The Brief

For many Los Angeles college students, public transit is often the cheapest and sometimes the only way to get to campus as gas and other costs rise. But using buses and trains can come with a price beyond the fare.

Metro offers free passes for students at participating K-12 schools and community colleges, while some universities offer discounted transit passes for their students. However, college students who rely on transit have to leave for class hours early to avoid being late, weigh safety concerns, stretch already tight budgets and miss out on college life, students told CalMatters.

Late buses, early alarms

For some students, using transit means getting ready and leaving long before class starts. Makeda Webb wakes up at 6 a.m. in her apartment in Willowbrook, more than five hours before her first class at Cal State Dominguez Hills, less than 5 miles away in Carson.

On most mornings, the psychology major competes with her brother and grandfather, who has dementia, for their one shared bathroom. Even though her earliest class starts at 11:30 a.m., Webb leaves home by 8:30 a.m. because her commute usually takes 40 minutes and unreliable buses have made her late before. Some professors have even threatened to drop her from their classes if she kept arriving late, so she doesn't take any risks.

"The bus is constantly late or breaking down," Webb said. "You have to wait another hour for the next bus. … (It) makes me late for school, so I have to leave extremely early to make sure I'm on time."

She doesn't have a car, so despite delays, taking the bus is cheaper for her than paying for gas and other driving costs. Her university offers Metro U-Pass, which allows participating university students to take unlimited bus and train rides for the semester for a flat fee. For spring 2026, the pass cost $67.50.

Her commute gets worse at the end of the day. When Webb takes the bus in the evening after class and extracurriculars, frequent stops and unruly passengers stretch the trip to close to an hour.

"Even though I only live (half an hour) away by bus, it takes double that to get there because the bus driver has to stop the bus or … something stupid is going on, like chaos, which makes it take forever," Webb said.

Webb walks home at night after getting off the bus at a stop near her home. “It’s not always enjoyable, especially with the type of people that get on the bus. We have a lot of drug addicts, we have a lot of people who do crazy types of stuff on the bus,” she said.

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For women, the train comes with risks 

Victoria Imo, a graduate student studying social work at the University of Southern California, has a car but often takes the Metro A Line, transferring to the E Line to get to campus. She uses her U-Pass to avoid the high cost of gas and parking.

Imo's U-Pass is covered by USC's mandatory transportation fee, which costs $146 for the spring semester. That is cheaper than filling her tank multiple times, which she said can cost up to $60 each time, or buying a parking permit, which can cost up to $585 per semester before added fees.

But saving money means she has to take extra precautions. Because of safety concerns on the train, Imo thinks carefully about where she sits, often near other women, and avoids using her iPad or laptop, opting to read instead. She wears a mask and sometimes headphones without music to avoid unwanted interactions.

In the past, Imo carried pepper spray and a Taser – the latter of which she previously set off to deter an unruly man who was "yelling behind me while I was walking up the stairs," she said. She activated the Taser so it crackled really loudly while she walked to her car.

Metro contracts with the Los Angeles Police Department and Los Angeles Sheriff's Department for law enforcement across its systems. The agency also has transit ambassadors to complement officers, report issues and connect passengers with resources. Still, Imo said she has not reported any safety concerns because she's so used to them.

"I haven't gone out of my way to give any feedback, because at this point, I feel like this is just what the train system is," Imo said. "It seems like everyone's used to it."

Imo walks down the stairs at the Sierra Madre Metro Station in Pasadena to catch a train to campus.

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Gina Medrano, a psychology student at Santa Monica College, described similar concerns. She has her own car, but gas prices have pushed her to use her GoPass to take the train from the Atlantic Station in East Los Angeles to her school.

She carries pepper spray, avoids wearing headphones and switches train cars if anyone makes her feel uncomfortable. After witnessing a near-fatal incident, Medrano said boarding a Metro train makes her feel uneasy.

"This lady started hitting a man on the train," she said. "After she kicked the door of the train while it was running … she jumped out of the train … and it was right in front of me. I had to call my mom to come pick me up, because I just couldn't handle what I'd just seen."

Medrano said the incident was one of several disturbing things she's seen on the train. She regularly sees things that make her question her safety and wonder why there isn't more enforcement.

"It's kind of normal to see needles and unsightly things on the train," she said. "There's not really a lot of enforcement or safety. I don't really feel safe on it."

For some, police presence sets off alarms

Zak Nirenberg, an electrical construction and maintenance major at Los Angeles Trade-Technical College, said their biggest safety concern is not other Metro riders, but Los Angeles Police Department officers.

"They're intimidating," Nirenberg said. "Most of the time they're on the (train), they're looking for someone to harass or actively harassing someone."

Zak Nirenberg rides the Metro train from Grand/LATTC Station in Los Angeles to Pico Station in downtown Los Angeles on April 30, 2026. They said their biggest safety concern is not other Metro riders but Los Angeles Police Department officers.

