Free rides across the Metro system this weekend to celebrate the debut of the new A and E Lines, 3 new stations and the opening of the Regional ConnectorMetro

Our new A and E light rail lines make their debut this Friday, June 16, at noon when the Regional Connector and its three new underground stations in downtown Los Angeles open to our riders.

The opening will make riding our system more convenient and will provide you with faster light rail trips to and through downtown L.A.

As part of our celebration of this milestone project, we’re offering free rides from 3 a.m. Friday through 3 a.m. Monday on all Metro buses, trains, Metro Bike and Metro Micro. Please come out and ride as much as you like and enjoy the many destinations you can reach via Metro across L.A. County.

As many of you know, the Regional Connector is a highly anticipated project that has been under construction for much of the last decade. We know many of you have questions. Let’s go…

What will the new light rail system look like?

The Connector ties together the A, E and L Lines. As a result, those three lines will become two lines:

•The new A Line will run between Azusa and Long Beach. On maps, the A Line will retain the color blue.

•The new E Line will run between East Los Angeles and Santa Monica. On maps, the E Line will use the color gold.

•It will be easy to transfer between the A and E Lines at any of the five DTLA stations they’ll share: Pico, 7th/Metro, Grand Av Arts/Bunker Hill (at 2nd and Hope), Historic Broadway (at 2nd and Broadway) and Little Tokyo/Arts District (at 1st and Alameda). Just step off one train and get on the next. No need to walk to a different platform.

How frequent will trains run?

Here’s the new A Line schedule and here’s the new E Line schedule.

The basics: trains on both lines will run every 10 minutes at weekday peak hours, every 12 minutes the rest of the day and during weekend daytime hours and every 20 minutes in early mornings and later in the evenings.