Dear {{ first name | reader }},

It has been a few months since my last newsletter, so there’s a lot to share in this update. Grab your cup of coffee and catch up with me. 

Please feel free to email me any questions you have, and follow me on Instagram to get more frequent updates!

Many of you know that BART is facing a budget deficit starting the next fiscal year and continuing forward year after year. Just this year alone, we had a $35 million dollar deficit that we cut down through belt-tightening, such as a strategic hiring freeze and keeping the shorter trains to keep electric costs low.

Since the pandemic, the San Francisco Bay Area has seen some of the highest work-from-home adoption. BART’s operating budget used to be 71% funded through fares, which mostly came from commuters. With those commuters coming into the office at a significantly smaller frequency, this means we have lost a large share of revenue. We are currently seeing an average of 40-50% of pre-pandemic ridership during the weekdays. 

The result is that beginning in the next fiscal year, we will face an operations revenue shortfall of about 350 - 400 million dollars per year. BART isn’t alone. To prevent the collapse of regional transit operators, Senators Wiener and Arreguín authored Senate Bill 63 to allow certain counties to place a sales tax measure on the ballot in November 2026. In its final form, the measure would last for 14 years, with five counties opting in, and creating a new oversight mechanism to ensure transit agencies are providing higher-quality service.

SB-63 is heading to the Governor for a signature.

You may have also seen a couple of news articles about the state loan, which didn’t get finalized in time. This last-minute news had many of us scrambling to get word to the Governor and organize an emergency rally in San Francisco. Stakeholders from across the Bay Area reached out over the weekend of September 6th, when the news broke. By the beginning of the week, Governor Newsom had directed staff at the State Department of Finance to finalize the terms of the loan within the next few months. BART staff have told me they believe the current deadline should give us enough room to receive the loan and not run out of money while we wait for the regional measure. 

This year has been filled with a few major disruptions that are completely unacceptable. Most recently on August 29th at 5:13 PM a Dublin Bound train reported smoke and flames. Two minutes after the report, the Transbay Tunnel ventilation system activated. At 5:17 PM an Antioch Bound train, which entered the tunnel before the report of smoke and flames, also reported smoke and stopped in the tunnel due to activation of the emergency door handle. 

A blown insulator appears to be the cause of the fire and smoke however BART staff is still analyzing the insulator to understand what caused the failure.

During our questioning, my colleagues and I asked staff about the procedures in place to communicate with riders. I specifically asked how often train car speakers are inspected to ensure their quality allows riders to hear announcements and if we could use the screens to share information with riders. Staff will follow up on an inspection of the speakers and will take a look at the procedures and frequency of emergency training for employees.

The second disruption occurred on Friday, September 5th, from approximately 3:15 AM to 11:45 AM. BART staff and our vendors were upgrading a train switch as part of our train operations network update. In May, we had a similar issue. Staff took that experience and did a lot of work to ensure a smooth transition to the new system by laying out infrastructure ahead of time. Unfortunately, this did not prevent the network issues. This resulted in the system being inoperable until 9:30 AM for the East Bay and the late morning for the rest of the system. This negatively impacted thousands of riders and the board of directors made it very clear it was unacceptable..

With many more switches at stations needing the upgrade, staff has committed to doing these upgrades on the weekend mornings and isolating the station to maintain service everywhere else. This will ensure that few riders are impacted. 

To review the staff presentation on the disruption, you can view it HERE. To watch my questions and comments, as well as the entire meeting, you can use the following YouTube video.

All of the materials for that board meeting are also available on BART’s Granicus site.

One of the biggest things we did at BART, that you probably didn’t hear about, was vote on the second Transbay Crossing (tunnel). We decided to select Standard Gauge technology rather than BART’s Broad Gauge for this crossing. The gauge is the type or train track. Standard Gauge is widely used all over the world; it’s what Amtrak and almost every other train system use. BART decided to use a broad gauge during its design because it expected its trains to be lighter than others and would need additional stability during high wind events. 

By choosing Standard Gauge, it will allow High Speed rail to connect from San Francisco to Sacramento. The State will also help fund the project. If we had gone with BART’s gauge, we would have to fund the project by ourselves, thus making the project next to impossible.

This project is still far from being close to shovel-ready, but it is a major step for a project that will transform the mega-region’s transportation network. You can watch the board meeting on this topic on Granicus.

In the News!

The past few weeks have been busy for me in the news. Below is an interview with East Bay Insiders TV and a profile from the SF Chronicle.