Nobody Drives in LA — Metro’s New Subway Cars Have Arrived in Los Angeles

This past Friday, I was invited, along with a pretty small group, to a sneak peak of Metro‘s new subway cars last Friday. Of course, I cleared my schedule. The event was scheduled for noon at Wilshire/Western Station. I had a bagel and too much coffee and then headed out the door. To get to the station, I crossed the street in front of my apartment, hopped on the 182, took it to Sunset/Vermont Station, and then took the B Line to Wilshire and Western.

I snapped a picture of the old train for comparison. For the transit nerds out there, it’s a Breda A650 and, while they’ve been pretty good trains (Carter Rubin estimated, I think, that each has traveled roughly a million miles) — I have personally never liked their seating arrangement. I’m 187 cm tall and have disproportionately long legs that most be folded against the seat in front of me or turned sideways. There are times I wish that I could move to a different car more easily — usually to get away from a problematic rider.

I exited the train and saw some familiar faces — first Metro Tech Lead, Nina Kin and then, Nobody Drives in LA gues (and Metro Social Media Content Manager), Jane Ashley. Another Metro employee checked my name off of a list and wrapped my wrist with a pink VIP wristband — without snagging any arm hairs. She said she was a fan of the maps so I introduced myself — but only after I hustled out of the station to find a restroom. I ducked into the H Mart at Madang (마당). As I headed back to Wilshire/Western Station, I spied a sign reading “Gangnam Station.” My bladder now relieved, I was able to chuckle at this incongrous absurdity. I have been to Gangnam and Wilshire/Western, sir, is no Gangnam Station. It has wellness rooms, boutiques, restaurants, and more inside the station. Most importantly, it has restrooms. But Gangnam Station, in Koreatown, isn’t an aspirational rebrand of Wilshire/Western Station — it’s merely a gogi-gui joint.

I was descending the stairs when I caught the new train pulling into the station.

The new trains are CRRC HR4000, made in Changchun. Due to new federal regulations, future trains will be Hyundai Rotem HR5000s, made in Changwon. They have a top speed of 110 kph.

Of course everyone wanted to peak into the cab.

The longitudinal seating means less seating capacity but more capacity overall… including for bikes, walkers, and wheelchairs. There’s also additional disabled passenger seating that flips up when not in use.

I personally prefer to have my back to a wall — facing other passengers— rather than have them sitting behind me. And now I don’t have to turn my legs sideways or jam them into the seat in front of me. Of course, there are people who need to sit more than I do and, if you’re physically able to, you should offer your seat to someone who needs it more than you — being mindful of the fact that some people may not look like they need to sit when, in fact, they do.

I honestly think the open gangways are a massive game changer. There are often unpleasant people on public transit from whom I wish to be as far away as is possible. I’m talking, of course, about young men who apply body spray like sunscreen. Personally I’d rather sit next to someone who has never showered in their life smoking methamphetamine in my face than catch even a whiff (assuming such a thing exists) of Axe.

There were some grumblings about the train’s USB ports. “USB Type-C is standard,” you exclaim. I have to assume that these can be updated fairly easily and that they won’t be this type of interface in thirty years. If only it were as easy to get people to adopt other global standards like, say, metric and celsius. Besides, there are plenty of us who like to hang onto antique technologies and keep them out of landfills for as long as possible… thus this photo depicts the charging of my phone that is four whole years old! There are little, sliding metal doors over the ports so, hopefully, no one will be seized with the unshakeable urge to destroy them but… this being the US, I’m still going to carry a charged battery pack in my bag and be thankful for this upgrade from nothing.

The line displays light up… which is neat for fans of colored lights. I also know that I get lost in a book, sometimes, and lose track of where I am, so this is actually pretty useful. The sign did look like it could be pulled off pretty easily but someone with zero civic pride and/or an untreated antisocial disorder. Come to think of it, the Metro maps weren’t in frames, either, which is pretty strange.

This particular sign looked like it might need to be peeled off and replaced — as it appears to have suffered some kind of printing malfunction. I wasn’t too bothered. Mistakes happen. I, myself, have actually included typos and made grammatical errors on this very blog… probably even in this very entry.

