<p>Metro</a> 101 - Entertainment</p>
<p>Who says you need a car to get places in Houston...</p>
<p>[Light</a> Rail / METRO](<a href=“http://www.houstontx.gov/abouthouston/exploringlightrail.html]Light”>http://www.houstontx.gov/abouthouston/exploringlightrail.html)</p>
<p>eh…honestly i think the light rail is pretty limited</p>
<p>Conversation between my son and a Rice student during Owl Days:</p>
<p>DS: The light rail only has one line, right?
Rice Student: No, there’s a northbound line and a southbound line.</p>
<p>Pretty limited, demonsword – I can’t say. My son and his friends have been using their Q-cards (free access to the Metro) to attend basketball games and other events since freshman year. Only a handful of his friends have cars at school, so the Metro has been their key to Houston. It seems to be a good solution for getting from campus to where they want to go.</p>
<p>I think it’s a very good idea to travel with friends when you’re exploring unfamiliar places – and if possible, with someone who knows the terrain.</p>
<p>Northbound and southbound – that’s right!</p>
<p>Yes, it’s limited, but considering it’s free for Rice students, it’s better than nothing. My daughter has used it many times to get downtown, for performances and restaurants, to get to Fiesta Market (mentioned in that Thresher article), and she’s used the free bus access to get to doctor’s appointments. She has friends who’ve used the light rail and then a bus to get to Hobby airport, which she might also try sometime. Not bad for free!</p>
<p>I’m not complaining at all, I’m just saying that it isn’t very extensive (buses do go a lot more places though.)</p>
<p>The light rail is pretty limited, true, but there are still quite a few places you can get to pretty easily with just a short walk from the rail line. Too bad the Angelika has (apparently) closed, though, because the theater district was really convenient from the train.</p>
<p>The Theatre distric is still there… The Alley Theatre, Symphony, Verizon Theatre and the Hobby Center (Broadway across America) are still there.</p>
<p>Way more interesting to me personally 
but the Angelika closing is quite sad. </p>
<p>The Rail is limited in many ways, but does help what could have been a really bad situation, being trapped on campus. This way you can get around fairly easily to some places, at least.</p>
<p>And bird rock - Maybe that rice student was the one I saw, who walked into a pole while reading his bioC textbook… :D</p>
<p>This is all true, but seeing a movie at the Angelika is usually a lot cheaper than attending a musical, a symphony, or most other things in the theater district.</p>
<p>Alley theatre tickets are 13 USD per person for students. But yeah, in general, everything else is significantly more expensive.</p>
<p>I like that you specify USD, just in case anyone was planning to pay in yen or something.</p>
<p>habit? dunno. </p>
<p>Ive made the mistake of leaving out the symbol before and someone thought it was CHF instead of USD.</p>
<p>I also forget to put the $ sign in the beginning. so USD at the end works as well :P</p>
<p>Other downtown events are more expensive…unless you manage to get free symphony, dance, etc. tickets on campus. I think my daughter has also managed to get cheap symphony tickets when the free ones weren’t available.</p>
<p>as Berkeley mom said, sometimes the cultural reps at colleges have discounted (often heavily) or free tickets. RPC also discounts tickets. Wicked was available for super cheap on campus. In this case its a first come first serve, so jump on them.</p>
<p>Id recommend looking around the downtown venues. Sometimes they have student packages or group discounts. </p>
<p>In my case, a movie is not as exciting as I can watch nit in my room with friends. And pause it / use my laptop. A live show though is unique to each an every audience :)</p>