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Saturday, November 2, 2019

It’s official, say Metro and Snoop: The A Line, running from downtown L.A. to Long Beach, has debuted - Long Beach Press Telegram

All aboard the A train.

After nine months of closures, the Metro A Line — formerly known as the Blue Line — fully reopened on Saturday, Nov. 2 with three simultaneous celebrations at different stations along the line.

  • Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia, Supervisor Janie Hahn and Assemblyman Patrick O’Donnell help open Metro’s new A Line on Saturday. Photo: Courtesy Metro/Robert Garcia

  • A rider waits as a train headed to downtown Los Angeles approaches at the A Line 103rd St./Watts Towers Station on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2019. (Hayley Munguia/SCNG)

  • Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks during the grand reopening of the Metro A Line, formerly known as the Blue Line, at the Watts Historic Train Station, adjacent to the 103rd St./Watts Towers Station on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2019. (Hayley Munguia/SCNG)

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  • Metro’s new A-Line when on line on Saturday. Photo: Courtesy Metro

  • Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti cuts the ribbon for the reopening of the A Line, formerly known as the Blue Line, along with other elected officials and Metro representatives on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2019. (Hayley Munguia/SCNG)

A dozen elected officials and Metro representatives headlined each event, with the day’s biggest star — Long Beach’s own Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr., better known as Snoop Dogg — serving as emcee.

As part of the reopening, Metro is offering free rides on the line through Monday, Nov. 4.

Although the rapper-cum-entrepreneur led the festivities at the downtown Los Angeles bash at The Bloc, adjacent to the 7th St./Metro Center station, folks at the other two events, in the Watts neighborhood and in downtown Long Beach, didn’t miss out. All three events featured screens that projected a live stream of the speakers at the other locations.

“I’m very excited to be celebrating with you guys what I used to call the Blue Line back in the day, when I was young Snoop,” he said, “and I used to get around in the city from Long Beach to Inglewood.”

The Blue Line launched in 1990 and is the county’s oldest light rail line. In the nearly 30 years since its kickoff, the line began to show its age.

So officials poured $350 million into a renovation project that started in January. The work, which included four additional crossover tracks to reduce interruptions, an upgrade to the control-signal system and the replacement of certain segments of the tracks, was so ambitious that Metro decided to shut down the line’s southern half for four months and then the northern half for five months.

“Today we’re going to bring the A Line into the 21st Century, and this is welcome news for tens of thousands of daily riders whose lives were disrupted by months of construction and shutdowns,” Los Angeles City Councilman Curren D. Price Jr. said from the downtown L.A. event.

“We thank you for your patience as this popular line underwent some significant upgrades,” Price added. “Now you get to enjoy the benefits and those improvements.”

In addition to the track and control system upgrades, which will speed up the ride and make delays less frequent, the A Line now features new touchscreens at every station, which riders can use to learn more about the Metro network, and access schedules and maps.

“At the touch of a finger, you can get up-to-the-minute updates on service alerts, when the next train or bus is arriving,” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said from the Watts event. “Metro will be rolling these out at stations across the county, but we’re starting with the A Line right here.”

The Willowbrook/Rosa Parks Station in South Los Angeles — the only stop that has remained closed since January — also received a full face lift, including a dedicated drop-off location, more bus bays, a new plaza, a Metro bike hub, and a customer service and security center.

As Snoop said, the A Line is no longer the Blue Line he once knew.

He was glad “to see them put something back into the community like this and to give it a new name with some new tricks,” he said.

“We got the A Line now, y’all.”

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November 02, 2019 at 03:11PM
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It’s official, say Metro and Snoop: The A Line, running from downtown L.A. to Long Beach, has debuted - Long Beach Press Telegram
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