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Norma Eisenman, a spokesperson for the LAPD, declined to comment on Nirenberg and others' concerns about officers' presence during fare inspections. The department directed CalMatters to file public records requests for documents about LAPD protocols.

Metro says safety is improving

Metro says it's making progress on safety, pointing to recent declines in violent crime and nonviolent offenses. The agency attributed those declines to increased visible uniformed personnel, fare enforcement and partnerships with behavioral health organizations on its transit system.

In a February Metro media release, Maya Pogoda, a spokesperson for the agency, wrote that violent crime fell 6.7% in 2025 from the year before. She added that crimes involving trespassing, narcotics and weapons decreased 33%.

Metro also announced the Department of Public Safety Dashboard, which publishes safety and security data submitted by law enforcement agencies and shows a more complicated history. According to the dashboard, after Metro resumed bus fare collection following a pandemic pause, trespassing reports, which include fare evasion, rose nearly 1,200%, from 126 in 2022 to 1,635 in 2023. In 2024, the number more than doubled to about 4,500.

Arrests also rose sharply, with LAPD and sheriff's department arrests increasing by 81% in 2023 to about 5,000, then nearly doubling to about 10,000 in 2024. Since 2020, the top two crime types reported on Metro have been trespassing and battery.

Pogoda wrote that the agency is trying to address safety through a mix of law enforcement and public services aimed at addressing homelessness, addiction and untreated mental illness. These efforts will all be coordinated through Metro’s new Department of Public Safety.

Los Angeles Police Department officers conduct fare inspections on a Metro train at Grand/LATTC Station in Los Angeles on April 30, 2026. According to Metro, officers conducted more than 116,000 train boardings and about 500,000 TAP card inspections in 2025 alone.

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Student passes help, but gaps remain

Even Metro programs meant to make public transit more affordable for students don’t remove every cost barrier. For some, the upfront cost of even a discounted pass can still be out of reach.

Stephanie Verdugo, a sociology major at Cal State LA, lives in on-campus housing and relies on Metro buses to run errands and, previously, to get to work. She said her university sells a U-Pass to students for about $100 a semester, but even as a frequent transit rider, Verdugo said she couldn't afford the upfront cost.

"I always had a very tight budget … so I could never actually buy (the U-Pass)," she said. "I would just have to pay the regular way."

Still, even while paying Metro's regular $1.75 fare for bus or train rides, Verdugo said using public transit has saved her money. That is partly because the agency's fare-capping system limits how much regular fare riders can spend to no more than $5 each day and $18 each week before rides are free.

"I don't pay a lot of money considering how much I travel on the bus," Verdugo said. "As a person who was traveling every single day for a month straight, I only spent like a maximum of $80, which, to me, is really good."

For Nirenberg, the Los Angeles Trade-Technical College student, the GoPass saves them a lot of money on gas and parking.

"(It's) not just for school, but for life in general. I don't pay for parking anywhere," they said. "I don't have to worry about finding parking. It's fantastic."

‘I've never been to a college party’ — when transit derails social life

Beyond getting to class, transit can also shape how much of college life students get to experience. Julian Levy, a political science student at Occidental College, lives in on-campus housing and relies on public transit to visit his family and get around Los Angeles. Without a car, Levy said, participating in college life off campus means planning around transit schedules, deciding whether a trip is worth the time and often leaving early to get back on time.

"I remember just feeling so frustrated … just because I didn't have a car," Levy said. "I had to leave early from (a friend's birthday party) because of the time I would have to spend on the much slower public transit system."

One trip to an Occidental soccer game at Chapman University in Orange made Levy reconsider taking transit to away games. He had taken Metro and Metrolink to get there without any issues, but after the game, one of the few trains back was canceled. A second train eventually came, but only after Levy waited about two and a half hours on the platform. He ended up getting back to campus after midnight.

"I remember thinking after that, 'Do I really want to rely on public transit?'" Levy said. "I've always been able to get where I've needed to go, but I've definitely reconsidered whether something is worth the risk of getting stranded somewhere."

For many students CalMatters spoke to, public transit can be unpredictable, crowded and unsafe. Still, it remains the most affordable, and sometimes the only, way for students to reach campus and make attending college possible at all.

"I'm a low-income student, I've never been to a college party. … I don't have the money, I don't have the time," said Webb, the Cal State Dominguez Hills student. "I have not gotten the full (college experience), but I'm still thankful, though. At least there's an option."

Martin Romero is a contributor with the College Journalism Network, a collaboration between CalMatters and student journalists from across California. CalMatters higher education coverage is supported by a grant from the College Futures Foundation.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

Topline:

Street flooding: Roadway flooding was reported this morning on the westbound 134 Freeway at the 5, near Glendale and Griffith Park.

