West Hollywood's Halloween Carnaval runs from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturday, October 31. The first barricades at the bottom of the hill go up as early as 7 a.m. that morning. From Hollywood Hills West, the hard part of Halloween this year is the daytime. The coffee run, the grocery trip, the dog walk at West Hollywood Park and a lunch reservation below Sunset all run into closures long before anyone in costume shows up.
The city expects tens of thousands of people along a one-mile stretch of Santa Monica Boulevard between N. Doheny Drive and N. La Cienega Boulevard, with a stage and DJ at San Vicente. The party is ten blocks of flatland. The closures that hold it in place reach the streets hillside households use to get anywhere.
The barricades go up at breakfast
The City of West Hollywood's official Halloween announcement, posted October 5, lists the closures by start time. Sorted by the hour they begin, Saturday looks like this:
| Street | Segment | Closed from | Reopens |
|---|---|---|---|
| N. San Vicente Blvd | Santa Monica Blvd to Melrose Ave | 12:01 a.m. Sat | No later than 7 a.m. Sun |
| Alleyways | Between Santa Monica Blvd and Melrose Ave | 12:01 a.m. Sat | No later than 7 a.m. Sun |
| Side streets | At Santa Monica Blvd, within the closure area | As early as 7 a.m. Sat | With the boulevard |
| N. San Vicente Blvd | Santa Monica Blvd to Cynthia St | 7 a.m. Sat | 6 a.m. Sun |
| N. Robertson Blvd | Santa Monica Blvd to Melrose Ave | 7 a.m. Sat | 6 a.m. Sun |
| Santa Monica Blvd | N. Croft Ave/Holloway Dr to N. Doheny Dr | 10 a.m. Sat | 6 a.m. |
| N. La Cienega Blvd | Holloway Dr to Willoughby Ave | 10 a.m. Sat | 6 a.m. Sun |
| Sunset Blvd turn lanes | Eastbound and westbound onto southbound La Cienega | 10 a.m. Sat | 6 a.m. Sun |
The city explains the early start. Installing the traffic control equipment that closes Santa Monica Boulevard can take up to five hours, so side streets may close at the boulevard as early as 7 a.m. By midmorning, most north-south routes through the Rainbow District no longer cross the boulevard.
What that does to the routes down the hill
For hillside households west of Laurel Canyon, La Cienega is the closure that matters most. From 10 a.m. Saturday until 6 a.m. Sunday, La Cienega is closed between Holloway Drive and Willoughby Avenue. For the same hours, drivers on Sunset can't turn onto southbound La Cienega from either direction. A drive that usually goes down to Sunset and straight south on La Cienega toward Melrose or Beverly has to start somewhere else that day.
Farther west, the same thing happens at Doheny, San Vicente and Robertson. San Vicente is closed down to Cynthia Street, and Robertson is closed between Santa Monica and Melrose. Doheny marks the western end of the event stretch, and the Santa Monica Boulevard closure runs from Croft and Holloway all the way to Doheny.
The Los Angeles side looks different on paper. LADOT's October 8 weekly update listed no Halloween closures on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, the hillside streets, Hollywood Boulevard or Sunset in Hollywood. City of L.A. notices can still be posted closer to the weekend, and LADOT keeps its major road closures page current.
West Hollywood is also loosening a rule that affects parking. Permit parking restrictions are suspended from 11 a.m. Saturday to noon Sunday. During those hours, curb space on the residential blocks below Sunset that's normally limited to permit holders is open to anyone. Expect those blocks to fill early on Saturday and stay full until Sunday afternoon.
The dog walk and the parking spots move too
The city's list also closes parks and parking lots that a normal Saturday depends on:
- West Hollywood Park, including its small and large dog parks and its basketball courts, is closed from 12:01 a.m. Saturday through 7 a.m. Sunday.
- The West Hollywood Park five-story parking structure is closed all day Saturday and reopens at 7 a.m. Sunday.
- The Library Garage is closed from 5 a.m. Saturday through 7 a.m. Sunday.
