...and why do BART employees totally ignore it?

Every day when I am using BART I see people walking in and out of the emergency exit gates for BART who are CLEARLY not BART employees. Is it racist of me to point out that every single time I see someone do this they are Black?

It is so easy to get into BART that I have even seen some of them sneak into BART in Downtown SF and then scale the fences and squeeze between the gaps so they can get into MUNI for free since it is harder to sneak into MUNI.

Here's an article from SFist about the DC Metro and how it compares to BART

DOES ANYONE ONE KNOW WHAT'S HAPPENING WITH JOHANNES MESHERLE OR HEARD ANY NEWS ON HIM LATELY?, I AIN'T HEARD NOTHING ABOUT HIM OR HIS TRIALS EITHER.

I was just thinking that a flash-mob-ish sort of thing on BART would be fun when I ran across:

No Pants! Subway Ride 2011 : San Francisco bay area BART/Muni
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=156182521089838

Anyone here gonna go?

Thanks to some excellent work by the Berkeley Police, the person who's been committing the armed robberies in North Berkeley has been caught and charged with the crimes.

See http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_16874278 for details.

Apparently, while they were at it, the Berkeley PD also arrested 8 other people for various crimes. Apparently more details will be forthcoming in the next several days. They're being a bit vague about things because some of the investigations are still in process.

Bravo!

Just saw the post at http://sfbart.posterous.com/public-meeting-dec-15-on-hayward-yard-initial , and it brought to mind the second post I ever made here. Anyone know if this expansion of the Hayward Yard will finally use that ramp? It's a bit unclear in the pictures posted on the SFBART blog.

(Just curious.)

For any of you who are users of the North Berkeley BART station, there has been a recent rash of armed robberies of pedestrians and break-ins to cars on the street in the neighborhood surrounding the station.

The armed robberies have been happening at gunpoint every few days since late October, and have been occurring both during the day and after dark. The text of the flyer being distributed in the neighborhood is below, and the full flyer is attached.

Please spread the word, and be careful out there!

NEIGHBORHOOD SAFETY ALERT

Yesterday, Monday I got on the 6.40am something train out of Pittsburg, last car as usual and the seats were so bad, dirty that I had to take a picture. While the seat cushion appeared to have newer covers, the backs were actually black and discolored so badly, people turned and left the coach. Did anyone see Sundays Amazing Race on CBS TV, they show trains all the time that contestants travel on, Sunday was in Korea, and except for India one trip, I have never seen anything as disgustingly dirty as our transit system.

Could somebody please tell me why there are so many delays due to "equipment problems?"

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/transportation/detail?entry_id=76657

to summarize, you can buy a bunch of $2 clipper cards and get cheap rides. use $2 ticket to enter the station, take an $8 ride, and the same card will still allow you to exit (the card allows a $10 negative balance). throw the card away and use another $2 card for your next trip. yikes.

They have got worse over the last three years, but this last week takes the cake. On Tuesday I came out of Pittsburg and had to walk through three cars until I found a seat that I could sit in without feeling bugs would eat me, they were so dirty and stained that you could no longer distinguish between the floor and a seat. Then last night in the first car headed back to pittsburg the smell was just overpowering it was so bad, I threw my clothes in the garage to go to the dry cleaners.

was the Market Street subway for BART today? Because when I was coming home from the Giants victory parade, my train had to wait at Montgomery for quite a while before heading to Powell where it waited for longer than usual as well. I also noticed that BART was shooting two trains to MacArthur, one to Bay Fair, and several to 24th street.

Civic Center was all dressed up for the game. There was a huge group of people watching the game on the lawn of City Hall when I left. I snapped a picture of the closed info booth that one of the employees decorated:

Giant Info Booth

Thought I would take BART into work this morning. Show up at Walnut Creek at 7:50 a.m.; station closed. Station opens at 8:00 a.m., first train at 8:16 which arrives late. Should have drove to Orinda because there is one leaving Orinda at 8:05 a.m.

I got an email recently stating that I HAVE to get a Clipper Card and that EZRider won't pay for rides soon. And oh by the way, I can't use Clipper for Parking so I have to carry the EZRider card anyway. What kind of dumbass thought this scheme up? Now I have to carry and maintain 2 cards??