Coastal Flooding: All weekend, forecasters have warned of dangerous rip currents and an elevated risk of coastal flooding.

Flooding was reported yesterday in Seal Beach and Long Beach.

"We have quite a few reports already of waves up to 10 feet on some beaches — Zuma Beach especially, where we've gotten reports [of] strong rip currents," said Todd Hall, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

Advisories and closures:

• An ocean water quality rain advisory has been issued for all L.A. County beaches until Wednesday, Sept. 9 at 2 p.m. That means to avoid ocean water contact for at least 72 hours after the rain.
• A coastal flood advisory and a high surf advisory for L.A. and Ventura county beaches remain in effect until Tuesday, Sept. 8 at 11 p.m.
• The City of Seal Beach is closing two beach parking lots due to flooding concerns.

What's next: Hall said to expect more showers across L.A. County throughout Sunday. On Monday, he said isolated rain is expected, mostly in the mountains.

A sign on the front door says “Beekeeper owned,” and inside the Hive & Hanger store in Burbank, the layout is a mix of vintage clothes, antique jewelry and something rather unexpected: a pop-up Bee Museum.

The owner is Carrie Diazzz, a vintage maven turned urban apiarist. She admits with a smile  two extra Zs at the end of her real last name are a homage to her beloved bees.

When the store opened in 2020, it was originally all-vintage. “I was not looking to change careers,” she said, but after taking a two-hour beekeeping experience course, she was hooked.

Hive & Hangar in Burbank doubles as a bee museum.

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“I don’t like dirt, and I don't like bugs. I'm a heels and lipstick, nails, kind of person,” she said. “There's just something magical about the honeybee. The more you know, the more you want to know.”

That prompted her to pursue a bee master certification at UC Davis. She collaborated with Elina Niño at the university’s Bee Lab to curate information and research to bring her pop-up Bee Museum to life almost a year ago.

A crash course in bees

The Burbank Bee Museum.

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There’s a Bee 101 explainer by the front door, which shows the differences between bees and wasps, and fun touches like pop songs containing the word “Honey,” and a list of Noteworthy Beekeepers including Aristotle, Benjamin Franklin, Leo Tolstoy, Emily Dickinson, Angelina Jolie and Sherlock Holmes.

One long-standing myth is that honeybees are stingers. “People always ask me how often I get stung, but I don’t wear gloves, and I don’t use smoke, and it very rarely happens. And honeybees die after they sting, as opposed to wasps, who can sting repeatedly,” she said.

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Most arresting is a floor-to-ceiling collage series of framed model fruits, vegetables, nuts and berries, all of which the honeybee has a role in pollinating. Beside that is an exhibit on pesticides, one of the insect's biggest threats. Pieces of dried honeycomb are everywhere.

Diazzz has also been hosting school trips for the Boys & Girls Clubs. “I might be the only beekeeper they will ever meet,” she noted. The point is to give bees the respect they deserve. “Did you know that it takes 12 honeybees their entire lives to make one teaspoon of honey?”

Rescuing hives across Southern California

The Bee Museum serves up not just honey, but bee knowledge.

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There are no live bees in the store, but Diazzz has her own hives in Burbank.

“They are from rescues: I cut the hive out from a wall,” she explained. She takes care of hives from San Diego to Bel Air, with many in the San Fernando Valley, and a couple with a view of the Hollywood Sign. Her caretaking quests have taken her on skyscraper roofs, at apartment buildings and in parking lots.

Almost a year ago, she began her studies as a honey sommelier at the American Honey Tasting Society in Connecticut, where she learned about the science and experience of honey. Her future includes going off to Bologna, Italy, the world honey hub, for the final round of studies and tests at the Albo Nazionale degli Esperti in Analisi Sensoriale del Miele or the National Register of Experts in Sensory Analysis of Honey.

Carrie Diazzz, owner of the store and the museum, sells small jars of honey sourced locally and from her own hives.

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“Nectar and honey are not the same thing,” she explained. “Nectar is the liquid sticky substance that bees collect from flowering plants and take back to the hive. They transform it into honey by dehydrating the moisture out of the nectar, and capping it over with wax.”

Diazzz recently held her first informal tasting experience at The Bee Museum, and has small batches of various local honeys for sale: cactus, sage, and honey from her own hives. “I usually leave the honey alone, and only take any extra they have made to sell,” she said, because bees use the honey as sustenance. Her favorite? “A toss-up between dandelion and sunflower. Orange blossom is delicious too, but very sweet.”

Maybe you, like me, are a daily puzzle player. Maybe you like a Wordle, or a crossword, or one of the other entries from the New York Times puzzle empire.

But maybe you're looking for something else.

