BART

🚆🏀 Friday, Feb. 14, marks the start of the 2025 NBA All-Star Weekend, hosted by the Golden State Warriors. BART looks forward to carrying fans to the games and events happening on both sides of the Bay. We’re also proud to partner with the NBA Players Association for the big weekend. Chase Center will host these events: • Friday, Feb. 14, 6pm: Castrol Rising Stars • Saturday, Feb. 15, 5pm: State Farm All-Star Saturday Night • Sunday, Feb. 16, 5pm: 74th NBA All-Star Game BART takes you directly to the Oakland Arena for these events: • Friday, Feb. 14, 4pm: Ruffles NBA All-Star Celebrity Game • Saturday, Feb. 15, 11am: NBA All-Star Practice presented by AT&T • Saturday, Feb. 15, 2pm: NBA HBCU Classic presented by AT&T Take BART to Montgomery Station and walk a short distance to Moscone Center for these events: • Friday, Feb. 14, to Sunday, Feb. 16: NBA Crossover interactive fan experience • Sunday, Feb. 16: NBA G League Next Up Game Take transit to the NBA All-Star Concert Series at Pier 48! The NBA will host a three-day concert series from Friday, Feb. 14, through Sunday, Feb. 16, at Pier 48. Headliners include Noah Kahan, The Chainsmokers, Zedd, and Flo Rida. The National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) will bring their Brotherhood Deli food truck along with activations and programming to SPARK Social SF from Friday, Feb. 14, through Sunday, Feb. 16, 11am to 6pm. It’s a short walk from SPARK Social to Chase Center. Those looking to win free tickets and other prizes can download the NBA Events app, which has partnered with BART and other Bay Area agencies to encourage riding transit around the Bay. After creating a free NBA ID account, visit the participating stations (see below), tap the tile on the dashboard corresponding with the station, and earn your check-in via your mobile device in mixed reality. Each check-in will also count towards unlocking NBA All-Star prizes through the NBA ID All-Star Rewards Program. Participating stations: 16th St./Mission Station Coliseum Station Embarcadero Station Lake Merritt Station Powell St. Station The Grand BART Prize will be in the form of digital Railgoods.com gift cards in amounts ranging from $10 to $100. Find more info here: https://lnkd.in/gEayyQp6

Update: We are overjoyed by the enthusiasm for this event. We sold out all 200 spots in less than 12 hours! 💟🚆 This Valentine’s Day, hop on the Valentraine and ride your way to love or friendship. On the evening of Friday, Feb. 14, BART invites adults ages 18 to 35 to join us for an on-the-rails mixer aboard a moving BART train. Ride BART into someone’s heart on a special train reserved just for this event! It’s time to get off the apps and get on Trainder. This is speed dating – literally. We’ll help grease the wheels with icebreaker activities, conversation starters, a raffle, and BART-themed Valentines that you can give to potential connections. Adults of all sexual orientations are welcome as are those looking to make friends rather than find romance. We will have name tags with a space to write in what you are looking for. Participants must be ages 18 to 35 (we’ll explore hosting a similar event for those 35+ in the future). When: Friday, Feb. 14, 6:45pm to approx. 8:35pm Where: Start at Downtown Berkeley Station and ride to 24th St./Mission before returning to Downtown Berkeley. The train will not stop for the duration of the ride. Who: Adults ages 18 to 35 of all sexual orientations looking for love and/or friendship RSVP Required: https://lnkd.in/gRz7hE6A BART is experimenting with hosting events on trains such as this speed dating/friend making mixer as a way to engage our community, spur connections, and encourage riding BART. We’ve heard so many stories of people meeting partners and friends onboard. We hope this event will generate even more stories! Find links to a selection of these articles here: https://lnkd.in/gdtJ5ij5 Here’s how things will go: Arrive at Downtown Berkeley Station no later than 6:45pm for check-in. Late arrivals will not be allowed onboard. We will meet inside the station on the concourse level under the rotunda. Look for BART staff with signage. Depart Downtown Berkeley at 7:10pm. We’ll ride the Red Line to 24th St./Mission, where the train will turn around and head back to Downtown Berkeley. The train will not make stops for the duration of the ride. Arrive at Downtown Berkeley Station at approx. 8:35pm. There will be additional staff and safety presence on each train car. BART has a zero-tolerance policy for sexual and gender-based harassment, consuming alcoholic beverages and illicit substances, and engaging in disruptive/disturbing behavior in our trains and stations.