- The Plummer Park South Lot is closed from 5 a.m. Friday, October 30, through 8 a.m. Sunday.
- The Crescent Heights Lot closes the longest, starting Monday, October 26, and staying closed into the following week.
For anyone who drives down the hill to use the dog parks at West Hollywood Park, the dog has nowhere to go there all of Saturday. The city's safety guidance for the Carnaval also asks attendees to leave young children and pets at home. A family with small kids and a dog is better off planning Saturday somewhere other than the flats.
Spending the day away from the flats
Because the closures fill the day, the best Halloween plans from the hills tend to be daytime plans that head away from Santa Monica Boulevard, or into it before the crowd arrives. The Los Angeles Recreation and Parks 2026 Halloween activities list and a few nearby venues give you options with times that work around the closures:
- Poinsettia Recreation Center, 7341 Willoughby Ave., hosts a free all-ages event on October 31 from noon to 4 p.m., with game booths, music, crafts, trunk-or-treat, face painting, bounce houses, costume contests and snacks. It sits on Willoughby, the same avenue that marks the southern end of the La Cienega closure. Leave yourself extra time to get there and back.
- Boo at the L.A. Zoo runs October 31 and November 1, plus the weekend this post publishes, October 24 and 25, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. It has trick-or-treat stations, keeper talks, pumpkin enrichment for the animals and performances, all included with zoo admission or membership.
- Halloween Day at Descanso Gardens, 1418 Descanso Drive in La Cañada Flintridge, runs October 31 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with trick-or-treating in the garden and the Pumpkin Express, included with daytime admission. Descanso's ticketed Carved pumpkin trail runs nightly through November 1, 6 to 10 p.m., with tickets from $12 to $52 and advance purchase recommended.
- Griffith Park Adult Community Center, 3203 Riverside Drive, hosts a Friday, October 30 event for adults 50 and up and their grandkids, 3 to 7 p.m., for $10, with a boxed lunch, a fortune teller, a costume contest and a magic show. Closer to home, the Fairfax Senior Citizen Center at 7929 Melrose Ave. holds a free 50+ party on Thursday, October 29, from 12:30 to 3:30 p.m.
For the evening, the options head east and north. Hollywood Forever, at 6000 Santa Monica Blvd., is screening The Thing (1982) on October 31, with gates at 5:30 p.m. and the show at 7:15 p.m. The Los Angeles Haunted Hayride in Griffith Park runs on select nights through November 1, with tickets from $38.99, according to KTLA. Over the hill, Universal Studios Hollywood's Halloween Horror Nights runs select nights through November 1, with separate tickets priced by date.
For anyone heading into the Carnaval itself, the city's rules are short. No alcohol along the route, no drinking in public, no weapons, no drones, and clear plastic bags only. Metro lines 4, 10, 30/330, 105, 212/312, 217 and 218 serve West Hollywood, with route changes posted at metro.net.
Sunday morning, when the streets come back
The reopenings arrive in close succession. La Cienega, the Sunset turn lanes, Robertson and the Cynthia-to-Santa Monica stretch of San Vicente reopen at 6 a.m. Sunday. The Melrose stretch of San Vicente and the alleys reopen no later than 7 a.m. West Hollywood Park and its parking structure reopen at 7 a.m., and the Plummer Park South Lot follows at 8 a.m. Permit parking rules return at noon.
That timing lines up with a reopening on Melrose. The Hart and the Hunter returned to its former West Hollywood home at 7950 Melrose Ave. on September 30 and serves brunch daily from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., Eater LA reported. Its doors open at 7 a.m. Sunday, the same hour the last San Vicente closure lifts.
Plans can change in the days before the event. The city posts updates at weho.org/halloween, and texting "halloween" to (323) 848-5000 gets you alerts by SMS.
If you have family or friends staying with you in the hills for Halloween weekend and want help working out how they'll get around, I'm glad to share what I know about the routes below Sunset. Reach out through Cassandra Hepburn, and let's connect.