So, with a tip of the hat to the people on Bluesky who helped me discover a bunch of games I love in the last month or two, I'm sharing a few games that I'm particularly enjoying these days — ones that are not NYT word games. (No disrespect to my original love, Spelling Bee.)

There are more, of course: the spelling bee game Beeswax, the word game Smush, the vexing Anthropeum, the movie games Framed and Cinematrix. Truthfully, I have more games in the "daily games" folder on my phone than I could ever actually play daily. But given a choice between puzzling and doomscrolling, I'll take the puzzles every time.

MapTap

Any idea where Regina is? Do your best in MapTap's daily geography game.

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MapTap is a very simple game. You are shown a 3D globe that you can rotate with your finger, but there are no lines dividing countries or territories. So you are just looking at the unmarked terrain of the world, and you are challenged to tap as close as you can to a particular named location. Maybe "London, England, U.K." You tap. It shows you the distance between where you tapped and where the place really is. You get more points the closer you are. There are five questions in each daily round.

This game can be genuinely humbling, because without those familiar borders showing, it can be difficult to even locate places you are very familiar with. (Without state and national boundaries, it always takes me a minute to precisely find even a place I myself have lived.) But what I love about MapTap is that as I do it, over and over, I actually get better at world geography, which is worthwhile and enriching.

TimeGuessr

Look carefully: What's your best guess for where and when this photo was taken? TimeGuessr makes you a detective.

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In the same family as MapTap is TimeGuessr, where each day's challenge is made up of five puzzles that each start with a photo. Your task is to choose, on a timeline, what year the photo was taken, and to choose, on a map of the world, where it was taken. Sometimes, the photos are of historically meaningful events, like the aftermath of a battle or a natural disaster. Sometimes, they are photographs of ordinary people going about their lives.

The trick with TimeGuessr is detective work. Some hints are straightforward: a sign in the window of a store that might tip off the location (if you can figure out what language it's written in), a license plate, something along those lines. But sometimes, the clues are more subtle. What are the people in the photo wearing? What do the cars look like? How is everybody wearing their hair? It's a fascinating exercise in putting together clues, and again, you can actually increase your knowledge of the world while you play.

The Loop

Everything is connected (somehow) in The Loop, which is a perfect first-thing-when-you-wake-up game.

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The Loop is my favorite early-morning game, perfect for when I'm only partially awake. It offers you 12 simple illustrations that you have to arrange in a circle so that each illustration connects in some way to the ones on either side of it.

So, for instance, in one round I played, a square-root symbol connected on one side to a carpenter's square (because square/square), which then connected to a picture of a toolbox (because a carpenter's square is a tool). On the other side, the square-root symbol connected to a carrot (because it's a root vegetable), and then the carrot to an icicle (because they're the same shape). It can be fun to crack all the different ways that the images connect to each other, but the game design also offers so many chances to get it right that there's a huge amount of grace for making mistakes. That, of course, is why it's perfect for being half-awake.

Clues by Sam

It's up to you to figure out who's innocent and who's guilty in Clues by Sam.

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Clues by Sam is a logic puzzle. It presents you with a grid — four across and five down — of people, each represented by a name, an emoji and an occupation. Your job is to figure out which of those people are innocent and which are criminals. (There is no set number; there could be lots of criminals or only a couple.) Your opening clue might say, "Michael is one of three criminals in row 2." Then you click on Michael and mark him as a criminal, and when you're right, that gets you another clue, and so on.

Like most of these games, this one is enjoyable largely because it's simple, but its diabolical twist is that you can't guess. If you try to label Jane innocent, for instance, and she eventually will be, but the game hasn't given you enough information yet to actually know that, then that answer is wrong and is rejected. You are only allowed to deduce from the clues you have, because it is genuinely the journey and not the destination. Note that Clues by Sam gets harder each day from Monday through Sunday, so if you're a beginner, give it a whirl early in the week to get the hang of it.

Catfishing

Catfishing asks you to figure out the title of a Wikipedia page from its categories — which is harder than it sounds.

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Without a doubt, the hardest game I play regularly. In this game, you get a list of at least some of the categories that a particular Wikipedia page belongs to, and you have to try to figure out what page it is. There are ten questions; my average score is about four, and the highest I've ever gotten is eight.

For example, if you know a page is filed under "20th century musicians," and "21st century musicians," and "American folk musicians," and "people born in Minnesota," you might start to zero in on Bob Dylan. But be warned: Many of the answers are far more obscure than that, and it's very common for me to give up and reveal the answer, only to learn that I never stood a chance, because I've never heard of the person (or event, or phenomenon) at all. It doesn't matter how many ways you classify certain medieval rulers or political conflicts of 19th century Iowa; I may never get there.

This piece also appeared in NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour newsletter. Sign up for the newsletter so you don't miss the next one, plus get weekly recommendations about what's making us happy.

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