Results tagged “bart”

Due to the Bay Bridge being closed over the weekend, BART will run on a 24-hour schedule for Friday and Saturday. According to BART.gov:

Yesterday, we gave you free hot dogs. Today, we bring your free chocolate. Dark chocolate. Milk chocolate too, hopefully. (Whatever, we still love us some milk chocolate. With caramel. And nougat.) Anyway, Mission Mission reports that "volunteers from the Bay Area Fair Trade Coalition and TransFair USA will be handing out free Divine Chocolate Thursday evening from 5-7 p.m. outside of four BART stations: 24th & Mission, Montgomery, Rockridge and Ashby Street."

Speaking of BART, if you have a BART ticket, TransLink or Transbay pass, you can score a free hot dog today. Zog's, located at the tip of Market and Post, is offering free hot beef injections today in order to ease your nightmareish BART commute.

Another thing regarding today's Bay Bridge closure: please send us you images of your packed BART rides. We imagine today's commute will be hellish, and we'd hate for the world not to see. So, if you can, please snap a few shots of riders complaining about overcrowding your BART ride today.

Via E.K.: "Dear BART a-holes: When you see a sweaty pregnant woman on a crowded train checking her bloodsugar while trying to balance her bags, standing up, it would be polite to offer her your seat."

We just came across this amusing post via The Muni Diaries' counterpart in commute-blogging, The BART Diaries. Apparently this blogger *really* hates Muni, and here are her highly generalized observations as to how Muni riders have fewer manners than BART riders. She has seen/heard Muni riders:

Will you become mayor of BART? Now it's possible with BART becoming the first major transit agency to partner with Foursquare, the social media thingy where you check-in at certain locales to gain points and bragging rights.

Declaring that he couldn't get a fair trial because of public outrage and we-are-all-Oscar-Grant fetishism, Judge Morris Jacobson ruled that Officer Johannes Mehserle, the BART cop accused of murdering Oscar Grant on New Year's Day, will get to have his trial moved out of Alameda County. In a court order, Jacobson wrote, "This case ... presents a grouping of factors that foreclose any real hope of insulating jurors from the pressure of the public outrage in Alameda County," Jacobson wrote in a 28-page order. "Defendant has met his burden of showing there is a reasonable probability that he cannot get a fair trial in Alameda County." A hearing at a later date will decide where, exactly, the trial will take place.

Eric Fisher has a great batch of old timey maps and hypothetical San Franciscos. Take, for example, the above GE ad, which shows what BART could've been like if people didn't, well, suck. ("Um, yeah, technically, Brock, the reason why BART was never able to..." Whatever, we're blaming people. Hrumph.)

Though small bits of blood on the ground are not a rare sight in the Civic Center/Tenderloin environs, we felt we should mention a not-insignificant amount of spilled plasma being mopped up at Civic Center BART station last evening (9/29) around 7:40 p.m. Whatever incident had occurred (we have a call in to the SFPD), it was over and what was left was a lot of blood droplets ranging from one end of the platform all the way to the other end, with a small pool next to one of the round benches, and several officers manning the exits. It appeared that whoever was bleeding, it was from a decent-sized wound and they had wandered the length of the platform and back before seeking help or being carted away. BART police have no information on the incident, and though we think there were at least a couple SFPD officers on the scene, we were too busy side-stepping blood droplets and getting on our train to deal with being proper journalists or taking photos. We'll let you know if anyone calls us back, and do tell us if you have any better info.

"A Shared Laugh" by blarfiejandro.

We've always wondered whether BART was as likely a terror target as the New York City subway system, and always suspected that no, it isn't. But you may have noticed some stepped up security patrols on trains, complete with bomb sniffing dogs, the likes of which we haven't seen since around October/November 2001.

This just in via the trusty funcheapSF.com: From 6 to 9 a.m. on Friday morning, BART riders will receive FREE Ghirardelli Luxe Milk Almond Chocolates and coupon cards at the following stations: Downtown Berkeley, Oakland City Center/12th Street, Embarcadero, Montgomery Street, Powell Street and Civic Center. The giveaway is valued at an estimated $1 million. (We assume Ghirardelli is footing the bill?) The sugar boost might make the extra crowded train ride just a little more bearable.

The father of Oscar Grant III, Oscar Grant II, is suing the transit agency that he thinks is responsible for his son's death. According to CBS 5/AP, "Oscar Grant Jr., who is in prison for murder, filed the civil rights lawsuit in San Francisco federal court, seeking unspecified damages." His attorney says that he"hopes people look past his client's murder conviction to understand there was a close relationship between father and son." Which is oddly touching. And depressing. Anyway, BART Officer Johannes Mehserle, if you recall, sits in the clink, facing murder charges for killing Grant on New Year's Day.

The possibility of a BART strike has most likely been eliminated, as 80 percent of the members of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 have voted in favor of BART's tentative agreement, which the other two unions had already approved two weeks ago. The new contract keeps wages intact and limits layoffs, but it gives management more authority over employee assignments, which will hopefully reduce the need for overtime. The union members will also have to pay more for premium health benefits. In later years, employees might be eligible for raises if there is savings in retirement benefits. ATU Local 1555 President Jesse Hunt said, ""We have accepted the cuts and sacrifices asked of us for the next four years, which were greater than those asked of any other employees, union or nonunion." The tentative agreement must now be ratified by the BART Board of Directors.

In a move that screams "BART slumber party, everybody!," the Bay Area Rapid Transit system will be open for business all night during the Labor Day Weekend, during most of the time the Bay Bridge closes down.

