This weekend, many Los Angeles residents and visitors looking to travel downtown will need to navigate around a significant disruption in Metro rail service. Construction to upgrade the Metro's downtown rail yard is the cause for the service interruption, which will affect the B (Red) and D (Purple) Lines from early Friday, March 28, through the end of service on Sunday. As reported by FOX LA, bus shuttles have been set to replace the rail service between 7th Street/Metro Center and Union Station throughout the weekend. With the Pershing Square and Civic Center/Grand Park stations completely closed and no subway platform access at Union Station, riders are urged to plan accordingly.
Affecting not only commuters but those who rely on the Metro to traverse the city's heart, this shutdown will likely cause delays and require additional transfers. "I’m an occasional rider of both lines and this will cause quite a bit of inconvenience for people to get to their final destination," Devrick Thomas told FOX LA in an interview. Metro officials have advocated using the A (Blue) or E (Expo) Lines as alternative routes, which can connect riders from the 7th Street/Metro stop to Union Station. The A Line offers a direct connection to Union Station, providing a temporary solution for the impacted travelers.
As per the Metro's The Source, a shuttle service, Line 852, will run between Pershing Square and 7th/Metro stations during the B Line's regular service hours to help mitigate the inconvenience for riders. The A Line also faces a disruption, with bus shuttles replacing trains in Pasadena between Fillmore and Lake stations for maintenance work during the same time frame.
Commuters like Chris Daniels, who usually ride the B line, anticipate a troublesome commute. "I just catch it from Hollywood and western to Pershing square, then I wait for the bus. But it’s going to be all messed up because we have to get off at 7th and Flower and catch a bus and then I have to catch another bus now," he explained to FOX LA. The construction is a part of the Division 20 project, which began in 2019 and aims to finish by 2026, as stated by the same source. Once completed, it is expected to make the Metro rail service faster, safer, and more reliable. The D Line Subway Extension Project, set to open its first section later this year, will, too, eventually benefit from the current upgrades.
Regular train service will resume at 4:00 a.m. on Monday, according to various reports. For the latest updates on service changes and shuttle options, Metro officials have encouraged riders to visit the official Metro website or follow Metro's rider alerts on social media. An alert posted by LA Metro Rider Alerts and embedded in a post by X provided critical details for this weekend's service changes and offered links for further information.
B/D LINES: No rail service between 7th/Metro & Union Station from 5:45am Fri March 28 thru end of service Sun March 30!
— LA Metro Rider Alerts (@metrolaalerts) March 28, 2025
🚊 Use A Line btwn 7th/Metro & Union Station
🚍 Shuttle btwn 7th/Metro & Pershing Sq
👷🏽♀️ We're working to expand DTLA subway yard
ℹ️ https://t.co/a1cD3FhgHJ pic.twitter.com/mwtxLjsfJh
