BART BUILDING BRIDGES TO BUSINESS COMMUNITY

Taking the initiative to forge a stronger partnership with business leaders, BART General Manager Grace Crunican and Board members Tom Radulovich and Zachary Mallett this week met with a sold-out crowd at the Bay Area Council to discuss the future of BART and what it means for business stakeholders.

Record ridership combined with aged equipment is creating serious challenges for BART, its riders, and the businesses who rely upon its service.  Three major systemwide projects are critical to sustaining and improving BART’s reliability while also expanding capacity: new train cars, a new train control system, and a new maintenance facility.  Director Radulovich also described several improvements that are targeted to address challenges that are particular to downtown San Francisco stations, including updating escalators and excavating and constructing new side-platforms to expand capacity at Embarcadero and Montgomery stations.

While major projects such as these take years to fund and deliver, BART is also taking immediate steps to improve station cleanliness and security.  For a glimpse of the new rail cars that will begin to arrive in 2017, a full-size mockup will be on display at various locations in the Bay Area during April.