page_title: L Line (Los Angeles Metro)
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: L Line (Los Angeles Metro) / History
caption_attribution_description: English: A Southbound train pulls into Fillmore street station
context_page_description: The L Line is a 31-mile light rail line running from Azusa to East Los Angeles via Downtown Los Angeles serving several attractions, including Little Tokyo, Union Station, the Southwest Museum, Chinatown and the shops of Old Pasadena. The line, which is one of six in the Metro Rail system, entered service in 2003 and is operated by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority. The Gold Line serves 27 stations.
  The name of the line was changed from the Gold Line to the L Line in early 2020; however, the line in its current configuration will cease to exist when the Regional Connector is completed in 2022. At that point it will be split into two parts, with the northern half serving as an extension to the A Line and the southern half serving as an extension to the E Line.
context_section_description: Much of the Gold Line's current right-of-way through the San Gabriel Valley was originally built by the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Valley Railroad in 1885, eventually taken over by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, as part of the Pasadena Subdivision, which saw Amtrak service into the early 1990s. This segment was part of the original plan for the Metro Blue Line, but when a ban on sales tax spending on subway tunnels passed in 1998, the project became a separate line terminating at Union Station.
  The original Gold Line, between Union Station and Sierra Madre Villa, opened July 26, 2003.
  The Gold Line Eastside Extension, a separate segment following all new right-of-way extending east from Union Station to East Los Angeles, opened on November 15, 2009.
  The first stage of the Gold Line Foothill Extension, running from Sierra Madre Villa station in Pasadena to APU/Citrus College station in Azusa, opened on March 5, 2016.
caption: A Siemens P2000 train stopping at Fillmore Station.
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