LOS ANGELES AND subways seem an incongruous pair, but the tube does run in Tinseltown, making it easier than most would imagine to navigate the city without ever steering one's wheels onto a freeway.

And not only do Metro Rail's four lines – Red, Green, Blue, and Gold – hit the high points, calling at Hollywood, Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and Universal Studios, but also they arrive in style, thanks to L.A.'s ambitious Metro Art program, which sets aside 0.5 percent of construction costs for public art enhancements. The program has recast Metro Rail stations as repositories for a range of artworks – mobiles, mosaics, neon art, video art, murals, and station-wide installations – that greet riders above- and belowground, far from the maddening cars.

Ground broke on the L.A. subway in 1986, and stations have opened steadily since then, including last year's debut of the Gold Line to the San Gabriel Valley. Fares are cheap too: $1.35 gets riders to spots all around the greater L.A. basin, from North Hollywood to South Central, from Long Beach to Pasadena.

Traveling by Metro Rail is not without glitches, such as the lack of direct access to LAX (though there is a shuttle) and the glaring omission of service to the west side. A Fairfax District explosion in 1985 revealed methane and hydrogen sulfide gas pockets along the planned beach-bound route, leaving engineers scrambling to steer the line north into the San Fernando Valley – and no railway to Beverly Hills, Westwood, Santa Monica, or Venice Beach. Still, Metro Rail continues to expand, albeit aboveground, with the Orange Line busway through the Valley coming soon.

On a recent trip to Los Angeles, we used Metro Rail from our Hollywood Hills base camp at Highland Gardens Hotel – formerly the Hollywood Landmark, where Janis Joplin checked out in 1970 (from room 105; we had 224). Interested in the public art program, we gathered outside the Hollywood and Highland station with a dozen other participants for a free, docent-led Metro Art tour.

Abuzz at 10 a.m. with camera clickers, sidewalk stargazers, and freaks, Hollywood Boulevard showed an unglamorous reality that our docents, Clyde and Linda, quickly distanced us from by leading us into the station. There Sheila Klein's station-wide installation resembling a glamorous starlet provides a glimpse at what makes a movie set. We descended down her "upswirled hair" (the escalator), past a bank of seductively blinking eyes (projected by spotlights), to platforms framed by a delicately curved metal canopy evoking the belly of the beast (or diva). In a nod to the framework behind every set, the cement support walls and overhead wiring that give function to the elaborate form are left exposed.

Leaving the starlet behind, we grabbed the first train, clean and uncrowded, and rode to the epicenter, Hollywood and Vine, where artist Gilbert "Magu" Lujan has infused his playful aesthetic throughout the station, designed to call to mind an old-school Hollywood theater. Aboveground three sculptures – of a stretch limo, the Brown Derby restaurant, where deals got signed, and a premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theater – offer emblems of making it in moviedom. A series of yellow brick tiles (evoking Lujan's favorite film) leads down past cartoonish, hand-painted tiles depicting '50s-era L.A. car culture, through a plush, velvet burgundy entryway, and past doors bordered by golden filmstrips. Old film reels line the ceilings above a balcony, while two Paramount projectors stand dormant, silenced by budget cuts. Musical notes sound out "Hooray for Hollywood."

Metro Art captures the flavors and myths of the neighborhood surrounding each stop, providing insight into L.A.'s diversity and cultural geography. At the end of the line in North Hollywood, we saw an ode to when citrus ruled the San Fernando Valley: a series of murals recalling more fruitful days. At Universal City, in a series of dynamic, hand-painted, bilingual mosaics, Margaret Garcia's The Trees of Califus explores an untapped history of Los Angeles, the 1847 capitulation of Cahuenga, when Mexico relinquished control of California to the United States.

Back in Hollywood, the tour came to its conclusion, but with plenty more to see and our passes validated for the day, we boarded again. At Wilshire and Vermont, Peter Shire's mobiles of whimsical acrobats, Korean hats, and Mexican crafts floated overhead, greeting passengers descending the escalator. Robert Millar's existential Questions, subtly etched into the walls, gave riders hundreds of "whos" and "whats" to consider. At Vermont and Sunset, Michael Davis's sci-fi motif echoed nearby Griffith Observatory and the campy space flicks of the 1950s.

And then the day was over, and we were whisking back toward Hollywood in a half-empty subway car. The L.A. heat had not yet subsided, inspiring westward visions of the coast. We wouldn't be getting there via the rails, it seemed, and we ended our tour wondering what Metro Art would have brought to the west side had it not been for that pesky methane gas.

If you go

Metro Art tours Free docent-led tours are offered the first weekend of each month, leaving Sat., 10 a.m., from Hollywood and Highland and Sun., 10 a.m., from Union Station. (213) 922-2738, www.metro.net.

Eats on the line In Thai Town a Thai Elvis impersonator enlivens Palms (5273 Hollywood Blvd., 323-462-5073) and a food court at the Thailand Plaza (5321 Hollywood Blvd., 323-993-9000) offers the works. Get off at Hollywood and Western. Wolfgang Puck's Vert (6801 Hollywood Blvd., 323-491-1300) serves fresh Mediterranean food. Get off at Hollywood and Highland. At Langer's Deli (704 S. Alvarado, 213-483-8050) you can't go wrong with the pastrami. Get off at Westlake and MacArthur Park.