i've lived in this area, and never heard it called 'westside village.' most people, inside and out, call it palms. give yourself 30 minutes to get downtown, 15 or so to get to westwood or santa monica. but palms has its good and bad areas, and it's not that easy to tell them apart.

for 'community,' west pasadena, brentwood, larchmont, sherman oaks, and playa del rey offer a yuppie community. pasadena has the bonus of having the gold line running into downtown. brentwood mostly closes down at 10pm, playa is a bit far from downtown, and sherman oaks can be difficult to reach from west l.a. or downtown because you're stuck with the 405 or the 101, two of the worst freeways.

a generally safe course is to pick something convenient to work for the first year, and then triangulate your preferred community after that. but the westside, pasadena, and the valley all have distinct feels (as do redondo beach, long beach, the dreaded orange curtain, and - gasp! - the 909).