A rampart is a fortified wall outside a castle, settlement, etc. Los Angeles never had such a thing, so where did this street get its name? From New Orleans, of course. Back in 1887, three new roads were established on the West End Terrace tract, near Westlake: Rampart Street, Baronne Street, and Carondelet Street. All three also happen to be historic thoroughfares in NOLA’s Central Business District and are laid out in the same order. (And yes, colonial New Orleans did indeed have a rampart where its Rampart Street now lies.) Tract owner George Crockett Knox (1841-1890), a surveyor by trade, was a Nashville native who lived in NOLA throughout the 1860s – except for a stint as a Confederate mapmaker during the Civil War – so he must have named these streets out of nostalgia. Knox came to Los Angeles in 1880 after some years in Anaheim and would serve first as city surveyor, then as police commissioner(!). But his New Orleans trio would soon be broken up: residents petitioned to have Baronne Street renamed Coronado Street in 1894. Rampart Street was upgraded to a boulevard in 1905.
Find it on the map:
