Topanga Canyon needs your business after Palisades Fire. A $1 bus ride can help you help them

The Topanga Beach Bus, which runs from the San Fernando Valley to Santa Monica and back, has resumed partial service after the Palisades Fire. The route is considered a lifeline for businesses that desperately need customers back in the canyon.

The roughly hour-long ride from start to finish costs $1. It takes you to the beaches through Topanga Canyon in the morning and back to the Valley in the early evening every day of the week.

L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, who represents areas along the route, told LAist that transportation has been a significant challenge since January’s fire.

Topanga Canyon “ relies on this route, and so reopening it, having a way to access the community has been something we've been working on relentlessly,” Horvath said.

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Why it matters to Topanga Canyon

Parts of Topanga Canyon Boulevard have been closed for fire recovery and repairs, but the town itself is still accessible.

A lot of infrastructure work is happening in the area, Horvath said, including around nine landslides that needed to be addressed and undergrounding work from SoCal Edison.

“We're working with Caltrans to get it as close to normal operations as we can,” she said. “It's really the capacity of the roadways that limits our access.”

Business owners have been struggling with a drop in customers since the boulevard washed out last year, and it’s only gotten worse after the fire.

Enrico Busto, owner of Busto and Sun Custom Hats, told LAist that business has been cut in half.

“Some are closing, or closed already,” he said. “So it's pretty hard to be here and, you know,  it's not sustainable for us not to be in communication with the rest of the town.”

Busto added that with parts of Pacific Coast Highway closed, they’ve also been losing out on tourists. He said while the community has had a lot of support, they need the road reopened as soon as possible.

Enrico Busto, owner of Busto and Sun Custom Hats in Topanga Canyon, hopes people will bring some "business and help our community ... thrive."

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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“ Topanga is one of the most magical places I have ever been — and I come from Italy,” Busto said. “ Come and bring us a little traffic, bring, you know, some business and help our community to, you know, go back and thrive.”

Paul Doolin, a tile artist at Topanga Art Tile across the street from the hat store, told LAist it’s been much quieter than it used to be. Doolin was interested in taking the Beach Bus to Santa Monica, but he’d like to see it run more than twice a day.

“ I think there should be a bus that goes through Topanga all times,” he said. “ A lot of commuters might use it instead of driving.”

How the ride works

The first stop on the Beach Bus is at Canoga Avenue and Rocketdyne Driveway, right outside Metro’s Canoga Orange Line Station.

Stand under the colorful Beach Bus sign, but it's hard to miss the even more colorful bus.

Stand under this sign to pick up the Topanga Beach Bus.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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It’s decorated with rainbows and a bright blue ocean, along with a graphic of Horvath and her dog, Winston.

“ It's very personal,” Horvath said. “It's fun and, you know, lets people know we're in their neighborhood.”

It can carry 22 people, but ridership has mostly been in the single digits since it reopened on April 21. The high was when 13 people took the bus about a week later, according to Horvath’s office.

The drive is beautiful and comfortable, albeit twisty. It can take about a half an hour to make it from the Valley to Topanga Canyon. From there, the bus continues on to the Metro E Line Santa Monica Station.

The partial service schedule means that rides are more than 8 hours apart. For example, it picks you up at Canoga around 9:30 a.m. and drops you off in the same spot a little before 6:30 p.m.

How to learn more about the beach bus

A view from inside the Topanga Beach Bus.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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You can find the schedule and stops here. It costs $1 for adults and children or 50 cents for people with disabilities and those over 60.

You can also call (818) 504-7270 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. for more information.

More frequent Beach Bus service is expected to resume when Topanga Canyon Boulevard and Pacific Coast Highway completely reopen.