Mulholland Drive

Brief Information

Mulholland Drive is notable not for its width or straightness, but for the way the road clings to the mountain ridge above Los Angeles. It runs through the eastern Santa Monica Mountains and the Hollywood Hills, so the line of the road itself matters no less than the surrounding views: this is not an ordinary city street, but an elongated edge between different parts of the city.

The main section was opened in 1924 as Mulholland Highway. It was built by developers investing in Hollywood, and even during construction, engineer DeWitt Reaburn predicted that the road would become famous as a scenic drive. This fact changes how the place is seen: the striking panorama here was not an accidental bonus, but part of the road’s concept from the very beginning.

What to Notice First

It makes sense to look at Mulholland Drive as a road that reveals its terrain. Its 21-mile eastern section is mostly two-lane, so its scale reads not as a highway, but as an elongated mountain drive. The line freely follows the ridge of the eastern Santa Monica Mountains and the Hollywood Hills: this is exactly what explains why the road is associated with views of the Los Angeles Basin, the San Fernando Valley, and the Hollywood Sign.

The road’s two roles can be compared. On the one hand, it connects two sections of Highway 101 and crosses Sepulveda Boulevard, Beverly Glen, Coldwater Canyon Avenue, Laurel Canyon Boulevard, and other roads. On the other hand, farther west its name changes to Mulholland Highway. What becomes visible is not a separate street in a grid of blocks, but a long ridge-top road where transport connection and panoramic outlook work together.