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Photos: Riders Expose Their Butt Cheeks At The No Pants Metro Ride
Every year, on a weekend in January, there's an international day for taking off your pants and riding the subway. This Sunday, bottomless passengers crammed Union Station for the annual No Pants Metro Ride.
The No Pants Subway Ride has been going on in NYC for over a decade with Improv Everywhere, and this weekend was Los Angeles' seventh annual event. L.A.'s event comes courtesy of improv group GuerilLA, who are responsible for things like impromptu housewarming parties at IKEA and protests with signs that say, "Things Are Generally Pretty Good!" Improvers with GuerilLA are called 'agents,' and each agent reads a top-secret dossier of mission objectives before participating. Or, in this case, taking off their pants and meeting up at their local Metro station.
Yesterday, agents met up at five different Metro stations around Los Angeles. We followed the group that met up at Wilshire/Western in Koreatown. Here, most Metro riders outside of the group seemed mostly unfazed when 20 people or so all took their pants off and boarded the train. This is Los Angeles, after all.
Now, your average pantsless rider looks like he or she is on their way to work but simply forgot to put on pants, though some really go all out on the costumes. Our favorites included a Stormtrooper whose underpants said, 'that's no moon,' and the Monopoly man.
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Once we arrived at Union Station, there were so many agents that it was impossible for your standard commuter to ignore. The beautiful art deco station was full of bare legs and flashes of butt cheek. There was a lot of pointing, laughing and questioning. The agents has previously been told that if anyone asked what happened to their pants, the answer was always, "I forgot them." So, we passed numerous groups of agents saying, "We forgot them!" to curious commuters.
We followed a large group of agents to Traxx, which soon became swamped with bottomless passengers seeking a little liquid courage to prepare them for the next stop. Forty minutes and one cocktail later, it was time for everyone to board the Red Line to Hollywood.
This time, every train car was packed with exposed flesh. We'd been told that agents were supposed to act as though nothing was out of place. Some agents were great at this, popping in earbuds and staring blankly ahead. Other agents, not so much. They jumped from car to car and engaged in chants—"take them off, take them off!"—to recruit more passengers to their mission. These agents would later be admonished at the official debriefing.
Once the train stopped at Hollywood and Highland, the agents met up in a corner of the station and were encouraged to go to Loaded for a boozy after-party, or to Pig & Whistle for a 'family-friendly' after-party. We followed a group of agents down Hollywood Blvd. to Loaded. One of the door guys at a club we passed tried to convince the group to stop by, saying, "We've got bottomless mimosas!" A guy who was already drunk at 2:30 p.m. also tried a to lure them over: "Hey, uh, nice...nice butt cheeks!" Neither attempt worked, but at least one was clever.
Once we got to Loaded, it was your standard afternoon no-pants party with two-for-one cocktails and a handful of rock bands. So, you know, Hollywood. All in all, it wasn't nearly as nude as the annual Naked Bike Ride, and everyone seemed to be having a great time. Notably, many of the agents indicated it was their first time on the Metro. If taking your pants off is what it takes to educate more Angelenos about our local public transit system, we're all for it. (It was also much warmer than New York's, where riders had to twerk for warmth.)
Photos: Riders Strip Down For No Pants Metro Ride 2014
Photos: The No Pants Subway Ride Was a Bare Affair 2013
Gallery: Subway Riders Strip Down to Their Skivvies on No Pants Day 2012
They Came, They Rode, They Wore No Pants (2011)
On the Subway in Their Skivvies: No Pants Day 2010
LA Strips Down For 'No Pants Day 2k9'
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