You're right, the original LA&I line went east of USC to Main, then turned north into "downtown". Later, when it was standard gauged, it connected at Alameda and 25th Street and steam trains ran up Alameda to the "River" Station, and later to the new Arcade location between 4th and 5th street. The line also served as SP's branch to Santa Monica "Harbor", going through what is the alignment of today's McClure tunnel on the I-10 to get down to the Beach and an enormous pier, that was, for a time, the rival of today's Ports of LA-LB.

When the PE took over, line was connected to the Long Beach line where they crossed at Amoco Junction which connected both lines to the PE Butte Street freight yard.

Today Expo turns up Flower, behind the Basketball Arena, at USC today, but the portion of the Expo opening May 20th is all part of the original LA&I ROW.....

I used to run on this line out of both Culver City and later out of J-Yard (formerly Butte Street on the "PE" side"). It was an "SP" job, that covered mostly former PE territory, and had a regular firemans job (back in the days...) out of Culver City that covered the SM Branch, the Culver City line, down to Inglewood and over to Venice (on PE lines acquired from the ATSF...)behind McCabes, and over the French Fry plant with carloads of spuds. Then up Sepulveda to SM Blvd. all the way to the Blue Whale, with a stop to switch Wonder Bread in Beverly Hills. On long nights we'd go to beans in Marina Del Rey, where Lee Thompson, the regular engineer, had his live aboard boat.....

When I first worked this, the Palms Depot was still next to the Santa Monica Freeway....and Jay Bell would bump me off it all of the time. Until one night when Jay got to Culver City early and was in a hurry to get the engine ready for an early "quit" night, and is "purported" to have run over the derail on the Helms spur. He claimed that someone must have released the hand brake and it could have rolled out, they put it back on the track and let off the brake, it rolled the other way....... and Jay bid off.

There's something I know.....?