Glassell Park is one of Los Angeles's older neighborhoods, having been developed in the late 19th century along the Pacific Electric Railway track that formerly ran in the median of Eagle Rock Boulevard and the adjoining hills. It is a quiet, almost sleepy, largely residential district, with a large industrial corridor along San Fernando Road (which parallels Union Pacific railroad tracks) and low-rise commercial buildings along Eagle Rock Boulevard. Today it is largely working class, Latino, white, Filipino and Asian.

Near-record rainfall in the winter of 2004-05 caused landslides in Glassell Park, leading to the red tagging of 14 homes in Glassell Park and Mt. Washington neighborhoods.