City of Aliso Viejo

Being that my office is in Aliso Viejo, I might as well write about it.
Aliso Viejo, is a beautiful city, very big family city. clean and friendly. There are some great places to eat, as well as great shopping, and it’s located 15 minutes from the beach, and close to freeways. I will say that many of the homes do look the same (however due to the hills, and greenery that out weighs the similarity of the town), and the location of Aliso Viejo is a little odd, it’s as if a builder looked at the mountains in-​between Laguna Niguel, Laguna beach and mission Viejo, and said, I think that’s a great place to put a new neighborhood. All in all I think it’s a great place for families to purchase a nice first home.

Nice place to live especially after living in Santa Ana. I traded the sounds of gunshots for golf balls. Lots of people equals lots of traffic. Can’t go anywhere without encountering multiple red lights. Sheriff’s department sits at ‘cherry patches’ to watch (cite) drivers who cross double yellow lines or go over the speed limit. How about actually driving through the neighborhoods? All the women walk their babies in 1,000 dollar strollers while some guy washes their leased BMW X5. Hey, I love it here and my three HOA’s that total 400 dollars PER MONTH. Yes that’s 3 HOA’s. Condos are overpriced and you’re piled above/​below your neighbors.

Beautiful! But needs a dog park! So many parks are vacant half the time and huge, yet none offer a little corner for Fido to run free… I want to be more proud of my town and don’t want to have to drive to MV or Laguna for this type of amenity. Come on Board members! We’ve been hearing rumors for years but nothing ever happens!

Three stars, but first the good:
Zero crime, awesome beauty, great parks and trails for walking, hiking, running, biking; close to nearly everything you could need in the modern age. However, there is more to this suburban, baby-​making, lushly landscaped, and mall-​filled city that is not readily apparent when you visit, and it wears on you over time, and nobody that lives here can refute any of the following:
1) Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Stop sign. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Green! Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight. .. Red Stoplight…
ALl these, just to get ANYWHERE in town — come drive here, you will understand immediately. Need further proof? They have stop signs in the only roundabout in town. I thought that, ehh — nevermind.
2) Overpriced housing, and I mean homes start at around $ 585k, or $ 300k for a condo, that is — if you want to avoid Megan’s Law-​predator-​listed neighbors, or $ 250 if you don’t — but that is only one place in town, and the most affordable (my Realtor told me about this, so beware!)
3) Here a mall, there a mall — everywhere a mall. Mom and Pop shops? What are those?
4) Super-​high population density, equal to Los Angeles (look it up)
5) Crows that will swipe down and take your infant. .. They feast on the garbage from a) the high population density, b) malls, c) people who are too concerned about themselves to realize what it means to live in a community of neighbors.
6) Bags of dog poop everywhere, because (see 5c above). Go for a walk, and note the little blue bags in and near the bushes (psst, they are everywhere in town).
7) It is not for everyone:
–MARRIED? Move here
–HAVE KIDS? Move here
–SINGLE? Stay away; you will commit suicide living here
8) Everything is on retail hours, because everything is retail, and I do mean everything, as the city opens at 10:30 and closes at 9PM. The exception being Ralphs and Vons, and the kitchens close early at the very few bars in town, and those are filled with local drunks at night — come visit Opah around ⁸⁄₉ PM — you’ll see.
9) Items 4 & 5c combine into this: Awful Parking; Costco and WalMart are right next to each other (shoppers migrate in from North, South, and East); Toll Road running right through town; natural obstacles to navigate around. I wish I could say that it keeps traffic out, but it does not, and all traffic from Laguna Niguel runs right through here. While it is rather quiet at night, daytime is a complete fiasco which include copious amounts of noise, parking, driving, navigating.
10) Too many Cars? No, too many people. Everyone parks multiple cars on the street, in every neighborhood, bar none because:
10a) high population density;
10b) high real estate prices;
10c) good schools (kid’s cars)
all combine to equal, well — it is not the cars’ fault, you see? [Too-​Many-​People]
Imagine a downtown area (except it is all Corporate: Chili’s/Applebees/Starbucks/Target/Etc) spread out over an 8 square mile area. The parking is still bad, everything is still expensive, and you will go out of your mind just trying to get around. Welcome to Aliso Viejo.

I was very happy for the few months living in the nice city of Aliso Viejo. Living directly off of Aliso Creek Road we had great easy access to the toll road 73 and 5 Freeway as well as the main Parkways such as Alicia Parkway and Oso Parkway.
This fairly new, clean and safe city has many great parks, restaurants, shops, schools and businesses anchored throughout the city making it a great place to start or raise a family.
Aliso Viejo houses many great restaurants and shops such as Romano’s Macaroni Grill, Barnes and Noble Booksellers, Boudin Sourdough Bakery and Café, Trader Joe’s, Pier 1 Imports, TJ Maxx and Stadium Brewing Co to just get started. You are also minutes away from the upscale mall, The Shops at Mission Viejo, as well as a hop skip and a jump from the world-​renowned Laguna Beach.
If it were more of a walking city like Rancho Santa Margarita, we would have gladly made the city of Aliso Viejo our home.

Aliso Viejo is the epitome of SoCal Suburbia. Nice clean streets, great safe neighborhoods to raise kids, and a quick drive to the beach. People tend to be friendly and generally, happy. The Botox meter here is about a 7 — what you would expect of any Socal suburb, much lower than neighboring Newport or Laguna Beach. Public spaces such as the parks and library are clean and well-​kept. Local law enforcement can be seen occasionally, and the lack of helicopter sounds at night further support that it is a safe environment. Parks are family-​oriented and not the place to score drugs like some places in LA. You can see a lot of cyclists and joggers around, and it seems the spandex rating here is pretty high. I do not doubt that there has to be some kind of women’s fitness boot camp nearby.
There are the downsides, like the cookie cutter housing and all the streets looking almost the same. You can feel like you are driving in an endless loop at times. If you are looking for great places to eat and be merry, don’t have too high of an expectation as there are many chain restaurants. The biggest danger here is that you may have an unpleasant encounter with a cougar on some of the trails — I am talking about the real cat kind, that growl and eat you, not the other restylane amped up kind even though they can growl and maul you too.

quiet, clean, new, green, short trip to the beach, the wilderness parks, or irvine spectrum. favorite spots in Aliso: the wilderness park and Soka university.

Aliso Viejo is a small city in between Laguna Hills and Dana Point. Its a big apartment and condo community and higher end housing. It has 1 main shopping centers that runs along Aliso Creek Rd. Easy access to the toll roads and the 5 freeway which makes commuting very easy during rush hour.