News: Crime on BART drops 17% compared with last year The BART Police Department’s continued focus on boosting its visible presence in the system appears to be having an impact for both rider and front-line safety. The end-of-the-year Chief’s Report shows overall crime on BART in 2024 was down 17% from the previous year and violent crime was down 11% over that same period. The substantial drop in crime happened even as BART served 2.6 million more trips than it carried in 2023. Additional highlights from the latest Chief’s Report include: *The total number of property crimes on BART fell by 536 incidents compared with 2023. *There were 229 fewer auto thefts, a 34% drop. *BART PD’s response time to Tier 1 emergencies in December was 3 minutes and 56 seconds, among the fastest for any law enforcement agency in the Bay Area. BART PD is using both sworn officers as well as non-sworn, unarmed Crisis Intervention Specialists, Transit Ambassadors, Fare Inspectors, and Community Service Officers to maximize its visible presence in the system. Their efforts are being bolstered by the installation of Next Generation Fare Gates, which are already in place at 16 stations across the system. The taller and more resilient gates are improving the station environment and deterring fare evasion. BART plans to install new gates at all 50 of its stations by the end of this year. Last year was also BART PD’s strongest recruitment year since the pandemic. The officer vacancy total has fallen to 16 and the department is continuing its aggressive recruitment campaign by highlighting its $15,000 hiring bonus for officers and dispatchers as well as the unique career opportunities only BART PD can offer.

San Francisco’s annual Chinese New Year Parade will take place on Saturday, February 15, starting at 5:15pm. 2025 is the Year of the Snake, which represents wisdom, intuition, and transformation! For the first time ever, the parade will close out with a choreographed drone light that will illuminate the sky over the Embarcadero at approx. 8pm. The Chinese New Year Parade is the largest illuminated night parade in the country, and thousands of people will gather along Market Street to celebrate. Transit is the best way to get there. Montgomery Station is the closest BART station to the start of the parade, at Market and 2nd streets. Embarcadero and Powell St. stations are also close to the parade route. Follow the rider guide above for reference. The BARTmobile will be zooming along the parade route along with a cohort of BART staff and their families, who will be wearing BART's 2025 Lunar New Year shirt. The shirts are available for purchase in adult, youth, and toddler sizes on Railgoods.com, as well as special BARTy x Year of the Snake stickers. If you are planning to visit Chinatown to celebrate the new year, take BART to Powell St. Station, transfer to the Muni T Third, and ride one stop to Chinatown-Rose Pak Station. Muni will be free on February 15.

The BART Bicycle Advisory Task Force (BBATF) is recruiting new members, with seats open for individuals who live or work in Alameda, San Francisco, Contra Costa, San Mateo or Santa Clara counties. The mission of the BBATF is to advise BART staff and the BART Board of Directors on ways to maintain and improve the convenience, accessibility, safety, and security of the BART system for all bicyclists and their bicycles. More information about the purpose of the Task Force and how to join can be found here: https://lnkd.in/ggPuR3Eu The Bicycle Task Force meets the first Monday of even numbered months via Zoom; the next meeting is Feb. 3 at 6:00 p.m. Attend this meeting if you’re interested in joining the task force, or email questions to Heath Maddox at hmaddox@bart.gov!

Regular train speeds have returned to the Oakland core service area! BART riders will benefit from faster train speeds through the downtown Oakland core service area following the repair of an essential power substation. This summer, the substation located near 19th Street Station failed after experiencing a fault, requiring BART to realign power distributions from nearby redundant substations while repairs were being made. This configuration required BART to run trains at slower speeds in the track areas approaching MacArthur, 19th Street, and 12th Street stations. Trains were also metered into these stations, causing frequent but short train holds. This service plan caused delays of about three minutes, but those delays could compound when other incidents occurred in the system. Crews have been diligently working to get the substation back to full operations, and late last week, the substation was successfully brought online. Over the weekend, normal speeds were restored. Trains no longer need to run at 27 mph through the area and are now travelling up to 70 mph. 2025 will be an important year for fortifying and expanding BART’s power substations. Another substation located east of the Transbay Tube is being fully renovated, and two new power substations located near Civic Center and Montgomery stations will also be coming online this year. This work plays a key role in ensuring that BART’s power system infrastructure is robust, reliable, and ready for the future.

