Speed: Filming Locations

Speed: Filming Locations - part 3

PART 3

Actual Southern California locations where 1994's "Speed" was filmed.

With the bus driver shot and Sandra now behind the wheel, the bus (that can't slow down
below 50 MPH) finds itself heading towards a traffic jam on the freeway. Keanu tells Sandra
to pull off the freeway on the next offramp, and she does - at 50 MPH - smashing signs and
cars as the bus barrels down the shoulder of the offramp.

At first glance, this appears to be an easy location to identify. There are street signs everywhere
that read "Western Avenue". And since the bus is supposed to be headed east on the
Santa Monica Freeway, Western Ave would seem to make sense. But look closer...

As the bus careens down the offramp, the first thing we see is a Hilton Hotel. Then we see a
building with the words "Molina Medical Center". Neither are to be found on Western Ave.

In fact, we're not even in L.A. any more! When Sandra pulls that bus off the freeway, the camera suddenly
jumps 15 miles away to Long Beach. Yes, Long Beach!

That's the Long Beach Hilton we see at the base of the "offramp". It's address is 701 W. Ocean Blvd.
And the address of that Molina Medical Center is 1 Golden Shore St., in Long Beach.

Worse, what we're really looking at isn't even really a freeway offramp!

If you're heading west on Shoreline Drive in Long Beach, you will end up on the north-bound
Long Beach (710) Freeway. But just before you go onto the freeway, they give you an
opportunity to instead pull off on a circular ramp that leads back around to Ocean Blvd,
(Long Beach's main coastal route). That is the ramp that they used as the "Western Avenue"
freeway exit. What you are really looking at is this Shoreline Drive exit to Ocean Blvd.
The offramp is located where Ocean Blvd meets Golden Shore Street, just east of where
Ocean Blvd hits the Los Angeles River, near the south end of Long Beach (710) Freeway.

The bus survives the offramp, and as it heads off on "Western", a garbage truck backs
into the path of the bus, forcing Sandra to swerve around it into the left, oncoming lanes.

This scene was shot in Long Beach, with the bus heading east on Ocean Blvd. The
swerve appears to happen just west of the intersection of Ocean & Long Beach Blvd.

The camera is looking east in the photo above, and the tall building you can see in
the distance (in the upper right corner) is the Villa Riviera, a Long Beach landmark,
located at the southeast corner of Ocean Blvd and Shoreline Drive, in Long Beach.

Sandra successfully avoids hitting the bus, and continues driving - still on the wrong side of the street.
The stacked / tiered building you see behind the bus in the photo below is located at the northeast
corner of Ocean Blvd and Long Beach Blvd. (The camera is looking north,
and the bus is traveling east on Ocean.)

When Sandra finally manages to swerve back into the right lane, she does it at the
intersection of Ocean Blvd & Linden Avenue. (the camera is looking northwest.)

One of the most dramatic moments in the film comes when a woman pushing a baby carriage
steps out in front of the oncoming bus, and Sandra is unable to stop. The bus smashes into
the carriage, sending it flying - but it turns out that the carriage was just full of empty cans.

Now a few seconds ago, we were in Long Beach. Hold on tight, because the movie
once again suddenly leaps miles away (30 miles this time) for this next scene .

The woman pushing the baby carriage steps off the curb at the southwest corner of
Pico Blvd and West Blvd, in south central Los Angeles. The bus is heading west on Pico,
and the woman is walking south, across Pico, when her carriage is struck. *

In the photo above, the camera is looking west down Pico Blvd, just before West Blvd.

In the photo below, the camera is looking back east on Pico. But once again, the producers
fooled the audience. The second ("after") shot was actually filmed several blocks to
the east of the first carriage shot, even though the bus is traveling west.

* Locations marked by an asterisk (*) may be located in high-crime areas.
Exercise reasonable caution.

More Speed locations!

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Most of photos on this page are stills from the DVD of "Speed"
(which you can buy by clicking here) and are copyright 20th Century Fox.