How to take public transit to see Taylor Swift at SoFi Stadium

A woman performs on a stage before a packed stadium.

By Jon HealeySenior Editor, Utility Journalism Team

July 31, 2023 Updated 1:36 PM PT

Driving to one of Taylor Swift’s shows at SoFi Stadium could be migraine-inducing, with Sepulveda Pass-level traffic jams and parking spaces selling for far more than the thrift-store dress you bought to celebrate Swift’s “Evermore” era.

So to cling to at least a shred of your humanity, you might decide to take mass transit to the show. It’s by far the least expensive and most environmentally friendly way to travel to the stadium in Inglewood from your home, hotel or short-term rental.

You’ll still need plenty of patience while pining in anticipation of the show — and again when you’re trying to go back home.

The central issue here is the mismatch between the number of Swift fans who will be at SoFi and the number of people who can fit onto a bus or train car. With roughly 70,000 people arriving and departing the stadium within a few hours each day — and all of it funneled to a handful of train and bus lines — you can expect to find far more people trying to catch a ride than the light rail cars, shuttles and buses can carry.

So give yourself extra time in case you can’t fit into the first train or bus that pulls up.

How to get to SoFi via L.A. Metro

At $1.75 per ride, Metro’s prices are hard to beat. Even better, Metro is offering a free shuttle bus from its two closest stations — Hawthorne/Lennox on the C (formerly Green) line and Downtown Inglewood on the K (formerly Crenshaw) line. The buses will run from 3:30 to 6:30 p.m. before the show and for 90 minutes afterward.

And to accommodate Swifties, Metro is running trains later into the evening — as late as 2 a.m.

One other option with extended service hours: Metro’s 117 bus, which runs east-west between Century Boulevard near LAX and Downey, will also continue offering rides for about 90 minutes after the show. The stop at West Century Boulevard and Yukon Avenue is a little more than half a mile from SoFi.

Now for the caveats.

You can get to these stations from almost anywhere in L.A. County, but it is likely to involve one or more (free) transfers from a different Metro bus or rail line. The C line connects directly to the north-south A (formerly Blue) line, which runs from Azusa to Long Beach; the K link links to the east-west E (formerly Expo) line, which runs from Santa Monica to East L.A.

That means the trip will almost certainly take longer than driving to SoFi would on the typical travel day. To find the right bus or train routes and transfer points, as well as the best times to start your trip, Metro suggests consulting Google Maps, Apple Maps, the Transit or Moovit apps or Metro.net.

Meanwhile, the shuttles to and from SoFi are buses, not ocean liners — each one handles a few dozen people, not a few hundred. So that’s probably going to be a bottleneck on your trip to and fro. By the way, it’s about a 40-minute walk from either of the closest train stations to the stadium.

But chances are good that you don’t live within easy walking distance of a Metro train station or a stop on the 117 bus route. So if you’re going car-free, you may need to take a bus to the bus or the train, using Google Maps or one of the other sites above to find the right routes.

But here’s the really important cautionary note: Make sure to check the schedule for the bus you use to connect to Metro, because it might be out of service by the time Swift walks away from the mic stand for the last time that evening.

Otherwise, you could use a ride-hailing service to get to the train or the bus, or you could drive and park. Many Metro train stations have parking, and some don’t charge for it; Metro has a helpful web page devoted to parking near its stations.

Other ways to leave your car at home

You can hire a car service, a taxi or a ride-hailing driver to drop you off and pick you up near SoFi; the city of Inglewood is reserving Kareem Court near the stadium for post-concert pickups.

If you’re trying to avoid cars but a public train or bus line doesn’t work for you, another option is Rally, a “bus rideshare” start-up that’s offering rides to and from SoFi on chartered buses. The service listed 105 pickup and drop-off points on Monday, mainly in and around Los Angeles County but also in San Diego and Santa Barbara.

The rides cost considerably more than a Metro bus trip — it’s $80 for a round-trip booking from many points in and around Los Angeles, although the fee is higher in some spots. But the buses take you into the stadium’s parking lot, where they wait for you until the show’s over.

More important, the company says the rides are not guaranteed until about two dozen riders buy tickets for that pickup point. The site will tell you before you make a reservation whether the route you’re interested in has been confirmed.

Rally Chief Executive Numaan Akram said the company’s service relies on crowd-sharing, counting on riders to spread the word about the service and recruit more passengers. If a pickup point hasn’t drawn enough riders by three days before the event, he said, Rally will cancel the route.

Rally is carving out a niche serving big events, including NASCAR races and NFL games in addition to Swift’s Eras tour, Akram said. “We’ve moved tens of thousands of Taylor Swift fans,” he said, adding, “We’re doing every single city because the Swifties really love it, and they keep sharing.”

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