HO Scale models of BART’s Legacy Fleet trains are now for sale at Railgoods.com! Head to the site to get yours now: https://lnkd.in/gMdAYwpQ We teamed up with @rapidotrainsinc to create these based on original blueprints, design drawings, and field measurements. Big shout out to the good folks at @gsmrm for inviting us over to see some of these model trains in action. Give them a follow and check out their amazing museum. A Car, B Car, C Car, and 4 car Train Sets (A-B-B-A) are available. See Railgoods for product details. Due to limited inventory, purchases are limited to one of each car type per customer. We recommend selecting “In-Store Pickup” at checkout to receive your product in person at the Lake Merritt BART station Customer Service Center and save on shipping. If you choose USPS delivery, a signature will be required upon delivery.

Enzo Wu is a BART speedrun world recordholder. He’s also a San Ramon teenager working to “spread the gospel of transit.” “A lot of people I know haven’t actually gone out and tried transit, and they form their opinions about it from family or social media,” Wu said. His longstanding question: How can you know you don’t want to ride transit if you’ve never actually ridden it? Wu believes public transportation is an important tool for people his age. You don’t have to have a license, and you don’t have to beg your parents to drop you off and pick you up. You can just go when you want to, where you want to (with your parents’ permission, of course). Wu has been working to get his friends to take transit by inviting them to take BART to an unexplored location. “People my age don’t go out and do stuff in public enough,” he said. “They’re not getting out there and interacting with new people offline." Transit is his foolproof balm for boredom. It’s also provided him with plentiful opportunities to practice independence and social skills. “Going out in public, riding the train, these are activities that build social confidence, which so many kids lack these days,” said Wu. “Knowing how to take a train or a bus or a ferry is a big step in growing up.” Some of his friends have never done anything alone, let alone take the train to San Francisco, he added. “We’ll go to a restaurant, and they’ll get stressed because they don’t know how to pay the bill,” he said. “It’s kind of shocking. They lack social skills. But I think transit can bridge that gap. Some of my friends won’t necessarily take transit everywhere like I do, but just getting the idea in their heads is a big step.” Only two years ago, Wu himself had almost no experience on transit. It was his mom who inadvertently gave him the bug when she signed him up for 511 Contra Costa's Pass2Class, a program that gives students free bus rides to school. When Wu’s mom first gave him the card he replied: “You want me to take the bus??? Ewwwwww.” “Enzo, just try it,” she said. You know what happened next. Wu has many “transit conversion” success stories to share. Once he gets a friend onboard it’s not uncommon for the transit ingenue to become transit oriented. He believes he’s “converted” at least a dozen friends directly and dozens more indirectly, thanks to people who watch his speedrun videos and livestreams. “Building transit skills now will come in handy many years down the line when you need to get to college, to work,” he said. “That’s why I ride transit, and that’s why I’m advocating for kids my age to do the same.” Read Enzo's story here: https://lnkd.in/gNxA6cpJ BART offers a 50% fare discount for youth ages five to 18 years old with a Youth Clipper card. Children four years old and younger ride free. Learn more about Youth Clipper cards and other fare discounts here: https://lnkd.in/gBxPbcUa

Transit’s response to this morning’s Highway 4 fatal car crash that blocked our tracks in both directions was a shining example of regional coordination. Tri Delta Transit and County Connection deployed extra buses to serve East Contra Costa County riders, connecting them to North Concord BART to get them to work, school, and appointments. BART crews quickly repaired the damaged third rail coverboard and barrier fencing and we resumed normal service by 7:35am.

BART’s Legacy Trains are running once again! We teamed up with Rapido Trains Inc. to create the definitive, museum-quality model of BART’s iconic Legacy Fleet! These HO scale train models are a must-have for any Bay Area model railroader, BART enthusiast, or transit fanatic. Extra inventory will be made available for sale on railgoods.com next week. Several customers picked up their models last week and preorders are being shipped this week. Stay tuned for more info.