-press

Bounded by Central expressway, South Shoreline Boulevard, West El Camino Real and Escuela Avenue, Shoreline West is a mixed middle-class neighborhood with a much needed facelift. It spans about 0.8 square miles of flat and affordable residential real-estate, that is, for Mountain View standards. This is due, in part, to Shoreline West’s fair share of foreclosures, something that Mountain View community is accustomed to with the recent economic downturn. But, for the most part, residences are bland and uninteresting. Its most debilitating aspect is that the neighborhood is not your typical safe, family-friendly community with crime being of relative concern.

Shoreline West’s residential terrain is a model of transparency. The neighborhood, as a whole, has an eclectic mix of residents with different incomes and ages groups. Its environment consists mostly of tawdry, mid-century California bungalows and long-standing townhouses. Most homes are of those small, boxy and single-story kind with flat topped roofs. They afford very narrow driveways and unremarkable, eyesore properties. For numbers sake, median house values circle around $700,000.

You also have a selection of ugly, two-story apartment buildings. If you head towards the northern end of the neighborhood, they have a 1980‘s, Mediterranean architectural style (somewhat unique to the community) usually of the two-bedroom assortment. Yet, they are still not becoming of the neighborhood. These tend to sell for around $450,000.

The neighborhood’s biggest luxury is its proximity to Old Mountain View’s nightlife and a plethora of assorted restaurants for every taste and budget. There is also a small commercial strip that lines El Camino Real. Within it, lies a couple hotels (Super 8, Comfort Inn, etc.), an Enterprise Rent-A-Car station and other un-notable commercial real-estate.

Demographically speaking, the neighborhood is largely diverse with plenty of immigrant families living within its borders. They tend to send their children to, in order, the Castro Elementary School, Graham Middle School and Los Altos High School. However, schools are not really recommended in the area, typically posting low scores against the California average. Furthermore, public transportation is pretty limited, and walking to school is almost out of the question.

Shoreline West is the neighborhood just to the west of Old Mountain View. If you are looking for a relatively affordable neighborhood in Mountain View, this is where you are likely to find it. Now, let me make this clear: this is not affordable by normal standards, only by Mountain View standards. Your average one-bedroom here will run you about $1300 on the low end, while a 2-bedroom starts about $1700. But that is the low end, for an apartment in one of the many 1970’s style shoe box apartment buildings that are fairly common place here. As the apartments get nicer, the rents get higher.

You will find apartments here with pools and a few with tennis courts, but as I mentioned before, many have all the character of a shipping container and are merely people boxes. You have no doubt been in these kinds of apartments at one point in your life—you know, bare white walls, a semi-detached kitchen (often with a bar that lets you see out into the main room) and a corner of the box for the bedroom.

This is not the whole neighborhood, however. Shoreline West is a pretty big area. On the northern end, you have a pretty nice apartment complex, in sort of a faux Mediterranean style (red tiled roofs and tan walls). It looks really nice, as far as that sort of thing goes.

And it is not just apartments in this area either. You will also find a number of early Twentieth Century California bungalows on streets like Palo Alto Ave. These are those really cute low-roofed houses with thick piers and tiny verandas that were once all the rage. They are still pretty attractive in my opinion, though the neighborhood does seem to have a little bit of a crime worry—if the prevalence of barred doors and windows are any indication.

If you are thinking of perhaps buying a home here, you will find a number of those newer homes that are popping up in the
Mountain View area. The ones that look to me a little bit like 21st Century versions of Queen Anne Victorians. Something about these house seems a little small on the outside and cramped on the inside. I’ve only been inside of one of them when visiting a friend who had recently purchased one of these and I think it is their attempt to make too small a space hold everything that a normal sized house holds. Perhaps it is because they are converting the lot of a California bungalow into the a space for a modern home.

Anyway, whatever the reason, these sorts of newer homes just end up feeling pretty cramped. The kitchen is one of the places you feel it most. You feel like you are in the hallway of a locomotive with the counters and appliances jutting out at you. You get the same feeling in the bedrooms which feel too oblong, while the living room ends up feeling more like a den.
It’s not horrible, but I am not sure it is worth the prices they charge which in this neighborhood is around $1.1 million. Pretty steep for a cramped little house in my opinion.

This is not to say that you can’t find some deals here as well. It seems like about half the homes currently on the market are there due to foreclosure in Shoreline West and some of these—mostly condos from the 80’s—are asking less than $500K.
And there are some larger homes on the southern end of Shoreline (1700 sq. ft.) that are going for $1.25 million.

Okay, so other than the homes what other conveniences are there for this neighborhood?

Well, unfortunately one of the drawbacks of this neighborhood is that the local elementary (Mariano Castro) and middle school (Graham) are some of the worst schools in Mountain View with below State average API’s and some of the sorts of school problems that you usually don’t find in Mountain View. Mediocrity in Mountain View schools is the equivalent of failure, so these are pretty bad on that count.

Because of the schools and slightly higher crime rates, I can’t really recommend this area for families with young children.
One of the main draws of this neighborhood, however, is its proximity to the restaurants and nightlife of Old Mountain View. But you need not traipse east in order to get some restaurant and bar action. Here are some of the highlights of this area:

Restaurants:

Le Petit Bistro: This is definitely the priciest restaurant in Shoreline West. As the name indicates it is a French place that serves traditional French food, created by Chef Jean Michel. It has the gaudy feel of an actual French place, complete with corny Romantic music. The lobster bisque, the duck and pate are what make it worth it for me.

Best Bite: This is a Persian place that basically does the whole Middle-Eastern menu from gyros to falafel. The décor is not outstanding but the food is pretty good. My favorites are the kebabs and the meerza ghesemi (just try it!) and the zazaki cucumber dip. I love the Persian twist on food, and let’s face it, given the state of world politics these days, we could definitely use some things that bring our two cultures closer rather than further apart.

Hacchi Sushi Lounge: I’m not much of a sushi guy, but my ex loved this place. She said it was the best sushi place in Mountain View and she was totally into the sushi, so I’ll take her word for it. As to me, my favorite here was the mussels—which they thankfully cooked.

Bars:

Old Mountain View doesn’t have the monopoly on bars either. Alibi on El Camino is just the right mix of a slightly divey joint (almost scary from the outside) and a neighborhood sports bar. Sangria Mondays are the best time to go during Football Season.

In a nut shell then, this is pretty good spot for singles or young couples—close to action. If you are an old fogey like me, you probably should take advice from the birds and migrate south.

They just gave it a new name but was part of Old Town before. The homes are old but nice and the people diverse and interesting. There is Mr. Chau's Chinese Food it is fast food so is okay Chinese food but not gourmet it is quick though so good dinner when you don't have time. I would say the best food is the Pizza and Pasta place.

The highlight is probably the park. Rengstorff Park has a pool and indoor activity center. There's a cool waterside and with the park you can gill your own lunch. It's a great place to hang out. They even have a skate area there.