Thanks. I’m guessing those who live on the east side of the mountains say “thank God for the mountains”? 😊
I grew up in the Inland Empire, from about age 8, moving their in the early fifties, which was one of the biggest periods of in migration to California from other states, and which saw many orange groves being converted to new housing. Our town grew 500% from 1950 to 1956 and nearly doubled in the next two decades, more than doubled in the next two decades and has grown 20% in the last two decades.
In other words we moved there at the beginning of the southern California sprawl.
Our first house was in a development that replaced some orange groves and we went through a couple orange groves walking to our primary school. Our high school was the first high school in our town and started as a common campus for both a senior and junior high.
What is the main feature of the town I grew up in? Housing and related retail - super markets, drug stores, hardware, restaurants, fast food, gasoline, dry cleaners, local insurance and real estate, ect. ,ect., ect., just nothing major and no large major employer. That is much like hundreds of towns across southern California. The largest growth industry has been in modern warehousing and supply chain distribution centers, fed by merchandise going in and out of the ports on the coast, then moved to or from the Inland Empire to or from all points north and east of the there. There are still some Aerospace industry and related companies in both Riverside and San Bernardino counties, and they predate the growth of the warehousing and distribution centers but I think their job growth is not what it used to be.