From Shootings To A Derailed Train, BART Had An Eventful Week

BART is a part of life in the Bay Area, and what happens on BART is indicative of what happens in the cities that BART serves. Bay Area Rapid Transit is a microcosm of Bay Area life. Whether you love it or hate it, BART is here to stay. And just like the rest the country, BART has been going through some things and we should talk about them.

Is BART equipped to deal with Climate Change?

While the Bay Area and most all of Northern California scorched under an unusually hot heat wave, BART tracks in the East Bay’s inland valley reached temperatures of over 140 degrees, leading to a BART car derailing on the tracks between the Pleasant Hill and Concord stations.

This isn’t the first time BART has had heat-related issues and as climate change continues to bring record breaking temperatures to the region, BART is likely going to have to respond in a way that would make the trains less vulnerable high temps.

People are riding BART again, so people are getting shot on BART again.

One of the unfortunate facts of life in America are shootings. Not a day goes where there isn’t a news story of someone getting shot within a 10-mile-radius of where you live. Even with the horrific normalcy in which shootings occur, public transit in the Bay Area is having tough week. To be fair to BART, one of the shootings took place on MUNI, but that’s irrelevant to people who just want to feel safe while commuting in the Bay Area on public transportation.

COVID’s not over, passengers are back, is BART safe?

While many of us want to pretend that the pandemic is behind us, sadly, it is not. People are still getting sick, and people are still dying despite COVID feeling like old news to many. BART numbers are up and people are going to want to travel around the Bay. The Warriors Parade and SF Pride brought ridership to the highest levels they’ve been at since before the pandemic. Is that going to lead to a COVID-19 going to surge as a result?

Arcade games are coming to Powell St. Station.

BART is 50 years old and as a way to celebrating, the transit agency has decided to bring back arcade games to the station. 

This is kind of cool because apparently back in the day, you could play arcade games are certain BART stations and I can’t think of a better way than to forget all about the shootings, COVID risk and heat derailments than a nice game of Frogger.

Doctors are suing BART because of something related to Elon Musk.

A group of doctors are suing BART because “the agency has run afoul of the First Amendment by rejecting ads blasting Elon Musk for covering up invasive and deadly experiments on monkeys conducted by his company Neuralink. The Physicians Committee’s rejected ad reads: “Elon Musk: Release the videos! What are you hiding? StopMonkeyExperiments.org.” BART refused to run the ad unless the doctors’ group replaced Musk’s name with his company’s name. The Physicians Committee is suing, alleging that this is an unconstitutional act of viewpoint discrimination under the First Amendment..”

I’m currently working on my second book, and in my second book, I write a lot of cyberpunk dystopian stories. But as life in the Bay Area continues to get progressively more bizarre, they feel more like contemporary critiques life here. Elon Musk abusing monkeys with chips meant to be injected into human brains is a real ass thing. So real that BART is getting sued for not standing up against it adequately enough for a group of doctors…

This literally sounds like a fucking sci fi novels.

BART has indeed had one hell of a week…

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