Metro Blue Line Advice - Downtown LA to LGB
 

I will be in downtown L.A. next weekend, and on Saturday I'll need to go to Long Beach (downtown area). Will not have a car, so am considering what appears to be the easiest route - the Metro Blue Line. I will leave L.A. for Long Beach in the early afternoon, and return sometime early evening.

Insofar as the route travels through some scary parts of L.A., is this trip presumed to be reasonably safe? Any advice from regular riders?

Are there any other transit alternatives? If perhaps the return journey in the early evening is questionable, I presume I could do a Super Shuttle to LAX, and another one to downtown. Much more costly and cumbersome, unless anyone has any other ideas.

Any comments and suggestions will be deeply appreciated.

Yes. The line is patrolled by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

While some of the MTA's bus routes through bad neighborhoods can be scary, the Metro lines are generally well patrolled by Sheriffs and have video monitoring and emergency calls for all stations. My college freshman niece regularly rides the blue line at late night *by herself* end to end. Her comment: "I had way more problems in Italian train stations..."

I realize I'm just echoing others here, but you shouldn't worry about it at all. The people who have to worry are those dumb souls who drive over the tracks and get hit on rare occasion. The train itself is safe. I live in LGB and have taken it several times to go downtown without feeling unsafe once. I only wish I worked downtown so I could ride it everyday. Instead, I sit on the 405 driving all the way up to Westwood. Ugh.

Very interesting. I would not have thought you could find free street parking near Staples. We are going this weekend, so I will see if it works for us ^

Ummm...

That's TWO subways, since you'd have to change from the purple line (Wilshire/Western) to the Blue line to get to Staples.

If I were looking for transit routing, I'd go to www.metro.net....

(...and most of their fastest routes seem to be one or two bus routes at first glance...)

True 'cause the Staples Center is at the Pico Street Station, which is a blue line stop.

But, couldn't one just walk from the red/purple line stop at 7th Street Metro Center (where one would transfer from the red or purple to the blue) to the Staples Center? I didn't think it was that far of a walk. According to metro.net, it's just ~0.15 miles.

Well, metro's pulling your leg on their mileage estimate...

The nearest 7th street metro station exit is 7th and Figueroa

The Northeast corner of Staples center is 11th and Figueroa

Mapquest calls it 0.5 miles, Delome calls it 0.6 miles.
YMMV, but four LA blocks sure isn't 0.15 miles in my estimation.

(and the Original Pantry is at 9th and Figueroa)

be sure to have an open mind as to what "near" means, especially if you're going in the evening.

LAX to Pasadena and back on a Friday afternoon?
 

I'm buying something on Ebay from someone in Pasadena. I want to pick it up during a 7.5 hr layover at LAX (on a Friday afternoon). What's the realistic time to get from LAX to Pasadena and back on a Friday? We should arrive 3p, get the car (at the Radisson) by 330-345. Anyway we can get to Pasadena by 5?

If you get the car by 3:30, you should be able to get to Pasadena by 5 or 5:15. Take the 105 to the 110 and come straight up--you'll be in HOV lanes much of the way. (You may know all this already.)

If you're heading back for a 10:30pm flight, you should be able to have a decent dinner and have no trouble getting back (at 9:00 or so, it's 26 minutes from where I live in Pasadena to LAX, assuming no traffic abnormalities and doing 75-80 in the HOV lanes).

Fuhgeddaboutit.

30 mins for baggage. 30 mins to get the shuttle to the Radisson. 30 mins to rent the car. Now it is maybe 5 PM. 2 hours more to get to Pasadena. But you ought to be able to do it within 7.5 hrs if your seller will agree to meet you later in the evening.

Realistically you are not going to get to the Radisson until at least 4:15-4:30 w/out luggage, or 4:45-5:00 with luggage. Figure 1:15-1:30 to get to Pasadena from LAX at that time of day.

So you get there in the 6:30-7:00 range, pick up your item, have a nice dinner in Old Town and then get back to the LAX area around 9:00 when traffic is light. Hopefully you are not connecting international. It's a lot of driving but doable, and possibly even enjoyable. All bets are off if you are flying out international.

Re-think that Plan
 

I'm an LA native, but I live in San Diego County now. I have traveled enough in LA recently to think that you are not likely to be able to leave LAX by rental at 3:30pm on a Friday and arrive in Pasadena by 5:00pm. Might be possible with luck for someone who knew all of the alternative routes around freeway jams. Still possible for you with luck depending on route and your particular destination in Pasadena. This is one route: Century fwy west from LAX to the 710 fwy north, which unfortunately ends somewhere south of Pasadena. The 110 freeway goes straight into downtown Pasadena from downtown LA, but downtown and the 110 will be a parking lot at that time.

This is the best online LA traffic report. You might see what the freeway looks like at 5pm:

traffic.tann.net/lartraffic/

Alternatively, you could take direct bus and/or a bus and trolly combination from LAX to union station in downtown

Be sure and sit in the A seat and eyeball the traffic on the 105 and 405 freeways while on the approach.