Speaking of Metro signage — this is the map I have been waiting for — and don’t recall having seen before — a map of both Metro AND Metrolink lines… that also includes Metro and Metrolink (and Amtrak) stations. I have spoken, on the podcast (Nobodoy Drives in LA) of jumping back and forth between Metro and Metrolink trains and how much a map of both systems would help someone like me.

And, to circle back to antisocial psychopaths for a second — this is the new emergency stop, which I asked about during our presentation. If you’ve ever been on a train in Los Angeles, you’ve almost certainly experienced someone pulling the ball above the door to hold it open for a friend or just to be annoying. When that happens, the train remains stuck with its doors open and the engineer announces over the train’s speakers to push the ball back up so that the door can close and the train can continue. It’s all a bit Rube Goldberg.

On the new trains, you must break a panel to pull down a lever to signal an emergency. The engineer can then look at the camera monitor or down the open gangway to determine wether or not there is an actual emergency — or whether some hamster brain (with apologies to hamsters) is just getting their kicks. There’s a similar situation with the fire suppression technology as you don’t want every vaping dumbass to trigger the sprinkler system.

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Our test train wasn’t scheduled to depart for Union Station until 1:00 — so there was time to socialize, explore every detail, and attempt to take artsy photos. I asked where the craft services table was.. or the cafe car. It’s good to dream… and to remind people with every opportunity that there should be places to dine inside stations. A vending machine would be, to me, more of an improvement than the latest fad* in USB technology.

When the train departed, the glee and excitement was palpable — possibly even irrational. I shot I this footage which, if you’re a transit nerd, will include many faces familiar to you.

Naturally, Gary Leonard was there snapping photographs. I filmed him snapping photographs as I made my way out of the station.

As I got to the top of the escalator, one of the old Breda’s pulled into the station (the track on the left). Unfortunately, when I tried to “pan” to the new train, my view was obstructed in what would’ve been a cool side-by-side. Oh well.

SEE ALSO

New Metro Subway Railcars Started Service Today (Streetsblog Los Angeles)

LA’s Subway Got a Glow-Up! (You Won’t Believe the Difference) (Kerry)

Touring and Riding Los Angeles Metro’s New HR4000 Cars for the First Time! (Tiger Railfan)

Transit Hunter

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Eric Brightwell is an adventurer, essayist, rambler, explorer, cartographer, and guerrilla gardener who is always seeking paid writing, speaking, traveling, and art opportunities. He is not interested in generating advertorials, cranking out clickbait, or laboring away in a listicle mill “for exposure.”

Brightwell has written for Angels Walk LA, Amoeblog, Boom: A Journal of California, diaCRITICS, Hey Freelancer!, Hidden Los Angeles, and KCET Departures. His art has been featured by the American Institute of Architects, the Architecture & Design Museum, the Craft Contemporary, Form Follows Function, the Los Angeles County Store, Sidewalking: Coming to Terms With Los Angeles, Skid Row Housing Trust, the 1650 Gallery, and Abundant Housing LA.

Brightwell has been featured as subject and/or guest in The Los Angeles Times, VICE, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Magazine, LAist, CurbedLA, Office Hours Live, L.A. Untangled, Spectrum News, Eastsider LA, Boing Boing, Los Angeles, I’m Yours, Notebook on Cities and Culture, the Silver Lake History Collective, KCRW‘s Which Way, LA?, All Valley Everything, Hear in LA, KPCC‘s How to LA, at Emerson College, and at the University of Southern California. He is the co-host of the podcast, Nobody Drives in LA.

Brightwell has written a haiku-inspired guidebook, Los Angeles Neighborhoods — From Academy Hill to Zamperini Field and All Points Between, that he hopes to have published. If you’re a literary agent or publisher, please contact him.

You can follow him on Bluesky, Duolingo, Facebook, Goodreads, iNaturalist, Instagram, Letterboxd, Medium, Mubi, Threads, and TikTok.