Mike S.
Yelp
I lived at DTLA for 4~ years and this park is the only park around. In fact, in my LA years, I found it's hard to find any park in LA in general. Being health conscious and working long hours on my pc all day every day, to immerse myself in nature and have my eyes on green plants have been an essential part of my life, which explains why I frequented this park when I lived in that neighborhood.
It's a very small park and can't really qualify for the title of "nature" but considering it's in DTLA, it's a bond fide "nature" in my book. I'd come here to stretch, get fresh air, something a little bit of Taekwondo exercise.
It has trees and grass, benches to sit and you can play on the grass. This is where FIDM is located so you will see many FIDM students around, but everybody came here, lots of families.
The security is always there. One time I saw a guard rudely asked a homeless-looking man to leave. "Homeless-looking" means he looked like homeless but he's not very dirty and he did not carry anything with him, totally empty-handed and quiet and well-behaved, just sitting there enjoy his own peace and quiet. But the guard was very cruel to him while forcing him to leave. I found that quite repulsive. One time a guard also asked me to leave when they were closing for the evening, and he was very rude. But other than those 2 incidents, they're normally cool.
If you're the kind who don't consider sunlight your best friend due to the UV ray, you may not like it here during the daytime after early morning and before sunset since you'll find it hard to find any shade here in this tiny park. And if there's any, chances are they're already taken by the time you spotted them. So early morning and after sunset are the best time to hang here.
There're handful of workout structure here too. They're very simple structure but they're there and some people actually use them so just so that you know.
Ralph's is just kitty-corner across the street, and Starbucks is across street from Ralph's. Whole Foods is at the other side of the park so you can shop after or before the park visit.