LA Metro Blue Line

I've heard that the original Nippon Sharyo fleet may be replaced on the Long Beach line. Are these cars going to be deployed to another line or will they be sold off? It would seem that these cars must have at least another ten to fifteen years of useful life in them.

Haven't heard that but I will say that the Blue Line cars certainly look beat up. They go through areas that are not too savory and are abused. I tried taking photos out of the windows once and had a tough time finding an area of the windows that was clean enough to shoot through. Of all the LRV lines, the Blue line probably has the most security/ police presence. It most likely needs it.

The information was posted on Wikipedia.org, which is not always reliable. In fact, there was no citation of a source. There wasn't anything about it on the official MTA site that I could find.

Mid life overhaul may be a better way to go, unless the cars have suffered significant mechanical or structural problems. Even cars (in northern climates) that have rusted out from salt and snow have successfully undergone mid life overhaul and lasted another 10 years.

Frame cracks are another story, although I only hear of that problem on buses, which suffer the disadvantage of bumpy roads that goes all the way back to day one when they were called omnibuses and which disadvantage probably begat rail transit in the first place.

In today's social climate, even plastic windows must be regarded as expendable items, namely intended to be replaced every so often when they become fogged up by the scouring off of graffiti or going through a non-brushless carwash numerous times. The plastic windows can be buffed and polished but few artisans do that nowadays.

Electric propulsion equipment can last an amazingly long time, witness all of the streetcars and trolley buses that left the U.S. for "third world countries".

They were planning on retiring them a year ago, but changed their minds and decided to overhaul them instead.

Good day. I'm in LA for a few days, working and staying in Long Beach but need to run downtown a few times. Is it safe to ride the blue line from LB to downtown? I ride Chicago'S green line through Austin So I'm certainly not one of those people that gets scared of my shadow. I just don't know anything about the area. Thanks.

Also what happened to the Long Beach red cars? I heard they were stored to make room for expansion of the cruise terminal.

I haven't been in LA in a few years but have ridden the Blue Line many times and never saw a problem, let alone experienced one. The times I've ridden it have been mostly weekdays during the day; the trains were all well filled, with proof of payment checked by sheriff's deputies with sidearms. Late at night I don't know about. It's a very interesting ride, and I'd do it again if I were out there.

Did you mean the San Pedro red cars? I hope someone reading this knows what happened to them; I'm wondering about it myself.

The Blue Line is an interesting ride: I have done it a few times. You will want to stay on the train because many of those stations are in questionable areas.

The San Pedro Red Cars have different from the Blue Line and as of right now, they are suspended. It's uncertain whether they will return to revenue service.

Sounds like good advice about staying on the train at intermediate stations--no problems in Long Beach or at 7th & Flower in LA.
A couple of interesting things to watch for en route:
Leaving the layover point in Long Beach you head westward, then first right to head north, and a few blocks later head east to rejoin the southbound alignment at Long Beach Blvd.; when you turn left to head north you're left-hand running to avoid having to cross the southbound track at that intersection, so that a southbound is not delayed by having a northbound cross in front of it. A diamond crossing to the north straightens it out in the median, out of the way. At Willow St., if you look over your right shoulder you should still be able to see a remnant of the PE line to Newport Beach where it joined the line to LA. Watts (103rd St.) was the beginning of the "four tracks" to 9th St., at that time the beginning of street running.

So I took the ride. It went just fine. Like I mentioned earlier, I've been on the Green Line in Chicago which goes through awful neighborhoods and as long as you stay aboard, you're fine. The Blue Line is a great way to get downtown from the port at rush hour. In the future I'll certainly use it more.

Important question: Can you see out the front of the Blue Line cars? And ditto re: the line to Pasadena. The answers may influence whether I ever take another trip to L.A. to ride these systems. Thanks!

This is kind of important to me considering I had rude awakening on a trip to San Jose a few years back. When I first rode their light-rail system in 1995 you could see out the cars of that era. When I returned in 2010 I was flabbergasted to find they had bought a whole new fleet of cars with no front window viewing at all. Just a solid cab door. What a let-down that was.

https://www.progressiverailroading.com/ ... ent--57840

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LA Metro) will close two Expo Line stations this week as crews begin construction on the Blue Line improvement project's northern segment.

The 7th Street/Metro Center and Pico stations will close June 22 and reopen August 21 so that crews can replace shared track at the junction of the Expo and Blue lines at Washington Boulevard and Flower Street in the 7th Street/Metro Center tunnel in downtown Los Angeles, LA Metro officials said in a press release.

The Blue Line is undergoing an eight month, $350-million modernization that began in January.
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