Metro is shutting down the D Line for 70 days to prepare for its Westside subway expansion
Four miles of new subway tracks will completely transform how Angelenos can commute to and from parts of the Westside by the end of this year. The first phase of Metro's D Line extension, slated to open later in 2025, will extend service underneath Wilshire Boulevard from Koreatown to just past the Beverly Hills border—and eventually as far west as UCLA.
But transit riders, particularly those in K-town, will have to tolerate a couple months of commuting pain before we can get there: Metro announced that it'll temporarily close the entire D Line (formerly known as the Purple Line) for 70 days, starting on Saturday, May 17 at 9pm through the end of service on Friday, July 25, in order to connect its current terminus at Wilshire/Western with three upcoming stations to the west.
The D Line is the shortest of Metro's half-dozen rail lines, and of its eight stops, the six in Downtown L.A. and Westlake are shared with the B Line (Red). Thankfully, that means all of those stations will continue to have rail service during the closure due to the DTLA-to-North Hollywood B Line. In Downtown L.A. specifically, Metro says you can expect trains to increase from every 12 minutes to every 8 minutes (until 7pm on weekdays and after 7am on weekends).
But it's a much different story for the two stops west of there in Koreatown: Wilshire/Western and Wilshire/Normandie. With those two stations completely out of service, Metro will instead operate a temporary 855 bus, which will follow the B Line schedule and take riders as far east as Wilshire/Vermont. Alternatively, you can rely on the existing 720 or 20 bus routes (or take a roughly half-mile walk between each stop).
Metro says it'll be using the 70-day closure to connect all of the rail, communication and power systems between the existing D Line and the upcoming extension. After the work is wrapped up in July, the next major milestone will be the still-to-be-announced opening date of the three new stations: Wilshire/La Brea, Wilshire/Fairfax and Wilshire/La Cienega.
We included the D Line extension in our list of 'things to look forward to in L.A. in 2025,' and it's easy to see why once you look at the locations of the new stops it'll add: at Wilshire and La Brea, about a half block down from République; at Wilshire and Fairfax, right next to the Petersen Automotive Museum and across the street from LACMA and the Academy Museum; and at Wilshire and La Cienega, just over the Beverly Hills border and near the Saban Theatre. After that, the line will expand to near Rodeo Drive and at the edge of Century City in 2026, and by UCLA and the VA in 2027.
The D Line isn't the only major Metro project in 2025: The A Line will continue its San Gabriel Valley expansion with stations in Glendora, San Dimas, La Verne and Pomona later this year, and the C and K Line's LAX/Metro Transit Center station
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