A pilot is being praised for setting down a small plane on a Southern California street while avoiding power lines and traffic.

Police told City News Service that the pilot reported engine problems on Friday afternoon while heading for John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana.

Video filmed from a car on the street shows the plane gliding over moving traffic to touch down in the middle of a wide road, near a set of traffic lights.

"I almost just got hit by a plane, pulling out of my gym," a woman can be heard in the footage.

The pilot landed the Cessna 172 about 8 kilometres from the airport in a Huntington Beach residential neighbourhood.

Nobody was hurt and the plane was undamaged.

AP/ABC