Long Beach Line

Long Beach
A train en route to Long Beach, 1923
Overview
Locale	Los Angeles, and Long Beach
Termini	Downtown Los Angeles Downtown Long Beach, California
Stations	8
Service
Type	Interurban
Operator(s)	Pacific Electric (1902–1958) LAMTA (1958–1961)
Rolling stock	PE 1200 Class (last used)
Ridership	1,603,476 (1958)[1]
History
Opened	July 4, 1902
Closed	April 9, 1961
Technical
Line length	20.37 mi (32.78 km)
Number of tracks	1–4
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge
Electrification	Overhead line, 600 V DC
Route map Legend Pacific Electric Building to Northern Division  J   R   S   J   S  to Sierra Vista–Watts & South Pasadena Local Amoco Air Line Vernon Avenue  V  Slauson Junction Fullerton / Whittier Fleming Florencita Park Florence Nadeau Graham Latin Watts end of local service multiple lines Willowbrook/Rosa Parks Springdale Willowbrook Sativa Winona Compton Dominguez Dominguez Junction San Pedro via Dominguez Del Amo Cota Los Angeles River Los Cerritos Vista del Mar Willow Balboa American Avenue Long Beach Long Beach–San Pedro This diagram: view talk edit

The Long Beach Line was a major interurban railway operated by the Pacific Electric Railway between Los Angeles and Long Beach, California via Florence, Watts, and Compton. Service began in 1902 and lasted until 1961, the last line of the system to be replaced by buses.

In addition to the Long Beach service, the line served as a trunk for a number of other interurban lines stretching to Whittier, Yorba Linda, Fullerton, Santa Ana, Balboa, San Pedro, and Redondo Beach. It was four tracks wide north of the junction at Watts, with local service on the outer tracks and long-distance trains bypassing the local stations on the inner tracks.

After the end of Pacific Electric service, Southern Pacific continued to operate freight trains on the tracks, and its successor Union Pacific still does between Amoco and Dominguez Junction. Passenger service to the corridor returned in 1990 with the opening of the Blue Line, a modern light rail service using portions of the former right-of-way. When the Regional Connector subway tunnel was completed in 2023, the Blue Line, renamed as the A Line in 2019, was extended northeast to Azusa, becoming the world's longest light rail route.^[2]