Most of you should recall the name of Oscar Grant, who was shot late on New Year's Eve at the Fruitvale BART station by a certain BART cop named Johannes Mehserle. Said shooting led to much outrage, protest, and rioting over there in the East Bay. Well, as of today a new independent report has been released to the public detailing all the non-confidential (read: boring) procedural items that have been under investigation regarding BART cops and their tactics and procedures. SF Appeal has some bullet points. Suffice it to say their tactics and procedures were bad, and no one will be carrying their Tasers next to their handguns anymore.

On Sunday, if you recall, there was no BART strike, a surprise twist that all but crippled Bay Area media. The unanimous (and somewhat iffy) angle on the strike aversion was that you, the public, thwarted the strike with looming fears of violent strike outrage.

UPDATE: BART announced at 7 p.m. today that they have come to a temporary agreement with the Amalgamated Transit Union, and tomorrow's strike has been canceled. The following terms will remain in effect until a new contract agreement is reached:

We're chagrined for downplaying this BART strike business earlier this week, but there's just been so many strike threats at this point (going back to mid-June) it's hard not to feel like the union's bluffing just a little bit. The update, as it stands, is that BART is ready to go back to the bargaining table with the Amalgamated Transit Union any time between now and Sunday; Mayor Newsom and Mayor Dellums have both issued statements encouraging negotiations to continue and expressing concern for Bay Area businesses; every local news station is going batshit interviewing commuters and predicting traffic Armageddon.

Remember the BART strike of September 1997? Which lasted an entire week? Turning into a nightmare. Well, what with BART officially announcing a strike, you should get ready for more of the same come Sunday night.

The looming BART strike, which has been a verbal threat every since union negotiations crumbled, might be a distinct possibility. More of a distinct possibility, that is, than we thought earlier. This afternoon, the BART board voted to implement "terms and conditions," which means they basically forced a contract on the Amalgamated Transit Union. But just this morning, Jessee Hunt, the head of the union (a union filled with BART train operators), had said if the board decided to force a contract, then they would strike. So, while an official announcement has not been made, they're having a press conference at 4 p.m. today. Also. although the other unions agreed to the contract, they can't picket; but they won't cross the picket lines, so... no one will go to work. And the strike will cripple Bay Area transportation as you know it. A 72-hour warning will go into effect, which could mean--at last--a BART strike would rain down on Monday. (Gulp.)

We don't know if this is just a lot of grandstanding by the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 -- the sole holdout union who rejected BART's latest contract offer -- but in what suffices for drama in these things, negotiations "broke down" again yesterday, as SF Appeal is reporting. We know, you're already yawning, but bear with us: BART is holding firm about eliminating wasteful work rules and losing a total of five station agent positions through attrition--not layoffs--and they've put some floating holidays back on the table. The union is saying fuck off. Perhaps we would be more invested in this story if we were a transbay commuter, but all we can say right now is... suckaz! No really, there probably won't be a strike... or there probably will be. Flip a coin.

SF Appeal reports that Muni will be replacing all existing fare gates at its underground Metro stations with TransLink-only fare gates (PDF) by fall of 2010, and it's possible Fast Passes will only be available electronically as well.

So, um, this strike thing still looms. Or does it? Wake us when it's over.

Due to Caltrans closing the Bay Bridge in both directions over the upcoming Labor Day weekend for earthquake retrofitting, BART will be running hourly overnight service to 14 stations during the wee hours of Friday, September 4 through the early morning hours of Labor Day on Monday, September 7. Participating San Francisco stations will be the 24th Street Mission, Embarcadero, and Powell Street stations, as well as the San Francisco International Airport station. We've never experienced a late-night holiday BART ride but can imagine they'd be pretty rowdy, not to mention the tragic Oscar Grant shooting that occurred this past New Year's Eve. Stay safe and keep your wits about you, BART passengers. [Via Eyes on Blogs, SFBART]

After teasing us over and over and over with a strike that promised to cripple public transportation and the lives of many, BART and union leaders came to a contract agreement, tentatively. According to first-on-the-scene SFAppeal, "management and union leaders this morning announced a tentative agreement on a four-year contract. The announcement was made late this morning in Oakland by BART General Manager Dorothy Dugger, Services Employees International Union President Lisa Isler, and Amalgamated Transit Union President Jesse Hunt." After the sort-of agreement was reached, Duggar, according to SF Chron, "said the agreement was the result of 'sacrifice and compromise' and would allow BART to continue operations under 'stable financial footing.'"

Believe us when we say we are just as sick as you are of this story/non-story that won't goddamn go away, but ONCE AGAIN, this weekend, there looms the threat of a BART strike, or maybe there doesn't. It would appear, since the threat has come and gone about nine times now, that all concerned are committed to negotiating this thing through and that ONCE AGAIN this will be an empty threat. But BART employees remain pissed off about a new contract that would curtail their overtime -- something that cost BART about $30 million last year -- and now that their contract has expired, workers have nothing stopping them from a walkout. So watch out everyone (especially those with homes or obligations in the East Bay)! It could be for real this time. Or not.

Yesterday, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission voted 10 to 3 to approve $140 million to help pay for the long awaited automated people mover between the Oakland Coliseum BART station and Oakland International Airport. And by long awaited, this writers means he was like a sperm when the idea was first raised back during the misty beginnings of time and space. The entire project is anticipated to cost approximately $522 million and should be completed by 2013.

According to CBS 5, "BART trains are stopped between Castro Valley and Pleasanton after a train hit a construction worker at the new West Dublin station." The incident happened a little after 3 p.m. Anticipate delayed schedule times today. Update: According to KTVU, "A BART construction worker was injured Thursday afternoon when at BART train struck the cherry-picker basket he was working from at the building site for the new Dublin/West Pleasanton station." The unidentified man is sill alive. No word yet as to the seriousness of his injuries. Also, the CBS 5 chopper is live at the scene. Service to Dublin Pleasanton has been restored.