Laveta Terrace runs like a hairline fissure through the hilly tiers of Echo Park. Just a few blocks east of busy Echo Park Boulevard, the street hits Sunset Boulevard only as a small alleyway, continuing on the other side as a long pedestrian staircase. At the top of the staircase is a beautiful, palm-lined street of historic and well-preserved Craftsman houses, including the Tom of Finland Foundation, the home of the late gay erotic artist Tuoko Laaksonen.

South of Sunset the street continues, zig-zagging past Kensington Road at the edge of Echo Park Lake, until it becomes a long, eerie, florescent-lit pedestrian tunnel underneath the Hollywood Freeway. From the high perch above Sunset with its view of downtown L.A. to the subterranean tunnel funneling the tidal roar of highway traffic, Laveta Terrace has some of the greatest topographic variation in the shortest distance in all of Los Angeles.