Between the Port of San Diego Big Bay Balloon Parade and the Holiday Bowl, Metropolitan Transit Services expects increased trolley usage Thursday.

Friends of a San Diego college instructor who was stabbed to death in Tijuana Dec. 18 say his body was flown back to the Philippines on Wednesday for burial.

Looking back at the year in arts, it's been one wild ride here in San Diego. It was a year of exciting growth, national acclaim, a centennial celebration, new faces and some controversy. Here's the Culture Lust report on the year in San Diego's arts and culture scene.

San Diegans who traditionally rely on the free 24-hour trolley service provided by MTS on New Year's Eve may have to cut their festivities short this year.

A new state law that takes effect on January 1 will increase the penalties for paparazzi who recklessly chase after celebrities in traffic.

Night Court sessions in San Diego's Central Traffic Division are about to be reduced to one night per week, and reservations will be required, court officials announced today.

The 20th annual Big Balloon Parade will float through San Diego's Harbor Drive Thursday morning. Up to 100,000 people are expected to line the parade route.

Kaiser Permanente San Diego announced today two donations of $45,000 each to help local food charities hand out fruits and vegetables.

A new law passed this year bans children’s jewelry made with cadmium -- a toxic metal. Yet, the law doesn’t take effect until the start of 2012 -- meaning for the next year parents have to evaluate the safety of the jewelry on their own.

A Mega Millions lottery ticket sold in San Marcos was worth nearly $600,000 today, lottery officials said.

A spill of roughly 180,000 gallons of sewage in an Oceanside neighborhood fouled a stretch of ocean shoreline several miles away Tuesday, authorities reported.

More blustery, wet winter weather drenched the already saturated San Diego area today, ushering in a messy morning commute and forcing a few road closures but causing no immediate serious problems.

San Diego CityBeat staff writer Dave Maass moonlights as a fiction writer. A new chapbook of his short stories has been published electronically.

KPBS Health Reporter Kenny Goldberg traveled around the world to cover the top health-related stories of 2010. Goldberg joins us to recap some of the biggest stories he's worked on over the last year. What impact is the federal health care reform bill having in San Diego? How might a new vaginal microbicide gel play a significant role in the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa? And, why did a team of local doctors perform brain surgery on a patient that was awake during part of the procedure?

Friends and family today were mourning a popular San Diego-area professor who was reportedly stabbed to death at his Tijuana apartment. Henry Abalayan Acejo, 45, was found dead of numerous stab wounds in the Rio Zone shortly after 11 p.m. Dec. 18, Mexican authorities announced Tuesday.

This year, for the first time, schools from China took part in international standardized tests, which provide an interesting if imperfect picture of which countries' students are doing best in reading, writing and math.