Comments on: Downtown SF Stations: Frustratingly Amateur

By: Angry San Franciscan

Angry San Franciscan — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 18:18:18 +0000

Every time I have to take MUNI I just hake my head in disbelief at the amateur hour on display in the joint Muni – Bart stations. Then worse I have a sense of embarrassment as my wife (who is from Spain and where I spent 6 years) points out another area where Europe is miles ahead of us. I mean everywhere else we have machines for dispensing a ticket that excepts bills. And as Americans the country that relies on credit cards more than anywhere in the world, why on earth can’t I use my credit card? This change ritual would have been archaic even 20 years ago. While the rest of the world has credit cards machines, infra red pass readers, etc. we are still fumbling with quarter and token machines. The only possible reason I can imagine for this crappy system is probably due to the Unions. Screwing the public over so a few overweight, bad attitude, with zero customer service or language skills can sit on a stole all day and be zero help. I really feel sorry for someone like a tourist who doesn’t speak English fluently, because trying to figure this system out would be impossible.

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 28 May 2008 04:48:59 +0000

Zig:

Geary BRT east of Van Ness won’t be the real deal, but more of an enhancement variety. There really should be a subway tunnel here, but:

The cost per new rider metric does favor the sort of exurban BART extensions we’ve been getting. But sooner or later, no matter what the politics are, we will reach maximum throughput for the Transbay Tube. We’ll need a second tube, and that will give us a new urban line. One alternative MTC has mentioned that I don’t especially care for runs from the Transbay Transit Center along Folsom, Van Ness, and Lombard to the Presidio. A slightly better version provides relief to the Geary corridor west of Van Ness, but still skips over the Tenderloin through a SoMa detour, so that the new line can “connect” to the existing line at a joint Civic Center/Van Ness station. Of course, this would all be extremely long-term.

By: Gopal

Gopal — Tue, 27 May 2008 16:32:17 +0000

I ride MUNI every day. The downtown stations should be improved drastically.

By: Zig

Zig — Sun, 25 May 2008 00:28:31 +0000

Politically has BART ever shown any interest in becoming more of an urban subway and expanding in urban areas?

It seems the way the system is structured politically this is virtually impossible. For the next 30 years we might see some weak attempts at ineffectual TOD (which is a slight improvement on the past) at new suburban stations and these new ridiculous EBart ideas coming to fruition but certainly nothing in Oakland or SF.

It seems it would take some serious vision on the part on SF leaders and higher sales taxes for SF residents for there ever to be more BART in SF. Even if there was the will it seems this would step on the toes of entrenched SF agency turf.
Central subway is going to be slow as hell. I am not very hopeful about BRT on Geary running in traffic EAST of Van Ness. With all of this new development something is going to have to give here eventually. The J-church line I ride is beyond terrible.

By: Jamison

Jamison — Sat, 17 May 2008 19:38:43 +0000

Phil & Ziggy,

Early designs for BART had the transbay line we know today, but the upper level was originally to be a local BART line running through the Twin Peaks Tunnel to St. Francis Circle and would have completely replaced Muni streetcar service. Further out, the streetcar lines like the L-Taraval would have been replaced with connecting bus service to BART. The plan evolved into what we know as Muni Metro today which is why BART owns West Portal, Castro, Church and Van Ness stations even though it doesn’t run through them.

By: PhilSironi

PhilSironi — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:20:43 +0000

Bart breaks down too sometime. I was on it yesterday when it did… but the Muni Metro has problems ALL THE TIME. Wasn’t the Muni Metro Market Street subway originally built for BART?

By: AlexJB

AlexJB — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:03:07 +0000

“The muni subway is a complete disgrace. We should just abandon it and give it over to BART. BART knows how to run a transit system. All of their trains are always on time and they never have missed runs.”

sorry, but that just makes me laugh. the BART system has its own wide set of problems, thanks very much… yesterday, because of some “weather-related problems” (high temperatures, presumably), they had system-wide 20 minute delays. and i had the joy, on my approximately once-monthly BART ride, of being on car for 30 minutes with no A/C and about 75 people. i think i sweat about 5 lbs off.

MUNI is still foobar’d, IMHO, but BART aint no magic wand…

By: david vartanoff

david vartanoff — Thu, 15 May 2008 21:30:43 +0000

In the joint stations,the fact that when BAR(ancid)T put in the newer TVMs they were allowed to ignore selling Muni fares is criminal.

By: Doug Cress

Doug Cress — Thu, 15 May 2008 13:19:57 +0000

I was confused just reading your post.

By: Ziggy Tomcich

Ziggy Tomcich — Thu, 15 May 2008 07:29:08 +0000

The muni subway is a complete disgrace. We should just abandon it and give it over to BART. BART knows how to run a transit system. All of their trains are always on time and they never have missed runs. I’d gladly pay more for BART running the MUNI subway trains. How did this mess ever happen? How is it that voters of the past ever thought that having two competing subway systems was a good idea? Muni has zero competence. They’ve proven to us time and time again that they don’t care at all about the service they’re supposed to provide. Why are we putting up with this? Let’s just give it over to BART and be done with it. Let’s get serious about our transit system.