I used to rent horses at Pickwick Stables in Burbank when I was a teenager, and my riding buddy and I thought nothing of going over the narrow bridges and through the dark tunnels on horses we didn’t know. For the horses, that’s where they were always ridden, and they seemed to think it was fine.
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You can hear the cars overhead. When I was a teenager, it was no big deal. Now? I doubt I could do it, even if I were able to ride again.
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Thats the way it is here too, a weird howling. I had a friend who would wait until we were dead in the middle before he would scream like a horror movie. I could have killed him 
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I understand that, I just feel bad for the horses. I know they get used to it, but 22 hours a day in a stall is pretty depressing.
Personally, I wouldn’t be able to stomach it. My filly is out 24/7 with a herd and it’s going to be tough for me to compromise on that turnout situation in a few years when I need to find an actual show barn for her that’s a more reasonable distance from me…
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When I lived south of Denver, I would occasionally bike in an area that had a tunnel. I must confess that I usually yelled loudly in the middle of the tunnel. Most of the time I was alone out there; I just liked the echo. I refrained if there was anyone around.
And before you ask, I don’t honk my car horn in the Eisenhower Tunnel through the Rockies. That’s just annoying to other drivers.
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Not at all. However, I have seen horses living like that in so many places: Salem, Oregon, Bend, Oregon, Seattle, WA, all over Florida, the SW and in quite a few large cities. Even the Queen’s (now King’s) guards for Buckingham Palace live in (they do get some weeks at pasture once a year). I think that horses historically have lived in in many places and many times. Any urban horse has limited turnout. It’s just like city kids may not have much in the way of countryside to run around it. It’s just life. 
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One of my jobs as a kid working for a large boarding barn in San Diego County was leading horses out to one of two enclosed rings in the center of the property and letting them run around for 45 minutes or so. This was how I grew up.
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Yes. At least IMHO. You asked and I answered. People generally are good about getting their horses out daily. Is it ideal? No, but that’s a lot of life.
As others have pointed out, eliminating horse keeping across wide swaths of Southern California would exclude a lot of people from horse ownership, except those who are geographically and/or financially fortunate enough to have a better situation. This would eliminate a good chunk of people and horses likely to the detriment of the horse industry at large. I
This map is kind of interesting.
Between the heat/humidity (horse is apparently allergic to his own sweat), bugs (also allergic to bug bites) and grass everywhere (insulin resistant) I’m not sure how my horse would feel about living in, say, FL, KY or SC.
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For those curious about trail riding over the bridges and through the tunnels in Griffith Park (and not afraid of TikTok).
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT6Qt9fX3/
We go over this bridge near Thousand Oaks with our show horses with some frequency. (FB link) The hills are not this green at the moment.
https://fb.watch/Bzn7aBMu4A/?mibextid=wwXIfr&fs=e
We also go under Santa Rosa Road, though it’s an underpass, not a tunnel. It’s definitely noisier than the tunnels in Palos Verdes that go under Crenshaw and Hawthorne Blvds. A fun night activity is to ride through the tunnels—it’s so dark that you lose some of your orientation and feel a bit like you’re floating.
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At that point you’ll need to make a decision. 
I’m lucky enough to have a situation where my horses are out 24/7 but I drive a lot. I couldn’t have managed it when I was working.
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Put me in a tunnel or under an overpass in a manual with a big displacement v8 and nice exhaust, and my self control is gone - I will rev it… 
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I haven’t heard anyone mention Pickwick Stables in decades! Oh, the memories. And nearby, good old Paddock Riding Club. Those were the days. 
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Paddock Riding Club is still there and running county-level shows.
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I must confess, I had a lot of fun with my International Scout, going through tunnels. It was a V-8 with a four barrel carb, and had quite a nice growl to it. So going through tunnels, first I would rev it, then I would hit the ooga horn. Fun times. I was 21 when I got it.
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I have a lot of fond memories of that place. That was when you could rent a horse and take off with no supervision. They took your word on it regarding how good of a rider you were. I always exaggerated as I wanted the spicy horses, and I certainly got them. My friend Carol and I would trail ride in English saddles. We put a lot of miles on those horses. All my babysitting money went toward horse rental.
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I’m glad not everything is gone! Gosh, I couldn’t count how many times I showed at Paddock. Those were fun times.
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My mom bought a horse that was owned by the proprietor of Studio Stables in the Griffith Park area. He was a large appaloosa named Sid because the seller named his horses after the person he bought them from. My mom negotiated a bit on the price but the quid pro quo was that she had to board the horse there for a couple of months. She rode a bit on the Griffith Park trails during the week but said it was too crazy on the weekends. We renamed him Heffalump. He was safe and colorful, but not much of an athlete and my mom eventually sold him to a large man who wanted to ride on the trail and in parades. One of his best uses was as a mount for costume classes. Here’s a photo taken during a “Grand Entry” at an ETI show in Malibu in the 1960s. My mom is next to me on my horse, Troy.
Another fun thing in the Griffith Park area was the Friday night Jackpot Jumpers at Pickwick.
There was no LAEC at this time, although the area where it now stands had stables and, IIRC, a large open area where people rode. LAEC as it now exists opened in 1982-ish.
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Several of the county-level organizations are gone. SFHJA (San Fernando) got rebranded as Southern California Horse Show Association, IIRC sweeping up TriValley (or at least its medals) in the process. The OCHSA shows got smaller and smaller and I think the Championship Show got cancelled last year. I am not sure if they are still an organization. Greater San Diego is still running. I think that IEHJA is still viable. LAHJA is also still viable though they reconfigured the medals a bit.
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In Los Angeles, if you are zoned for horses, you can stock to 10 horses per acre and I was once in a facility that had a variance for 100 horses on 5 acres.
You commit to a plan to get these horses out at least 6 days a week (hopefully 7) with a combination of turnout, riding yourself, training rides, a part-lease, or begging a friend/barn-rat to get your horse out. Usually people IME try to turnout 7 days a week and get the horse ridden 5-6 days a week.
It’s not ideal but horses that do have owners who make these arrangements seem to do relatively okay.
Turnout is typically 30 minutes to an hour in a small sun paddock. The use, as you can imagine, is tightly regulated, so that people don’t overstay their allotted time - often a trainer has just one for their barn.
Other facilities often have Mare Motels that are 12 x 24 covered or half-covered pipe ‘stalls’ that give horses a bit more room and socialization. And there are barns that have dirt communal group turnouts, usually for lesson strings or for the lower level pleasure/trail riding folk. Often these are … interestingly hilly!
Horses are tucked into all kinds of surprising areas in greater Los Angeles.
There’s little grass, not just because of the water, but because of the density and the soil type. It just doesn’t hold up to hooves. The only place I’ve been at where there’s grass you can ride on, sort of, was Middle Ranch.
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Did you have papers on your appy?
He looks exactly like a Mansfield Comanche bred one, wonderful horses those, born broke and friendly and unflappable.
Jack Mansfield was one of our neighbors, those were very distinctive, nice horses, as you say yours was.
You may find this story interesting:
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