We may be experiencing a new uptick of Muni Metro troubles and delays — something that has been written about extensively on SFist over the years but which had become a bit less of a daily occurrence in, say, the last two or three. Let's just say it has become less frequent of a phenomenon that the entire underground system has a meltdown during the morning or evening commute that rises to the level of breaking news. But this morning there have been heavy delays on the inbound lines ferrying commuters from the central and western neighborhoods to their downtown jobs — including a breakdown on the L-Taraval at Forest Hill due to a train with door problems, and general congestion reported between Van Ness and Embarcadero — and a quick scan through the SFMTA's Twitter account shows that such delays have been very common in recent days and weeks. (But if you've been trying to get from West Portal to Embarcadero on the regular, or home during the evening rush hour, you already know this.)

Last Tuesday there was a systemwide meltdown the likes of which seemed to happen on a weekly basis back in 2011/2012 in which trains had to be operated manually through tunnels and thereby caused major delays for commuters.

Then on Friday there was a catastrophic delay in the middle of the morning commute that was not the fault of a Muni train, but was the fault of a bomb threat at Civic Center Station that caused both Muni and BART trains to have to stop running through the station for over an hour.

SFist has reached out to the SFMTA for confirmation on whether there has been a considerable uptick in delays do to mechanical or computer failures, and we'll update you if we hear back.

Three years ago, former Supervisor Scott Wiener attempted to address Muni's problems by proposing that their funding be tied to population growth, as SF's recent population boom had been having some impact on commuter congestion. That became Proposition B which was approved by voters in November 14. And now that Wiener is in the state senate and no longer has to commute from the Castro to Civic Center anymore, this may no longer be one of his pet peeves.

Now we may have to wait for the new Muni Metro fleet to begin entering service — a few new Siemens light-rail vehicles, which won't fully replace the current Breda fleet until 2028, will begin showing up in the tunnels sometime this year. The new trains are said to be able to travel 59,000 miles between failures, while our current fleet tend to only make it 4,000 to 5,000 miles between failures, on average.

Related: Check Out The New Muni Trains That Will Begin Showing Up Next Year